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RE: [Zope] Some tough questions about zope... (long)
by Michel Pelletier 08 Mar '99

08 Mar '99

> -----Original Message----- > From: Tony McDonald [mailto:tony.mcdonald@ncl.ac.uk] > Sent: Wednesday, March 03, 1999 9:42 AM > To: zope(a)zope.org > Subject: [Zope] Some tough questions about zope... (long) > > > Hi all, > This is quite a long email where I ask a lot of questions about Zope, > but I hope you'll be lenient with me as I think I have a few hard > decisions to make! > > Some background: > I'm one of the web developers here, with a remit to implement a > curriculum database that can; > (a) support the Medical Faculty here > (b) get rolled out to three other Medical-related sites, each with > their own 'look and feel' > (c) possibly implement a University-wide curriculum database. > > I've read a lot of the documentation, and am doing so constantly, but > the wisdom of the list would be very helpful indeed. > If you continue to use it you will get the Zope Zen. :) > The questions: > a) Is there a way for us to 'dump' the non-dynamic parts of a Zope > database into static HTML pages. This would act as a way to say to > the team "look, we have a parachute!". This begs the question we've asked around here so many times, 'What is data?' Everything in Zope is Dynamic, in my thoughs, 'non-dynamic' is a Document with not DTML in it. But there is no way for Zope to sniff a document and see if it contains dynamic structures or not. Perhaps what could be done is to write a simple MyDocument that you stipulate in policy never to have dynamic stuff in it, and then write a crawler scripts that sucks out all such documents into a local file structure. There maybe easier solutions. > b) Can I integrate with the Perl/PHP3 programs that we have (the Perl > programs are mainly .cgi, but the PHP3 programs are server-side > scripted, and as such are embedded into the HTML itself). This is so > that I can ...do what? ;) Zope can call your cgi scripts just like they are, as URLs. They would, of course, have to be external to Zope and if you have a bunch of little ones you may find it better (and a damn sight easier) to rewrite them as Python in Zope as external methods. (DTML is also a rather powerful language for being so simple). Just leave your PHP stuff in your documents; Zope will parse out the DTML and return it to the server, which will parse out the PHP stuff and return it to the browser. In fact, you can probably make DTML and PHP work together nicely and simplify much of your PHP code. In the quickie case you don't need to change your PHP. > c) Is there any way of using the XML documents that I'm creating into > the database and parsing them to produce either HTML or RTF output? Zope doesn't contain an XML parser. You would need to do this with an external package. > d) I know that this a terrible question to ask... but is Zope likely > to 'remain' open-source (we're worried about getting stuck with a > proprietary system)?. Yes. > e) Can I 'point' an Apache virtual server to run a Zope cgi (ie > dropping the :port requirment). Yes. > f) I'd like to have the option to have user authentication > information coming from a database - is this possible? Yes. There is an unsupported open source User Folder Product called UserDB, where you tell it how to query your DB and it uses that for authentication. > g) We have something like 200 main level directories holding the > study guides, each with up to 200 files in them - is that pushing the > Zope database too far? Not at all. > h) We also need resources such as QuickTime movies, images PowerPoint > slides etc. to be uploaded - would they sit in the database or can > they be held somewhere else (and what happens about file name > conflicts)? ooo. Someone has yet to write an ExternalFile product (though I suspect it would be fairly simple) to add objects to the db that refer to files outside the db. For now you can upload them as File objects to be contained entirely in the db. The same rules that apply to file name conflicts in, say, a UNIX filesystem, apply to the Zope db. You can't have the same object id in the same folder. (With a minor non-exception of aquisition, all lower folders can see the contents of higher folders, but if you place an object in a lower folder with the same id as an object in a higher folder the lower object will override the higher object. Get that?) > i) Does Zope have the equivalent of 'server logs', which we > use for research. Since Zope is served through a web server you can continue to use the server logs. In other words, No. ;) Object by Object logging is something we've discussed, but would require *a lot* of thought and work. > j) Is it possible to have a 'pointer' at a location in the Zope > database that will point to a 'real, honest to goodness' HTML file on > the server (ie something like a redirect..oops I think I may have > answered my own question) If that file is being served up by Apache then you can just use it's URL as a 'pointer'. > and lastly > k) What kind of loads have people put Zope under (10,000 +hits a day, > 100k?). We have one application which has 170 Medical Students > sitting in front of screens and clicking a button at the same time > (they're selecting their final year options) which then starts 170 > CGI-based Perl processes off interrogating and updating the database. > This really grinds the system down... Ah yes, the inevitable benchmarking question. There are lots of issues here, memory footprint vs processor speed vs concurrent access...etc. The quick word is, Zope is fast and it will get much faster. Zope is currently not concurrent but will be in 2.0. Zope+Apache is a bit slow due to the pcgi bottleneck and is much improved by using ZServer. As it stands now, ZServer is something like twice to 10 times faster than Zope+Apache. Medusa (the web core of ZServer) serializes the requests into Zope at the moment, but when 2.0 comes out it will be the fastest web application platform on earth. Don't quote me. > > I hope that I haven't bored everyone to tears here - it's just that > Zope seems to do an awful lot of what I need, and I'd really like to > know what I'm letting myself in for if I start using it for > everything I do.... No problemo. > > many many thanks, > tone. -Michel > ------ > Dr Tony McDonald, FMCC, Networked Learning Environments Project > The Medical School, Newcastle University Tel: +44 191 222 5888 > Fingerprint: 3450 876D FA41 B926 D3DD F8C3 F2D0 C3B9 8B38 18A2 > > _______________________________________________ > Zope maillist - Zope(a)zope.org > http://www.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope >

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RE: [Zope] Zope not multi-threaded - is this a problem?
by Michel Pelletier 08 Mar '99

08 Mar '99

> -----Original Message----- > From: Tony McDonald [mailto:tony.mcdonald@ncl.ac.uk] > Sent: Sunday, March 07, 1999 3:25 PM > To: zope(a)zope.org > Subject: [Zope] Zope not multi-threaded - is this a problem? > > > Hi, > I've read on the zope-dev list that Zope is not multi-threaded. > > Does this have any ominous implications for server > performance? I believe it > means problems for people writing products, but does it give > problems for > folk using Zope in an 'install products and use them' scenario? > We can discuss this now, but in a short while it won't really matter. Zope as we know it now is not 'multi-threaded'. The real issue concerning Zope is one of concurrency, since the 'threading' of requests is ussualy created by the web server (Apache using multi-processes or Medusa (ZServer's) use of select(), neither of which use actual 'threads'). There are two areas that we are working on to make zope concurrent. The Database: There is a new version of BoboPOS, called BoboPOS3. It is currently alpha. BoboPOS3 supports concurrent processes opening, reading and writing the Object Database. 'Concurrifying' Zope: Concurrent programs have to be careful about some issues. In particular, the use of global data. These can sneak in on you in wierd ways. For example, in the regex python module (yes, regex has been depreciated for re, but for now regex is faster) certain uses of compiled reg expressions don't work when two 'threads' enter the same expression. Also, there is an issue about passing mutable objects as default arguments to methods. To be truely thread safe, default arguements need to be immutable, or mutable arguments can only be used in immutable ways. These are, as you said, developer issues. Product developers have to be careful not to block Zope for long periods of time. People in the 'install and use them' scenario should not use these types of Products unless they are sure the block times are low, and product developers should be very, very careful about moving their software out into the world if the product blocks. It should be made clear to the user that this software could stop up the whole works. Why is won't matter soon is because we are working on making Zope fully concurrent. -Michel > many thanks for any thoughts, > tone. > > _______________________________________________ > Zope maillist - Zope(a)zope.org > http://www.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope > > (For developer-specific issues, use the companion list, > zope-dev(a)zope.org - http://www.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope-dev ) >

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Why doesn't this loop over files?
by Tony McDonald 08 Mar '99

08 Mar '99

Hi, I've d/led the ZopeDemos folder, installed it and started learning more about Zope, but there's something happening that I'm not sure about. The 'looping' example doesn't seem to iterate correctly over new additions to the folder. The DTML is here:   <H3>Objects of type </H3> <TABLE BORDER=1> <TH>Id</TH><TH>Title</TH>   <TR><TD></TD> <TD></TD></TR>   </TABLE>   If I create a new DTML method or document in the folder 'subFolder', it isn't recognised. I've even copy/pasted the documents that do work into the subFolder with no joy. Curiously, new folders *are* recognised. My Question is: What's preventing Zope from reading *all* the Documents in the subFolder? This would be the core of my first real application in Zope (a resource upload/download facility for staff here) so any advice would be appreciated. thanks tone. ------ Dr Tony McDonald, FMCC, Networked Learning Environments Project The Medical School, Newcastle University Tel: +44 191 222 5888 Fingerprint: 3450 876D FA41 B926 D3DD F8C3 F2D0 C3B9 8B38 18A2

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top level acl_users Folder
by Service Informatique CHSR 08 Mar '99

08 Mar '99

Hello, Is it possible to change (I mean: to delete) the top level UserFolder and use something else, say, a UserDb folder? Also, I made a french version of Confera. If someone is insterested, drop me a note. Regards, Jephte CLAIN

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Q for the group
by Dave G 08 Mar '99

08 Mar '99

Advice needed, opinions wanted. I have a situation where there is a group of users with both a private space and a public space. The users homepage is considered private with the public space where all anonymous viewable docs are held. I have two thoughts on how to do this, Zope is capable of either method, I'm curious which method everyone else thinks best, and why. First method; community folder (contents public viewable by permission) user_folder (contents not public viewable by permission) users manage page (not public viewable by aquisition) users public folder (public viewable by permission) public_html (public viewable by aquisition) public2_html (public viewable by aquisition) users private folder (not public viewable by aquisition) Second method; community folder (contents public viewable by permission) user_folder (contents public viewable by aquisition) users manage page (not public viewable by permission) users public folder (public viewable by aquisition) public_html (public viewable by aquisition) public2_html (public viewable by aquisition) users private folder (not public viewable by permission) Both have advantages and disadvantages, either way I end up with on - off, off - on, in the permissions hirearchy. Anyone have a good argument for either method? DAve. "On the Plains of Hesitation bleach the bones of countless millions who, at the Dawn of Victory, sat down to wait, and waiting -- died"

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Zope not multi-threaded - is this a problem?
by Tony McDonald 07 Mar '99

07 Mar '99

Hi, I've read on the zope-dev list that Zope is not multi-threaded. Does this have any ominous implications for server performance? I believe it means problems for people writing products, but does it give problems for folk using Zope in an 'install products and use them' scenario? many thanks for any thoughts, tone.

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RE: [Zope] Creating Zope a zope application
by Paul Everitt 07 Mar '99

07 Mar '99

Sture wrote: > The doc says 'Creating a Zope application is simply a matter > of creating a > regular Python module containing the objects to be published, > and placing > this module along with some Zope-provided support files in > the appropriate > place on a web server' > > The doc continues to say that the zope documentation covers > this prosess, > but I'm not able to find it. So my question is - what are those > zope-provided support files, and where am I supposed to place > those file > along with the python module that I've created? Docs are still pretty light, but take a look at the Product Tutorial at: http://www.zope.org/Documentation/Reference/API --Paul

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RE: [Zope] Washington, DC area Zope users?
by Michel Pelletier 07 Mar '99

07 Mar '99

> -----Original Message----- > From: Edward C. Jones [mailto:edcjones@erols.com] > Sent: Saturday, March 06, 1999 6:05 AM > To: zope(a)zope.org > Subject: [Zope] Washington, DC area Zope users? > > > Are there any Zope users in the Washington, DC area? > > Digital Creations (the mecca of Zope users) is in Fredricksburg, VA. About 50 miles south of DC. -Michel > > _______________________________________________ > Zope maillist - Zope(a)zope.org > http://www.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope >

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RE: [Zope] [DTML] creating variables
by Paul Everitt 07 Mar '99

07 Mar '99

Tres wrote: > I too miss Python when working in DTML. But in this case, I I also wish Python could get into DTML. I look at some of the DTML that gets written and think "Ugh, that's pretty awful." Still, I don't yet see an alternative. --Paul

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Creating Zope a zope application
by raver＠box.dust.za.net 07 Mar '99

07 Mar '99

Hi! I'm reading 'A technical introduction to object publishing with Zope'. The doc says 'Creating a Zope application is simply a matter of creating a regular Python module containing the objects to be published, and placing this module along with some Zope-provided support files in the appropriate place on a web server' The doc continues to say that the zope documentation covers this prosess, but I'm not able to find it. So my question is - what are those zope-provided support files, and where am I supposed to place those file along with the python module that I've created? Sture Lygren

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