Re: [Plastic-devs] Occasionally asked questions

[Mark T. <m.b...@br...>]

On Thu, 23 Nov 2006, Noel Winstanley wrote:

>
> On 23 Nov 2006, at 14:33, Mark Taylor wrote:
>
>> On Thu, 23 Nov 2006, John Taylor wrote:
>> 
>>> Do you think there's anything to be gained in having a prominent FAQ on
>>> Plastic Central that addresses these issues as we encounter them?
>> 
>> good idea.
>> 
>>> I've made a rough start (attached, without css)  - if anyone wants to add
>>> something (or indeed, thinks it's a rubbish idea), then let me know.
>> 
>> I find the "it's not Java-centric honest" rhetoric to be slightly
>> disingenuous: what is true is that the hub has to be written in Java
>> (um, unless you want to try to fake Java RMI-Lite communications from
>> Python ... good luck).  I'm not sure whether you're avoiding emphasis
>> of this fact in order to serve the greater good, or if it's an oversight.
>> 
>
> does / should the plastic spec mandate that java-rmi must be supported in a 
> valid implementation of a hub?
> an xml-rpc hub could certainly be written in python.

that's certainly true - the only part of PLASTIC which requires Java
is support for the java RMI protocol in the hub.  If that protocol
were made optional, then a hub could be written in any language.

It's also true of course that this isn't a concern of application authors,
only hub authors - you should indeed emphasise that there's nothing 
java-like that people writing PLASTIC client applications has to do.

Mark

-- 
Mark Taylor   Astronomical Programmer   Physics, Bristol University, UK
m.b...@br... +44-117-928-8776 http://www.star.bris.ac.uk/~mbt/