Re: [Gnu-arch-users] anonymous id

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

>>>>> "Tez" == Tez Kamihira <address@hidden> writes:

    Tez> Aren't there any good way to escape initial "tla my-id" and
    Tez> "tla my-default-archive" and so on....

I don't think so.  You can make it prettier by having a configurator
that asks all the relevant questions and provides help.

However, Tom's choices for the format are clearly adapted to arch's
distributed design (global uniqueness) and to the fact that arch is a
protocol for humans (meaningful ids).  He pushed the principle too far
in some cases (file id tags, where uniqueness is essential but meaning
often merely a distraction -- they are either hidden in .arch-ids or
they live in a comment, so why not have a really meaningful comment
instead of a mandatorily backward-compatibly meaningful, aka "planned
obsolescence", comment?).  But the content of the Creator: field in a
patch log SHOULD be both an identifier for some unique entity and
meaningful to the human reader.

My own preference is for the meaningful identifier to provide a
contact channel, thus the use of a real email address.

    Tez> I think they are quite frustrated things for beginners

So what?  If Tom wanted to cater to beginners, he would have written a
video player.  With skins (cf http://www.jwz.org/docs/linuxvideo.html).

I see every reason to provide a pleasant setup utility cum interactive
tutorial (but I'm not volunteering, at least not today).  However, the
core UI should encourage good practice by making it inconvenient to do
dumb things.

    Tez> as well as experts who have to re-setup or migrate their
    Tez> environments.

I have no sympathy for preventable self-inflicted injury.  What's so
hard about this?

    #!/bin/sh
    export RSYNC_RSH=/usr/bin/ssh
    if test "$1" = "-h"; then echo "usage: $0 address@hidden"; exit 0; fi
    if test -n "$1";     then rsync -r $1:~/.arch-params ~/; fi
    cd ~/.arch-params
    for $i in *; do
      if test -r $i; then
        # =locations is often pretty big
        if test "$i" = "=locations"; then
          echo "* Browsed contents of =locations with 'tla archives | less'."
          tla archives | less
        else
          echo "* Contents of $i:"
          cat $i
        fi
      else
        echo "No readable $i found; maybe you want to create one?"
      fi
    done
    # add any other standard stuff that could be in arch-params
    for i in =id =default-archive =locations =revision-library; do
      if ! test -r $i; then
        echo "No readable $i found; maybe you want to chmod/create it?"
      fi
    done


-- 
Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences     http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp
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