schema updates and changes

[Patrick Wagstrom <wagspat iit edu>]

Hi all,

So I've been working on my license work, and it's coming along nicely,
although it seems like my research is conspiring to keep me from
finishing this.   Anyway, I've got a rather simple question.

In the past it's been mentioned that the schema is generally regarded as
more or less stable now, but that doesn't mean it won't change.  For
example, I've changed it to add license support to F-Spot.

Is there a way in F-spot to tell what version of the schema you're
using?  Right now it appears that each component just creates the tables
when they start up if they're not there.  This doesn't seem like it will
lend itself nicely if we need to change he schema at some time.

I was thinking we could implement something like what MythTV has.  A
field is stored in the database with information about what version of
the schema is in use.  If the system starts up and see that it's running
on an older schema, it automatically updates the schema.  This would
allow F-Spot to deal with larger changes in the schema automagically in
the future.

Am I missing something in F-Spot?  Any thoughts on whether or not this
is a good idea?

Thanks,

Patrick