Re: help and caching

[John Fleck <jfleck inkstain net>]

Sander -
Thanks for thinking this through.
I like your suggested solution. Here's my question: If my
sysadmin/distribution has not pre-generated the doc, am I to understand
that no cached version will be saved in
share/gnome/help-generated/$docname/$locale the first time I call the
help file?
I would prefer a solution that caches for repeat visits, though I
recognize the setuid problems of being able to write there.
Cheers,
John

On Wed, 2002-06-12 at 17:22, Sander Vesik wrote:
> 
> So, somehow I got to be the one to write this up. 
> 
> ------- % cut here & --------
> 
> There are presently problems with perfomance in displaying the help, it
> brings about the need for the wraped chapter hacks and multiple .omf files
> for them and there are equaly many and bad problems with several
> alternatives:
> 
> 	* it would not be good to go back from "online" rendered xml
> 	  documents. We would lose scrollkeeper integration, docs would
> 	  not get "built"/would get out of date, and localised docs might
> 	  not get build/included in all cases. Peopel building their own
> 	  packages have to get the doc build tools right, etc.
> 
> 	* a per-user cache residing in a user's home directory would need
> 	  to be very constrained in space and there would probably need to
> 	  be an option to turn it off, and thus its value due to cache
> 	  overruns would be low
> 
> 	* a per-system updated cache would need a setuid program, brings
> 	  about yet another set of adminstrative preferences, and is a
> 	  potential bad source of security issues
> 
> 	* most caching and pre-generation schemes don't allow for a
> 	  simple way to update the docs when newer versiuons of the
> 	  help system/stylesheets are available. 
> 
> Thus the following proposal:
> 
> 	share/gnome/help/$docname/$locale/
> 
> would continue to contain the master versions of documents
> 
> 	share/gnome/help-generated/$docname/$locale
> 
> would contain the pre-rendended document "fragments" in the form of
> sectid.html, which would be used if help is requested for that particular
> doc/locale combination (falling back to C) *if* the timestamp on the file
> is newer than that of the xml document and the stylesheet.
> 
> 	yelp-pregenerate docname locale
> 
> would generate the pre-generated html for the specified doc and locale.
> 
> It would get rid of the perfomance problems with large documents, avoid
> problems when users install a newer version of the program (they would
> just get the help displayed from the xml version), allows distributors to
> ship optional 'doc-accelerator' packs or do the generation at installation
> time, allows for simple space/speed tradeoffs with docs with localisations
> to seldom-used locales, etc. It also avoids having to deal with security
> issues.
> 
> The main downside is that users in large installations are at the mercy
> of the system administrrtor in yet another way. 
> 
> ------ % cut here % -----
> 
> Mainly to kick off the discussion.
> 
> 	Sander
> 
> 	you'll rescue me right?
> 	in the exact same way that they never did
> 	i'll be happy right?
> 	when your healing powers kick in
> 
> 
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> gnome-doc-list mailing list
> gnome-doc-list gnome org
> http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/gnome-doc-list
> 
-- 
John Fleck
jfleck inkstain net (h) jfleck abqjournal com (w)
http://www.inkstain.net http://www.abqjournal.com

"You don't want to die with the music still in you."
 - John Gardner