19 Jun
2012
19 Jun
'12
10:22 a.m.
I think one way of seeing things is that a war is not only a collection of
jars which are easily (un)installable/upgradable with the EM. If we don`t
do this, we have no way of updating the velocity templates for example, or
the filesystem skin, or js resources, etc. Each distribuion could have its
own customization of these things that it might like to upgrade.
Without what Thomas is proposing, from what I can tell, we can only upgrade
jars and wiki pages.
+1
Thanks,
Eduard
On Mon, Jun 18, 2012 at 12:31 PM, Thomas Mortagne <thomas.mortagne(a)xwiki.com
wrote:
> On Sat, Jun 16, 2012 at 2:29 PM, Denis Gervalle <dgl(a)softec.lu wrote:
> > On Sat, Jun 16, 2012 at 10:05
AM, Thomas Mortagne <
> thomas.mortagne(a)xwiki.com
> > wrote:
> >
> >> On Fri, Jun 15, 2012 at 7:18 PM, Denis Gervalle <dgl(a)softec.lu wrote:
> >> > On Fri, Jun 15, 2012
at 12:26 PM, Thomas Mortagne <
> >> thomas.mortagne(a)xwiki.com
> >> > wrote:
> >>
>
> >> >> Hi devs,
> >> >>
> >> >> Since I got some veto on
> http://markmail.org/message/feavtmfokcsaalpo
> >> >> lets cut all that in small peaces.
> >> >>
> >> >> The today's episode is about finding what is the war we are
running
> it
> >> >> at runtime to list it in the core extensions (among other things
it
> >> >> allows to check for available updates).
> >> >>
> >> >> Like the JAR packages, a WAR contains pom.xml file, problem is
that
> >> >> this pom.xml file is not in a "stable" location
> >> >> (META-INF/<groupId>/<artifactId>/pom.xml) and I
can't find any
> generic
> >> >> way to scan a WAR like Reflection allows to scan jars files from
the
> >> >> classpath.
> >> >>
> >> >> So as a last resort solution I propose to include the extension
> >> >> identifier in the METAINF.MF at build time. This will give me the
> >> >> entry point I need to find the pom.xml and gather more detailed
> >> >> informations about the war to put it as core extension.
> >> >>
> >> >> WDYT ?
> >> >>
> >> >
> >> > Currently, I do not really see what it changes compare to our previous
> >> > thread.
> >> >
> >> > Let me try to better explains myself with a similar example from
> another
> >> > domain.
> >> > In Javascript, you sometime needs to detect in which browser you are
> >> > running in, and we all know that this is bad.
> >> > The good way to do is to detect available features, and not the
> browser
> >> as
> >> > a whole.
> >> >
> >> > I see the war here as the browser, and the deployed jars/xars as the
> >> > available features. Providing a way to know which was the initial WAR
> >> > deployed, is therefore encouraging the bad way to know what features
> are
> >> > available. This is even worse than in the browser detection, since
> XWiki
> >> is
> >> > really modular, and you can install a XEM war, but setup XE over it.
> So,
> >> I
> >> > really do not understand currently why you really want to better know
> on
> >> > which WAR you are running ?
> >>
> >> This comparison does not make any sense. It's like saying a browser
> >> should not know its own version to be sure it's not going to indicate
> >> it.
> >>
> >
> > Finally, trying to make analogy to clarify my point does not make it :(
> > There is absolutely no issue with putting somewhere the version of the
> > core, but this is for me completely different to put in the distribution.
> >
> >
> >> If you had read my mail more carefully you would have seen one example
> >> I gave: "among other things it allows to check for available
updates".
> >>
> >
> > I had read it carefully ! So the only goal would be to automate the
> update
> > of the war itself ? Not sure to know if this could be done, but you may
> > have a better view than I have on this specific point. I do not see the
> > exact relation with EM however.
>
> All it cost right now and the only thing this vote is about is to
> indicate in the METAINF.MF what is it exactly, it's one line. That's
> exactly what METAINF.MF is for and IMO Maven itself should even put
> those informations but it's no unfortunately. I'm not even proposing
> to introduce some custom distribution file...
>
> It also allow to remove the custom version.properties files which will
> be made useless since we will get all informations we need from the
> pom like we do with any core extension jar. Said another way it's
> about knowing what is the distribution and not just what is the
> distribution version.
>
> > So, if your goal is to build a war upgrade
> > procedure, when the war has been the deployment method, than you have
> > probably the only valid use case IMO, and you have my agreement, but this
> > is really lot of work for a very simple admin procedure for which
> > containers already provide an interface.
>
> I don't understand what you mean, tomcat is never going to tell you
> that there is a new version of XE.
>
> I appreciate your concern on the the work to do but that's not what
> I'm asking. All I'm asking is if everyone OK with the way I plan to
> extract distribution related informations.
>
> >
> >
> >> This is one of the perfectly valid use case for wanting to know what
> >> is the distribution and there is others I'm sure. For example right
> >>
> >
> > Really curious to know about other valid usages, and in particular, to
> know
> > how to avoid bad one.
> >
> >
> >> now by default you get the distribution name and version in the footer
> >> and this is done by putting it in the name in XWikiPreferences page at
> >> build time which could hardly be worst. It will also make the
> >> version.properties useless and all the build configuration to generate
> >> it since you will get a generic API to get the version of the
> >> distribution and also any extension like you can do already.
> >>
> >
> > AFAIK, we have only 2 distributions, XE and XEM, and the difference
> between
> > these two wars are really small.
>
> XWiki ecosystem is not just about what's in https://github.com/xwiki/.
>
> Here hare several examples of distributions of XWiki I know about with
> they own versions and customizations:
> * XWiki Cloud
> * Curriki
> * Nearbee
>
> And there is lots of others I never heard about.
>
> Even if we were proposing only one distribution in
> https://github.com/xwiki/ we would still don't know anything about it
> at platform level which mean we can't suggest the default
> corresponding XAR to install for it to be complete, we can't check and
> warn the admin that there is a new version etc. I really don't see
> what you don't understand in the fact that we need to know what is the
> distribution before doing distribution related actions.
>
> > This is probably mainly why I do not
> > understand your goals. Writing the distribution next to the version is
> not
> > so easy since you may setup the XEM war and finally use it as you would
> use
> > XE. or the reverse.
>
> I don't really care that you customized a XE and installed some
> extensions to manager wikis, your distribution will still be XE and
> what you will get is XE related informations. All the rest is
> extensions.
>
> >
> >
> >> >
> >> > Moving further in the future, we may expect to have a single minimal
> WAR,
> >> > and a bunch of extentions choosen freely by the user, using something
> >> > similar to a linux setup, using recommended groups of extensions to
> build
> >>
> >> Linux is not a good example for what you are trying to say. Many
> >> distributions like Ubuntu to cite just one have the concept of
> >> distribution as a whole with version and distribution upgrade.
> >
> >
> > I was not referring to distributions, but to the way dselect provided a
> > presets features for different purposes. Which only append at initial
> > setup, but does not persist later. Upgrading later, is only based on
> > installed packages.
> >
> >
> >> > XWiki well suited for this or that purpose. And therefore, the WAR
> will
> >> > completely loose its meaning. IMO, currently, a WAR is simply the
> minimal
> >> > core, and a pre-selected set of extensions, just to ease an initial
> >> setup.
> >> > After being deployed, it loose its meaning completely, and could fully
> >> > changed. I know that these "core" extensions are installed
for ever,
> but
> >> > this more a limitation than a feature, except for the minimal needed
> set.
> >>
> >> Please lets do things one step at a time. Also don't assume that the
> >> future is settled, I still don't agree with you that it is a good
> >> thing to completely loose the concept of XWiki distribution that you
> >> can upgrade etc.
> >>
> >
> > Ok, maybe you should currently explains me what is the advantages of the
> > two distributions we have. I have already found this so confusing,
> because
> > you can so easily switch from one to the other without reinstallation.
> >
> >
> >> It's not like I was proposing a very complex thing that is going to
> >> make XWiki stuck for any evolution of the architecture, it's just
> >> adding one perfectly valid information to the MANIFEST.MF file. This
> >>
> >
> > This exactly the meaning of what you want to add that I do not
> understand.
> >
> >
> >> is not something built at the hearth of extension manager that you are
> >> running in a WAR, it's just one more information when this information
> >> is available. It will not change anything at all in the way to deal
> >> with extensions in general.
> >>
> >> >
> >> > Could you explain why you really want to give that initial set of
> >> > extensions some properties as a whole ? or am I missing something
> >> > fundamental ?
> >>
> >> Where did I said exactly that I want to replace the list of core
> >> extensions by the single WAR entry ? The goal is not to make all
> >> extensions put the war as dependency instead of the proper core
> >> extensions but to provide an information that should be provided
> >> simply because it exists and can be useful.
> >>
> >
> > If the information as no meaning, it would be useless. So what is the
> > meaning of that information ? XE and XEM are so similar, and each could
> be
> > turned into the other one with very simple configuration changes. So I do
> > not understand the meaning of the information you are adding, and for
> which
> > use case it is valid to be used.
> >
> > The fear that a bad developer will put XWiki Enterprise 4.0 as
> >> dependency instead of listing the actual modules his extension needs
> >> should not prevent us to provide this information for other needs than
> >> dependency resolution.
> >>
> >
> > No fear of that, only of the meaning and usage intended for the
> information
> > you were adding.
>
> The whole idea is to extract as much informations as we can from the
> currently installed stuff to make admin life easier and allow to
> propose distribution related actions. If you can't admit that we do
> have official distributions (even if it was only XE) and that 99% of
> the users don't choose the jars/resources themself one by one to
> create their own WAR or whatever other way of packaging I can't really
> say much more.
>
> What I propose if something that allow to manage distributions and
> that obviously also work if you don't have any declared distribution,
> you will just not get any distribution related informations.
>
> >
> >
> >>
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >>
> >> >> +1
> >> >> --
> >> >> Thomas Mortagne
> >> >> _______________________________________________
> >> >> devs mailing list
> >> >> devs(a)xwiki.org
> >> >> http://lists.xwiki.org/mailman/listinfo/devs
> >> >>
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > --
> >> > Denis Gervalle
> >> > SOFTEC sa - CEO
> >> > eGuilde sarl - CTO
> >> > _______________________________________________
> >> > devs mailing list
> >> > devs(a)xwiki.org
> >> > http://lists.xwiki.org/mailman/listinfo/devs
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> Thomas Mortagne
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> devs mailing list
> >> devs(a)xwiki.org
> >> http://lists.xwiki.org/mailman/listinfo/devs
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Denis Gervalle
> > SOFTEC sa - CEO
> > eGuilde sarl - CTO
> > _______________________________________________
> > devs mailing list
> > devs(a)xwiki.org
> > http://lists.xwiki.org/mailman/listinfo/devs
>
>
>
> --
> Thomas Mortagne
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