[xwiki-dev] .xar Extension NOT Used Properly

[jeremi joslin]

Hi,

On 2/3/07, Vincent Massol <vincent at massol.net> wrote:
> Hi Jeremi,
>
> I'm +1 on my side but as you voted -1 we'll need to convince you to
> change your vote ;-) Let me give it a try below...
>
> On Feb 3, 2007, at 9:41 AM, jeremi joslin wrote:
>
> > Hi,
> >
> > -1
> >
> > I'm not for changing to jar. it's not a Java archive, it's an XWiki
> > Archive. I don't see the point to change. People will think it's
> > javacode.
>
> * JAR is an archive format. It can be used for lots of different
> things. There are even software that use JARs for their installation.
yes, but a JAR in java term is a zip. There is also JAR compression
method. so if you go this way, it's the same problem.

> * I really believe that in the future our applications will not be
> made only of XML files but will also contain other libraries (jar
> files) and java classes. For example imagine the IRC bot application.
> There are some xwiki pages but we also need the picoirc jar. We'll
> need to bundle all that together.
And what's wrong with putting a jar inside a xar? even if we use a
jar, it will only be readable by XWiki.


> * XWiki is a Java application so all users are familiar with the JAR
> format.
But it's not a normal jar. That will lead to misunderstanding.

>
> Of course we can use the XAR format for that. XAR looks nice because
> there's XWiki inside but there's a cost of inventing a new archive
> format:
> * It needs to be described
> * There needs to be tools for it (or people need to rename it to
> zip...). BTW if it's a zip we might as well name it zip... The
> problem with Zip is that it does not support meta data information
> such as the jar format does. And we need these... And there are APIs
> to get these metadata so we don't have to reimplement all the code
> (as we've done for the package.xml file).
> * It makes it difficult for the build (this is the same argument as
> above with tools) as all the existing plugins do not understand the
> XAR format so we have to reinvent all the tools... This is why I had
> to implement the xar handler and the xar plugin in our repository. It
> would make it much easier if it were an existing format such as JAR.

Why not renaming the xar to the zip. it's just that people don't need
to know what is inside, but if they want they can.

I dont see the point, we are using an API for reading and writing the
metadata: XML. We will also need to reimplement the writing of
metadata in the manifest file.

So it's already done isn't it?



>
> I think it would be much better to use an existing format (which we
> do except we're using Zip instead of JAR), already documented rather
> than invent a new one. There's no point in us hiding the underlying
> format we use by changing the extension. We might as well use that
> format's extension...
Ok, rename it to zip if you prefer, that's only a problem the
extension to be xar  for openning it under windows. But i prefer
people to think it's a file where they have all there pages, and don't
need to read what is inside. But if they want, they can.


>
> > if you look at this page :
> > http://filext.com/detaillist.php?extdetail=XAR there is some other
> > software who are using this extension. So why XWiki can't use it?
>
> Some people have thrown nuclear bombs in the past. Is that a good
> reason for others to do it? Probably not.
>
> It's not because people are doing bad things that we have to follow
> them ;-)
>
So why changing to the jar format? ;-)
And even the xar format is not so used. I ask to my friends, no one
know it. Did you know it before? I thing changing to the jar format
will bring more misunderstanding.

jeremi



-- 
Jeremi Joslin (http://www.jeremi.info)
skype: jeremi23 - jabber: jeremi23 at gmail.com
http://www.xwiki.com - http://www.pengyou-project.info