On Jan 1, 2008, at 12:28 PM, catch wrote:
Well I missed the initial discussion with this, but agree profile is likely to be confusing. However, I'm not convinced it's too late to change how it's presented.
I, too, was sounding the alarm on this one months ago... :( The main problem is that the core installer looks for a "profiles" directory in your drupal directory tree. This has been true since D5, and isn't going to change now in D6, either. True, once everything is packaged automagically by d.o into full blown "distributions" (or whatever we call them), we can partly hide this fact from end users. The tarball you download that includes core, the contribs you need, and the install profile, can all be called a "distribution", and it can quietly put the .profile file in the right subdirectory of your "profiles" directory. However, I think Drupal is notorious for changing its mind about terminology, and leaving things in an inconsistent, confusing state ("categories" vs. "taxonomy" rehashed, anyone?). Sure, we can *attempt* to hide some of the ugly details in the name of "our users don't need to know", but that often results in more confusion, not less. :( So long as the installer is looking in your "profiles" directory, for files that end in ".profile", I think the "installation profile" terminology is going to have to stay, as much as that sucks. -Derek (dww)