[drupal-devel] settings inconsistencies

[Carl McDade]

Bèr Kessels wrote:

>Op donderdag 3 februari 2005 11:51, schreef Carl McDade:
>> This paradigm is not condusive to bloat or anarchy in that the true 
>core
>> [...]
>> adjustments and increasing its size with extensions.
>
>The success of the various unices (linux at the top) lies in the fact 
>that 
>small progams (anloge: modules) do one thing, but do it well. 
>Instead of that windows-environment where you need yet another Freeware 
>app to 
>do yet another task only to find out it does neraly the same as foobar, 
>with 
>that minor difference. I.e: there is not one single CD burner 
>application for 
>windows that does its job good and nothing more. you will find loads of 
>apps 
>that allow you rto rip, collect, and even play music. 
>So why should we need:
>burner.module
>burner-with-ripper.module
>burner-withplayer.module
>burner-with-oggplayer.module 
>
>when the best solution is to have burner.module, ripper.module, 
>player.module 
>ogg.module. And to make them work together?
>
>
>Regards,
> Bèr
>  
>
That solution is fine as long as the core is player.module and burner
and ripper and ogg. There would be problems though if someone wanted to
extend player module in a manner that does not actually add function but
in reality changes player.module to something other than its original
capabilities.

ie the original:

    player.module (wmv,mpeg,asf) /burner /ripper /ogg

In the present state of thingswith a closed system core, needing to add
Mpeg2 functionality would be:

    player.module (wmv,mpeg,asf) /burner /ripper /ogg ->
newplayer.module (mpeg2) /burner /ripper /ogg
    or
    player.module ( /burner /ripper /ogg)  wmv,mpeg,asf ->
newplayer.module (mpeg2)

So you can see where the module bloat is coming from. Inorder to use any
of the players two modules have to be loaded everytime because of their
interdependacy. The module rather than being upgraded by the new
functionality becomes interdependant. The solution to this would of
course be to redo the core module so that it is open to all formats and
does not provide its own core format. this way would set only one  :

player.module ( /burner /ripper /ogg)  -> newplayer.module (wmv,mpeg,asf
,mpeg2)
or
player.module ( /burner /ripper /ogg) 
                                                        ->
newplayer.module (wmv,mpeg)
                                                        ->
newplayer.module (asf ,mpeg2)

This is of course is a large task and smacks of OOP.  So a good end
solution would be to  remove player .module from it's "core" status and
set it to "plugin" status this would allow it to  be changed to:

    player.module (wmv,mpeg,asf,mpeg2) /burner /ripper /ogg

Which would reduce the load on the core and give more flexibility to the
module. The decision to make the  player.module part of the core was not
a good one. The player.module should have been a fully seperate module
to begin with. This goes back to my previous statement that "many" of
the modules should not be extended but made replacable. This does not
apply to every module and there should be a set criteria for "core" and
"plugin".

I hope this is confusing enough to understand ;)



-- 
Carl McDade
Information Technology Consult
www.carlmcdade.com
carlmcdade at gmail.com

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