Re: [Emc-users] Need someone better than I... (cry for assistance)

[Ray H. <re...@up...>]

Mark.

On Thursday 25 September 2003 04:42 pm, Markwayne wrote:
> If you are going to use tickle I cant help you. I dont tickle.

Several of us can write the tickle code pretty easily if folk will help 
with the logic of the process.  Tickle would have the advantage in the 
emc environment of being there already.  

<snip>
> (who hates complexity, especially complexity that attempts to hide
> other complexity - Keep It Simple!)

Yes, I'm with this idea as well but the fact is that a lot of folk have 
great difficulty with the ini file -- in spite of the 40 plus pages 
available to help.  I guess that is why I like the kernel config.  Every 
line has a help button.  Not all of them have something real to say but 
if we wrote it, we would have no one to blame but ourselves.

This will get much more difficult as we move into the HAL and add in 
ClassicLadder or some such IO program.  The additional configuration 
parameters will get very long and the relationships between will get very 
complex.  A state diagram of each noodle in a bowl of spaghetti may be 
trivial by comparison. 

> And as the config quirks and complexitys are sorted out the
> configurator program would change to match.

This is the scariest part of doing a configurator.  The one I wrote 
several years ago took a current generic.ini as it's model.  That way no 
matter what changed in the ini, the configurator could at least read and 
write it while at the same time helping with stuff that had gone before.  
Nothing changes by itself.  All changes require time and effort.

With a dedicated configurator we will need to version it right along with 
each version of the ini.  And INI does not get satisfactorily versioned 
right now.  The person responsible for a change in configuration, 
anywhere within the emc would have to take the responsibility for 
updating the config system.  Now that ought to be a threatening thought!

Ray