Re: [Openinteract-dev] has_many progress

[Chris W. <ch...@cw...>]

>...
> I think that both links_to and has_many share a fundamental flaw. They
> both allow relationships to be defined from the "other" end, making it
> possible to define conflicting behavior for a single relationship. This
> unnecessarily complicates the error checking or precedence rules and
> the documentation. I think always forcing the relationship to be
> defined by the class with the linking field, and having a single syntax
> (has_a) for defining it, makes for a much simpler, cleaner, more
> consistent, easier to understand/document/implement, less error prone
> design. Including both approaches (e.g. has_many and reverse_auto or
> auto_by), in my opinion, only complicates and confuses things further.

Good point.

> For this reason, I think we should forget trying to make the new syntax
> backward compatible. I think we should leave the old syntax in place
> (but deprecated) as long as necessary for backward compatibility and
> add a completely redesigned new syntax that folks can migrate to
> gradually or as they need the new features. If it were up to me I
> wouldn't touch links_to at all, and I wouldn't touch the old has_a
> either. I'd just add a new configuration handler for the case where the
> key of a 'has_a' spec matches one of the field names, in which case you
> assume it is the new syntax I proposed, otherwise you assume it's a
> class and use the old has_a semantics.

My main concern is that we don't break existing code. Everyone seems to
also be avoiding this so: great.

Next is ensuring that new features are easily implemented, testable and
maintainable. I suspect Ray's right in that overloading existing syntax
will make all of these more difficult.

I'm not against adding new syntax/configuration keys as necessary and if
it takes care of both of these items, it's probably the best option.

> [1]  I confess I never really did understand the purpose of the alias.
> What is the difference between the alias and the class? Isn't one of
> them redundant?

Yes, but IME most humans prefer the alias (e.g., 'news') vs. the class
('MyApp::Persist::News'). Plus it's less typing :-)

Chris

-- 
Chris Winters (ch...@cw...)
Building enterprise-capable snack solutions since 1988.