If you are concerned about cleaning up unused variables, this simple patch for cleaning up unused node-type variables should also be added to the mix: http://drupal.org/node/104572 -Peter ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: "Greg Knaddison - GVS" <Greg@GrowingVentureSolutions.com> To: development@drupal.org, "Mohammed Sameer" <msameer@foolab.org> Date: Thu, 3 May 2007 12:55:58 -0600 Subject: Re: [development] low hanging fruit for Drupal 6: variable defaults On 5/3/07, Mohammed Sameer <msameer@foolab.org> wrote:

If we have it as a hook then we don't really need to clean them up in hook_uninstall() because drupal can invoke the variables defaults hook, get the list of variables and simply delete them from the "registry". We now only have one problem. hook uninstall runs when the module is unloaded but then, we can implement the extra hook in the .install file ?

Hope I'm not talking nonsense ;-)

I think it makes at least some sense. My experience from looking at hook_uninstall solutions is that lots of variables get left around. The proposed hook_settings() would create some basic variables. It would probably not know about _all_ of the variables that the module may create. Many variable names are based on variables: e.g. modulename_contenttype_something. My solution for that has been to delete all rows from variable table that start with modulename_ I think if you try to delete specific variables I think you'll end up leaving lots of unused keys around. The realm idea would help a lot with the cleanup, but is not "low hanging fruit" IMO. Greg