Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Archives use cases

[Robert Anderson]

On Tue, 2003-10-07 at 08:00, Clark McGrew wrote:
> On Mon, 2003-10-06 at 23:22, Robert Anderson wrote:
> > On Mon, 2003-10-06 at 10:32, Clark McGrew wrote:
> > > Both of the cases are questions about how to manage the flat arch name
> > > space when there are a large number of categories.
> > 
> > In an abstract sense, the flat name space is completely irrelevant to
> > how you might handle a "large number of categories."
> 
> I'm reminded of the saying, "In theory, theory and practice are the
> same.  In practice, they are different".  The practical question I'm
> trying to grok is how to manage an archive with a large number of
> categories without having brain lock.  Consider doing a "tla categories"
> on a large archive.

It returns a large number of categories, because you HAVE a large number
of categories.  You haven't stated a problem yet.

> For a practical example of the problems created by a large flat
> namespace, on most unix systems you can check a directory listing of
> /usr/lib.  On my system, there are about 1000 names.  Now, summarize the
> libraries by topic and package.

Ok, now we're getting somewhere.  What you want is a mechanism to
organize your categories by some criteria.  Something like "topic."  I
think the most straightforward solution to such organization is to use
different archives for different topics.

> In essence, the problem is "lots of categories".

That's not a problem.  That's a relatively quantity.

A problem looks like "I want to do X, but I can't."

> I'm approaching the problem from an organizational point of view.  How
> should we use TLA so that accidental naming collisions don't happen? 
> How does a user browse all of the categories to find an interesting
> one?  etc.

What kind of "interesting" is the user looking for?  By what criteria
might they be interested in searching?

Bob