[development] Overloaded "profiles" terminology (was: Getting both better internal and external APIs into Drupal 7)

[Derek Wright]

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)