[Zope] Cool but...

[Alexander Staubo]

>-----Original Message-----
>From: zope-admin@zope.org [mailto:zope-admin@zope.org]On Behalf Of
>Christopher Petrilli
>Sent: 16. juni 1999 23:49
>To: David J. Orme; zope@zope.org
>Subject: Re: [Zope] Cool but...
>
>
>> Okay, Zope looks *really*, *really* cool.  The one thing I
>*really* wish
>> I could do is to NFS mount or SMB mount the object database
>onto my file
>> system.  Then I wouldn't have to go through the nonsense of uploading
>> graphic files and Zope would automatically interoperate with
>all of my
>> HTML editing tools.
>
>Our approach is to use FTP to get into the Object Database, and this is
>supported today, so long as you're using ZServer for your
>server.  Having
>said this, while I think that SMB and NFS are interesting
>ideas, both have
>their own SERIOUS problems that are difficult to overcome.  If
>you wish to
>undertake this, you should look at what hoops have to be
>jumped through to
>get FTP working... sorta.

Moreover you can accomplish the same thing by using an FTP-enabled
editor (UltraEdit, FTPEdit, Emacs) or even mirroring (you can replicate
between a local file area and ZServer's FTP server).

>If you're using Windows machines, you should investigate
>IE5+WebDAV (which
>is called Web Folders)... this might be of some help.

Unfortunately, IE5's WebDAV support has no provisions for in-place
editing, and so again, you need a specialized editor for that.

>Please understand that while the object database might LOOK like a file
>system in some regards, it contains data which can not be
>expressed in any
>common file system,

Except for BeOS' BFS file system, of course. :-)  It does attributes,
transactions, and efficient RDBMS-like queries.

And don't count out NTFS 5, either (due for NT 5.0, er, Windows 2000
(yuck)), which supports out-of-band attribute data and more.

And now Linux will be getting XFS from SGI's IRIX -- the premier
journaling file system of the UNIX world -- which surely supports at
least some of these features?

>as well as organizational ideas which are
>completely
>foreign to the file-based world (such as acquisition).... just a bit of
>clarity.

True, although this is not something that precludes the use of a
file-system metaphor. Even Zope's own management screens visualize the
database as a hierchical system of container objects.

>> Even so, I think I'm going to give Zope a whirl on a small
>project and see
>> what happens.  I like PHP but wish it had exceptions to help
>create more
>> robust code.  I think that Python is a better programming
>language, and
>> the way Zope integrates it into the web environment is very
>intriguing.
>
>Let us know how it goes at the end.
>
>Chris
>--
>| Christopher Petrilli                              Digital
>Creations, Inc.
>| petrilli@digicool.com
http://www.digicool.com

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