29 Jun
2010
29 Jun
'10
1:29 p.m.
Thomas Mortagne wrote:
Except that, as I said, it is impossible with the design you are proposing...
Please explain why that is, I see no problem with taking a List as a relative Reference
and completing it using
the document in the context. The biggest challenge I see is signaling what the
"current node" is since each
reference is a node as well as a list containing that node and I'm sure there is a way
to sneak that information
out through a method in the list interface. A hack it would be but I don't see that it
would have any major user
affecting consequences as would some other ideas.
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On Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 12:32, Caleb James DeLisle
<calebdelisle(a)lavabit.com> wrote:
So you advocate for adding API which is not explicit in the code, not listed in javadoc,
and might create a
collision that is undetected on compile? That sounds to me like a hack.
Thomas Mortagne wrote:
Note that you forget one feature of Velocity: we can implements an
uberspector that automatically convert give list to the corresponding
EntityReference.
So you would only have
getDocument(DocumentReference) in the api
but if someone calls getDocument(["Main", "WebHome"]); the
uberspector
will see that there is not direct match but there is a EntityReference
based one so it will convert the List and calls
getDocument(DocumentReference) On Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 11:42, Caleb James
DeLisle
<calebdelisle(a)lavabit.com> wrote:
Then we will have
getDocument(Reference)
getDocument(String)
getDocument(List)
not to mention rename, copyDocument etc.
If we must add new methods because we can't make references easy to create then I
think sooner or later we are
going to have to change direction. I believe that in order for a new api to be
accepted by the community, it must be more useful and/or easier to use
than the api which it replaces.
The old way of getting a document was this:
$xwiki.getDocument("xwiki:Main.WebHome")
The current way to get a document is this:
$xwiki.getDocument($services.model.createDocumentReference($context.wiki, $space,
"WebHome"))
I am quite sure that the user community will choose the former even if it has escaping
issues.
Lest one think we can bully the community into choosing the latter by deprecation or
removal of methods, recall
the dismal sales of Windows Vista even with the control afforded by the proprietary
license and the awesome power
Microsoft wields over the market. The user is the boss, their word is law.
My first proposal is that we move to an easier way to handle document names.
My second proposal is a possible way to do it.
I would like velocity and groovy script authors to be able to give a command like this:
xwiki.getDocument(["Main", "WebHome"]);
or in velocity
$xwiki.getDocument(["Main", "WebHome"])
To make that possible I am proposing we change the reference model as follows:
EntityReference extends List<String>
Each reference has a name which is expressed as a string, it also has a reference to the
next node and the last
node. This is a classic example of a LinkedList. The point is that any List<String>
is a valid (although reletive)
reference. When a relative reference is passed, it is replaced with a complete reference
which is completed using
the document in the context.
As you prepare your -1's please recognize that the community will never go for the
current model and almost
anything is better than a rift between the community and the development team. If there
are any other ideas of
how to make it that easy, I would be glad to hear them.
I don't see why making
public script API to get a document easier
imply to change EntityReferences. You can always have this
xwiki.getDocument(["Main", "WebHome"]); without touching
EntityReferences design, you just create a reference from this list in
the getDocument implementation.
Groovy does not needs a service to create a document reference so it's
not an issue for it IMO
So in groovy/python/ruby/etc. users will not be able to get documents or will they be
given the choice
of the buggy method and the one nobody is likely to adopt?
Problem
with your proposal is that it will introduce several
limitations since you have only strings: You have no idea what is
what in this String list you can only rely on the index of the string
in the list.
- the current EntityReferences is that way because we wanted to make
possible to have a reference with just the wiki and the page and give
it to a resolver to get a full reference
- how do you support multiple spaces since you can't know which of
theses strings are spaces ?
The algorithm would work like this. If the current
document is:
xwiki:one.two.three.space.doc
and you reference ["xwiki", "Main", "WebHome"]
it would count back 3 from the current document location and you would get
xwiki:one.two.xwiki.Main.WebHome
To make an explicit reference you could pass an entity which is illegal such as:
[0, "xwiki", "Main", "WebHome"]
or
[$xwiki, "xwiki", "Main", "WebHome"]
Since nested spaces are not implemented I don't see why we need to worry too much
about
how easy it is to work around them as long as we know it won't be impossible to
implement
when the time comes. Caleb
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