December 1998 - Zope

- ANNOUNCE: Product API tutorial available
by Amos Latteier 31 Dec '98

31 Dec '98

Hello Zopesters: I've finally finished the first draft of a Product API tutorial. http://www.zope.org/Documentation/Reference/ProductTutorial.tar.gz It describes in pretty reasonable detail how to build a Zope Product. The example is a polling Product. I would love feedback, since this is a pretty rough draft. Have fun! -Amos

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- Zope/filesystem issues
by Amos Latteier 30 Dec '98

30 Dec '98

With all this talk about wanting to use the filesystem to store Zope objects rather than the object database, I just wanted to underscore a point that has been mentioned, but mostly passed over. Zope objects are much more than simply text files. They are Python objects--so storing them in general requires something like a pickle. Documents and Folders can be approximated with filesystem directories and text files, however, they don't capture a lot of information like Zope object properties, permissions information, etc. In addition many objects like Database Connections don't map very well to a filesystem object at all. I've been thinking about these issues while working on FTP support, since FTP uses a filesystem metaphor for communication with Zope. For example, when you FTP an object in and out of Zope, you probably won't be putting and getting the complete object. You will be most likely putting and getting the textual or binary 'content' of the object. So while being able to import and export partial representations of Zope objects to and from the filesystem is an important convenience, I see big problems with it being a complete replacement for through the web editing. -Amos

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- Tabula
by Magnus Lie Hetland 30 Dec '98

30 Dec '98

Where is the documentation for Tabula? Is it indeed a standard part of Zope? Sorry if I'm being dense here... (And yes, I did find the Object Reference, but it wasn't easy to use as an introduction...) (Perhaps you should have a search engine on your site? :) -- Magnus Lie Hetland www.pvv.org/arcadia <arcadia(a)pvv.org>

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RE: [Zope] - Help with Zope Project -- please!
by Rob Page 30 Dec '98

30 Dec '98

Dave: > Ok - first please 'reply to all' for this message. While I have > sent a subsribe to the list, I have yet to receive any mail > from it, so I'm not certain that it is working for me yet. <SNIP> > I want to have a method for inserting into the data_table that does > uses this value: > > ie, it should look like this: > > Last Name ************ > Name *************************** > Keywords **************************** > > and populate both the data_table, including the submitter id, > and the data_table2. > > So my questions are: > > a) how do I get the sql_method that I am using to look up the > id# for the user based on the LastName and insert that value > into the data_table? This might be a little dangerous since you've not indicated that LastName is a key field. Such a query (i.e., SELECT id from user_table where l_name =  ) might very well return multiple rows. Could you get the person to "login" to the system and either a) set a cookie or b) a hidden form variable? > INSERT INTO data_talbe values ( > "", > '', > ??????????????????? > > what do I put in the ?????????????? to make it work? > > b) then I have an sql_delimeter line, and I want to iterate > through the > keywords tokens and insert a record into the data_table2 for each > of the keywords, including the submitter id# and the id# > of the just > inserted record from data_table. How do I do this?? I think this is harder than you might think... It's hard (impossible?) to get the id of a just-inserted record when you're using the database's native auto-increment facility. In cases where we've needed to this very thing we define a table key that is populated with a pseudo-random string (e.g., a string-ified time representation plus some a few random characters). This gives you uniqueness in the keys and, more importantly, you can do other things with the key value. So, to summarize I would, get the person to visit a "login" screen. Successful logins set a non-persistent cookie which is that person's user_id. Subsequent requests can use the cookie in DTML (and in SQL Methods). Inserts into data_tables should use a pseudo-random string (PrincipiaTime works nicely for this). This way you'll know the id. Maybe even stuff it into the REQUEST so it's available for the entire request. --Rob

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- ZODBCDA for Linux?
by Scott Sampson 30 Dec '98

30 Dec '98

Is there a target date to make the Zope ODBC Database Adapter available on Linux?

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Re: [Zope] - Requirements for a project development system
by Curtis Galloway 30 Dec '98

30 Dec '98

Christopher Petrilli wrote: > Um, what does this have to do with Zope? > [...] > I'm just affraid you've made this a MUCH larger issue than it is. My point is that designing an interactive web site is the same as any other software project. For simple projects, you can throw them together with any old thing and it will probably work. Zope would be overkill for something simple. But simple projects have a way of growing and becoming more complex. And I have used plenty of tools that worked great on demoware, but failed miserably when used for the real, large-scale project. I'm just trying to share my experience working on larger projects in the hopes that the people on this list will be able to avoid the mistakes I've made in the past. > I'll say this up front, which is that if you have hard and fast rules > about how things must behave to be "usable" and a system doesn't mean > those rules, why don't you just move on, rather than trying to spin the > world into your own orbit? Because Zope looked interesting initially, and I thought the authors (and Zope users) might be interested in my observations. Like I said, your mileage may vary. If you haven't seen it already, take a look at Phil Greenspun's web site at http://photo.net for lots of interesting discussion about database-backed web sites. --Curtis

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- Why I don't think Zope will work for me
by Curtis Galloway 30 Dec '98

30 Dec '98

Zope is very cool. Zope has many useful features. But I believe that storing most of your useful data inside an opaque object database is a fatal flaw. I learned through painful experience that having your project data in text files in a filesystem is a Good Thing. You can use standard UNIX tools to manipulate these files. You can use EMACS or vi or any other tool to edit them. And most importantly, you can use CVS or RCS or any other similar tool for source control. I just don't see how you can build a large project with multiple developers using a Netscape browser as your editing tool, unless I'm missing something very obvious about the way Zope works. --Curtis

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- Help with Zope project
by David Wagle 30 Dec '98

30 Dec '98

Ok - first please reply to all for this message. While I have sent a subsribe to the list, I have yet to receive any mail from it, so I'm not certain that it is working for me yet. Now, I've got Zope and the ZMySQLDA stuff installed on my Linux box, and it is working just fine. I can connect to the database, and I can insert values and do selects. Now I'm trying to get a little tricky, and after pouring over the documentation, I realize I have no idea what I'm doing. . . . So maybe someone here can point me in the right direction. I have a database connection on the top of my hierarchy. I have several folders under the hierarchy in which I want to be able to manipulate different parts of the database. A simplified database scheme looks like this: user_table ( id int auto_increment, l_name char(30) not null ) data_table ( id int auto_increment primary key, name char(30) not null, submitter int references user_table(id)) data_table2 ( id int auto_increment primary key, keyword char(30) not null, d_id int references data_table (id), u_id int references user_table (id)) Now, I have a ZMysql method that takes as an argument the lastname, and returns the user id. I want to have a method for inserting into the data_table that does uses this value: ie, it should look like this: Last Name ************ Name *************************** Keywords **************************** and populate both the data_table, including the submitter id, and the data_table2. So my questions are: a) how do I get the sql_method that I am using to look up the id# for the user based on the LastName and insert that value into the data_table? I have something like this: Arguments L_Name:string:required name:string:required keywords:tokens INSERT INTO data_talbe values ( "", '', ??????????????????? what do I put in the ?????????????? to make it work? b) then I have an sql_delimeter line, and I want to iterate through the keywords tokens and insert a record into the data_table2 for each of the keywords, including the submitter id# and the id# of the just inserted record from data_table. How do I do this?? Thanks for the help. I realize that this is probably pretty basic to some of you folks, but I am really struggling with this and finally decided to come begging for help. If you need more info, please ask. Dave

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RE: [Zope] - Encryption
by Paul Everitt 30 Dec '98

30 Dec '98

Andreas wrote: > That's what I'm doing now. Edit the documents, cvs commit, > ssh server, cvs > update -Pd. That's it :) > But it works only with a file based representation *g* ;) Doesn't have to...CVS has a client-server protocol. Implement it in the forthcoming Zope-Medusa and you can check your files out from and into Zope. You could even cover the socket you used CVS on with SSH port forwarding. --Paul Paul Everitt Digital Creations paul(a)digicool.com 540.371.6909

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- Help with Zope Project -- please!
by David Wagle 30 Dec '98

30 Dec '98

Ok - first please 'reply to all' for this message. While I have sent a subsribe to the list, I have yet to receive any mail from it, so I'm not certain that it is working for me yet. Now, I've got Zope and the ZMySQLDA stuff installed on my Linux box, and it is working just fine. I can connect to the database, and I can insert values and do selects. Now I'm trying to get a little tricky, and after pouring over the documentation, I realize I have no idea what I'm doing. . . . So maybe someone here can point me in the right direction. I have a database connection on the top of my hierarchy. I have several folders under the hierarchy in which I want to be able to manipulate different parts of the database. A simplified database scheme looks like this: user_table ( id int auto_increment, l_name char(30) not null ) data_table ( id int auto_increment primary key, name char(30) not null, submitter int references user_table(id)) data_table2 ( id int auto_increment primary key, keyword char(30) not null, d_id int references data_table (id), u_id int references user_table (id)) Now, I have a ZMysql method that takes as an argument the lastname, and returns the user id. I want to have a method for inserting into the data_table that does uses this value: ie, it should look like this: Last Name ************ Name *************************** Keywords **************************** and populate both the data_table, including the submitter id, and the data_table2. So my questions are: a) how do I get the sql_method that I am using to look up the id# for the user based on the LastName and insert that value into the data_table? I have something like this: Arguments L_Name:string:required name:string:required keywords:tokens INSERT INTO data_talbe values ( "", '', ??????????????????? what do I put in the ?????????????? to make it work? b) then I have an sql_delimeter line, and I want to iterate through the keywords tokens and insert a record into the data_table2 for each of the keywords, including the submitter id# and the id# of the just inserted record from data_table. How do I do this?? Thanks for the help. I realize that this is probably pretty basic to some of you folks, but I am really struggling with this and finally decided to come begging for help. If you need more info, please ask. Dave --NAA25068.915047169/plato.healthpartners.com--

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