Re: Module proposal: dconf

[Martin Meyer <elreydetodo gmail com>]

It sounds like the backend for GSettings is somewhat pluggagle, at
least on a per-platform basis. Can we make this configurable by the
distro people at compile-time or runtime?

Here's my thinking:

1) People may not like whatever storage mechanism is offered by dconf,
so options may be good.

2) Some backends may not be appropriate for some user situations. For
example, NFS-mounted will have special considerations because of the
possible concurrent access problems. Maybe support some sort of
lock-safe database for them.

3) Maybe we could design the system to support fallback/chaining
preference reading: check the primary backend for a setting. If not
present, check the secondary backend; if not present ... so on and so
forth until the last backend to check is the system-wide default
preferences database.

4) Maybe someone could write a (read-only?) backend that supports the
current gconf XML database format. Then it could fit nicely into #3 to
support pseudo-migration. Maybe we could make some sort of flag to
migrate preferences from a secondary preference backend into the
primary preference backend on first read, then (optionally) remove the
original preference.

That would address several of the issues I'm seeing in this thread.

Also, could someone please explain what exactly the dconf settings are
stored as? I've seen hints at some sort of binary form but I'd like it
really spelled out.

- Martin

On Wed, Oct 14, 2009 at 8:00 AM, Rodrigo Moya <rodrigo gnome-db org> wrote:
> On Tue, 2009-10-13 at 23:06 +0200, Luca Ferretti wrote:
>> 2009/10/13 Rodrigo Moya <rodrigo gnome-db org>:
>> >> Ryan is a bit sad to not get feedback on his proposal, so a bit more
>> >> seriously: I think what we probably need is a migration plan. Should we
>> >> move all the code from gconf to dconf in one cycle (if possible)? Should
>> >> apps implement migration for the data in gconf? etc.
>> >>
>> > I think it makes sense to do the migration for all the apps at once.
>>
>> Are we speking about:
>>   a) all GNOME Desktop applications
>>   b) all applications hosted on git.gnome.org
>>   c) all GNOME/GTK+ apps using GConf :)
>>
>> ??
>>
>> Serius: what's the plan for thirdy part applications?
>
> if dconf listens to changes in gconf, 3rd party apps would just need to
> link to glib/GSettings instead of libgconf, and their migration would be
> done automatically, right?
>
>
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