Re: Old gconf keys (was: Tab width)

> > >   - How do you deal with apps parking obfuscated data in the registry?
> > As opposed to parking obfuscated data in dot-files?
> Data that's meant to be modified by humans tends strongly to be
> human-readable.  Sure, there are exceptions.  Sendmail.  Files which
> request a delay...but neglect to mention measurement units.  I've seen
> miliseconds, deciseconds, seconds, and minutes....
> Once you automate and mediate all data access, it's easy to go
> obfuscated (as Evo did), even if it's not an intentional decision.

Once you 'mediate all data access' you have a system that is much more
extensible and easier to administer.

> > >   - How do you deal with bloat (old settings, stale settings).  Treating
> > >     gconf as a write-only repository...leads to its own problems.
> > >     Messing up the cleanup process also has its downsides.
> > There are *no* pitfalls when messing with GConf. Just do a "gconftool
> > --dump" before and "gconftool --load" if you screw up. 
> "Just do" or "require all automated accesses do"?
> If you're going to design for atomic commits and rollback capability
> (and versioning, why not go whole-hog), fine.  But don't put the onus on
> the user.  Aunt Tillie ain't gonna do it, and her nephew Joey won't
> remember reliably.

If Aunt Tillie ain't gonna backup, then gconf is the least of the
problems.

> > You can do it while the app is still running and nothing will go
> > wrong. And I already posted an example of how one could write a
> > trivial script to clean up stale settings.
> Guaranteed?

Yes.

> See atomic and rollback capabilities.

We are talking about application configuration data, like LDAP, the
write to read ratio is very very lop-sided.

> From where?  Are you snapshotting the fiel continuously?  What's your
> storage/processing overhead for this?

?  And you're doing that to dot files?  What a waste of time,  make a
backup at a known good state.
 
> > Really, gconftool is great. Not only is gconftool great, but GConf uses
> > an open and fairly simple API, so you can write your own program to do
> > specific things to it.

The Gconf API is a thing of beauty.

> Oh yeah, it rocks:
>     $ man gconftool
>     No manual entry for gconftool

man gconftool-2

> Y'know, I *love* how GNOMEgoes _miles_ out of its way to smooth the
> waters with us old-time farts who expect to find freakin' *man pages* in
> our man pages.
> Bug #108142, filed 09 Aug 2001.  Think we might have a manpage by 2009?

man gconftool-2

   
> > > I'm not saying that gconf (and the Registry) don't have their benefits.
> > > But there are some serious costs, many of these *are* common to both
> > > gconf and the MS Windows Registry.  Naysaying doesn't make it otherwise.
> > Of the serious costs you've mentioned, none are serious and none are
> > costs above and beyond those of dot-files.
> I believe you've misunderestimated system complexity.
> > I'd argue that even your "comments for a group of options" gripe could
> > be easily solved by allowing documentation on GConf directories, which
> > shouldn't be all that complicated.
> Pardon?  How?  So I've got to edit two files to keep track of what's
> what?  Why can't I edit-in-place within a single file?

????  I see long and short description for keys in gconf-editor.  These
is no problem here to be solved.

> You don't know Microsoft like I know Microsoft.  Spend a decade or so
> reading legal docs, Findings of Facts, subpoenaed emails, and the like.
> There's a nice start here:

And I've got a network to run!  The reason I can edit a remote Windows
systems configuration via regedit or gpedit (Manage Computer) and have
*GREAT* things like policies and GPOs on that horrible system called
Windows is BECAUSE they have a centralized repository for configuration
information.  Thank God!  Maybe someday the UN*X community will grow out
of its silly "everything  should be a crappy text that only that app can
understand and remote adminsitration involves some crappy hack like
webmin trolling through those stupid text files via regular expressions
and rewriting them while a-hopin'-and-a-prayin' it doesn't muck
something up in the process" attitude.  GConf is one step in that
growth.

>     This really isn't that hard. If you're going to kill someone there
>     isn't much reason to get all worked up about it and angry -- you
>     just pull the trigger. 
>     - Jim Allchin, Microsoft Corp., Sept 18, 1993.  Business as usual.

Rich stupid American jerks saying really stupid things.  Color me
shocked.  Take the e-mail archive of ANY company and I'll show you
things just like it.

> You really think these people have changed? 

No, nothing ever changes.

> > I'd go as far as to say there are no *fundamental* problems with GConf
> > above and beyond the fundamental problems of a hierarchical filesystem.
> > There may be missing features -- it's still only a few years old, after
> > all -- but they're solvable.
> And dotfiles have shaken out the bugs for three decades.  Gee, now
> _that_ can't be any good, toss it out.  Wouldn't do to have any tried
> and true technology around.

Using dotfiles IS a bug.

> > But GConf *does* solve two nearly-fundamental problems with dot-files:
> > 1. Each one uses a separate syntax.
> Really?  Most are pair-assignment,

"Most" - and that is exactly the problem.  And the pair delimiter is?
And nested pairs are represented how?  dot files suck.

>  with some minor variations in theme.
> Knowing the valid settings and their values is the hard part.  There's a
> few variants, but that covers most of 'em.

"most" again.

> > 2. Editing the dot-file doesn't modify the behaviour of
> > already-running applications.
> Samba much?  File-watching isn't *that* hard to implement.

So every-single-app needs to implement file monitoring? (Which by the
way, is really hard to do cross-platform).  Nah, just use GConf, and let
them worry about it - one place to fix bugs.

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