The Strengths and Weakness of Fedora/RHEL OS management

[Toshio Kuratomi]

On Tue, 2006-03-28 at 14:37 -0800, Shane Stixrud wrote:
> On Tue, 28 Mar 2006, Toshio Kuratomi wrote:
> 
> >
> > If you look through the following, monster thread you'll find that
> > elektra is a bad choice for the desktop configuration api.  System and
> > desktop configuration requirements are different.  Also, the author of
> > that GConf comparison doesn't seem to understand the problems GConf is
> > attempting to solve which doesn't bode well for it ever displacing
> > GConf.
> 
> If I am not mistaken since that time elektra has developed its backends so 
> that they can import/modify/export data from other systems like gconf so 
> that gnome can continue to depend on gconf while users/admins can have a 
> single method of modifying data.
> 
Hmm... but what is really the goal of the project?  To have a unified
on-disk format?  Or to have a unified API?  Reading through the myriad
posts and Documentation leaves me with the feeling that which one it is
depends on which suits them at the time.  Elektra using a Gconf backend
would give you a unified API -- but if the GConf API is more suitable
for the desktop than Elektra then what are you gaining?

OTOH, if the on-disk-format is what's important (so the system admin can
edit the text files consistently) then Elektra would have to be the
backend for GConf (which is possible, contrary to the implication on 
http://www.libelektra.org/GConf )

> In either case Elektra may very well not be the correct solution, but a 
> technical solution does exist, it may just not of been found/developed 
> yet.  There is a problem to be solved here, I haven't heard anyone argue 
> seriously to the contrary

I think Nicholas Mailhot had an extremely valid point:  The
configuration format (key = value; <key>value</key>; etc) is not a major
stumbling block for a system admin.  It's what the application
developers choose as the name for key and what they fill value with that
make configuration files easy or hard to understand.  Elektra and the
like are seeking to solve a problem that will only marginally aid a
system administrator in editing a config file from a text editor.

-Toshio
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