[geeklog-devel] Story Templates (was Re: About the "internal" and Webservices APIs)

[Joe Mucchiello]

At 03:15 PM 8/11/2007, Oliver Spiesshofer wrote:
>sorry? I dont get your point. I put a featuer up for discussion, not 
>entering into a comeptition with one you proposed some time ago. The 
>fact that I discuss it means that I want other people s input.
>and this IS the gl_dev mailing list, in which core code is discussed...

My point was that the only reason you don't propose doing this as a 
plugin is you have CVS access. There's nothing important about making 
story templates a core function. It's not an indictment; it's an 
observation. I would prefer that geeklog core was streamlined and 
just about everything was a plugin. Stories, topics, comments, all of 
it, out. (Yeah, I should just jump to GL2, right? That's a different issue.)

What did I propose some time ago that you are referring to? I'm not 
talking about any prior work of mine. I'm just pointing out that your 
idea in my opinion is not needed in the core of GL. Since this is the 
mailing list in which core is discussed and I'm a member of the list, 
I'm discussing it.

>>But the ratings plugin isn't supported by core and every upgrade 
>>people using that plugin have to put that ratings_option tag into 
>>every thtml file they want ratings to exist in. (OOo, an idea. See 
>>next email...) So while porting a hack from version to version can 
>>be difficult, porting an extension from version to version is just 
>>annoying. But your proposal isn't any more core-worthy than the 
>>ratings plugin, really.
>again, this is not a competition. we simply have a misunderstanding 
>on what my idea is supposed to do and what it is meant for, 
>therefore any discussion about how to do it seems not really helpful 
>as I know realize.

You are looking to provide templates that will cause stories entered 
at different times by different authors to share a similar look and 
feel. Some story types may have different looks but all stories of 
the same type should be uniform. This isn't rocket science. I'm just 
saying you can accomplish this with the existing template library and 
a few well placed calls. I'm also saying that other than stories and 
staticpages, there's not much other need for this templating system. 
And I'm saying that you can do this through the plugin API without 
modifying core. Have I missed something? I've seen the forum posts 
requesting such a feature and I believe it use to be in the bug 
tracker/feature requests. (Another planning tool missing.) Still, 
doing it as a plugin means sites that don't use it aren't burdened by 
the additional runtime if'ing around the code.

>>I should move this to another thread but I'm lazy. This is not 
>>really directed at Oliver but at the whole core team. Where is the 
>>Geeklog roadmap? How are decisions about adding core functionality 
>>made? Is there a list of projects for 1.4.2? 1.4.3? 1.5? Is there 
>>any architectural guidance? Should Oliver write his idea into the 
>>core or should he write a plugin? Who decides? Roadmaps are 
>>prominently displayed on most OSS webpages. Geeklog's page is 
>>completely silent about it.
>to give you my very personal view on that, the others who are in the 
>core team can confirm this or not. we are not a commercial operation.

There's no reason why a non-commercial group cannot plan ahead. Most 
OSS projects have Roadmaps. Most OSS are not commercial operations. 
Roadmaps are about planning. This goes back to the end of life for 
PHP4 and my comment when that was announced that GL should have an 
announcement that GL 1.5 will be PHP5 only. Or 1.4.2, or 1.4.3? 
Something. There should be a plan.


----
Joe Mucchiello
Throwing Dice Games
http://www.throwingdice.com