Hi Fred,
"Fred" == Fred Wilson Horch <fhorch@ecoaccess.org> writes:
Fred> Wanted to follow up on Steve's points. Fred> I don't know if we need just one serialization interface Fred> that tries to solve all five issues. Ok.. Fred> We currently have two serialization interfaces in Zope: Fred> 1) the FTP interface, and 2) the XML export interface. Fred> Seems to me that the FTP interface could be generalized as Fred> the "lossy" serialization interface that is "morally human Fred> readable" and the XML export interface could be tweaked a Fred> bit as "lossless" but "morally binary". Fred> The FTP interface would be used when you want a Fred> representation that can be edited by hand. It solves C, D Fred> and E, but not A and B. Fred> The XML interface would be used when you want a Fred> representation that can be manipulated programmatically. It Fred> solves A and B, but not C, D and E. Hmm.. maybe I'm misuderstanding... which would/could you use for version control? It still seems to me that a blend of these could be developed that would work in all cases. An object could have a human readable part/aspect and 'the rest' could be captured as an xml bloblet. The 'human editable' part could just be what you get on the FTP interface (as you say), and the rest could be saved/restored to a 'auxiliary' file that would track other aspects of the object. Since objects could implement their own serialization, they could decide what aspects belonged in which part. Otherwise I can't help feeling that we'd have problems with duplicated versions, some xml/zexp, some human-readable that would inevitably stomp on eachother in any version control scenario. If all this could be worked in to the existing FTP/export/import system... there would be a minimum impact on existing interfaces. Fred> FWIW, I'm working on tweaking the XML export/import code to Fred> serialize object hierarchies as directories and files, Fred> rather than exporting a single file. Cool.. this sounds like a promising approach. I'd be interested in testing this.. thanks! -steve Fred> Fred Fred> P.S. The link Karl sent Fred> (http://www.thetwowayweb.com/theXmlFiles) is interesting. Fred> -- Fred Wilson Horch mailto:fhorch@ecoaccess.org Executive Fred> Director, EcoAccess http://ecoaccess.org/ P.O. Box 2823, Fred> Durham, NC 27715-2823 phone: 919.419-8354