Re: [Simplog-devel] Request for Comments

[Jeremy A. <ash...@13...>]

Jim Hu wrote:
> I'm concerned that 1 and 2 both have the "too much code to master" 
> problem.  I'd like to help more on #3, but I understand the problem 
> totally.
using a framework should remove the need to get in and look at the code 
for anyone using the app.  The engine its running on top of shouldn't 
need to be looked at and tweaked. That's the whole point of using a 3rd 
party framework or application.  All one would need to understand is the 
module API (in drupal's case) or the process for adding a new 
helper/plugin/whatever under another framework.  Currently, extending 
any functionality in 0.9 is a pain in the ass.  It shouldn't be.  That's 
why I want to move to a modular approach.
> The thing that drew me to Simplog in the first place is that the code 
> base was simple enough for me, as a relative newbie, to get in there 
> and tweak it.  I'm concerned that the whole app framework approach is 
> moving away from the Simple part of Simplog.  I looked at Drupal for 
> another project - perhaps not hard enough - but in the end I just 
> didn't want to deal with all of the baggage that they've accumulated, 
> and learning their way of doing things.
The "simple" in Simplog is for the end user who is using the app.  
Download, installation, integration and use should be a simple as 
possible.  That's the overriding mission I set out to accomplish.  For 
most, this should be a black box solution.  You shouldn't have to know 
anything about PHP or programming in order to use Simplog.  As far as 
implementing this solution goes, I want to make it easier for any 
developer to be able to add functionality.  The easiest way I see this 
is to use a module/plugin based backend.  The MVC baased frameworks can 
so this, but it is pretty complex.  Drupal has an very powerful module 
API that has a slight learning curve, but is very well documented and 
has plenty of online tutorials and resources for beginners.  They also 
already have almost everything implemented that is already in Simplog. 
> Something I may have missed - which may have led to not offering you 
> enough help - is a discussion of what the application framework 
> actually is.  What does it need to do, and how can the task of 
> building it be divided up among the rest of us so we can help you 
> more.  Are you stuck on #3 because there are too many things that need 
> to be in it?  Or maybe somewhat less flexibility would be acceptable 
> for 1.0...
I've basically been writing an application framework from scratch, based 
on the original proof of concept I did a while back.  Its a completely 
module based system.   I've been working on the authentication and 
permissions modules, and the event handling system (so "events" can be 
triggered within function that other functions register to "handle" so 
modules can interact with one another).  The whole thing is turning out 
to be more complex that I originally thought and I've just not had the 
time to put into it to finish it.  I didn't want to release it for 
general development until I at least had a working framework with 
authentication and access control working and a couple of dummy 
modules.  Then others could build the main functional modules for the 
application.  All in all i'm thinking this will take to long to do.

Thruthfully, the current codebase is an ugly set of hacks to achieve a 
purpose and is just getting too big to be useful to me as a developer 
anymore.  A clean base is needed in order for this project to move 
forward.  The current code is GPL'd, so anyone is more than welcome to 
fork off another project, but simplog needs to have a solid base to be 
built on.