on 5/27/03 4:19 PM Sylvain Wallez wrote:...
How is this different from a resource? Resources also allow to define overloaded generators and transformers. So do we really need a new concept ?
Resources were supposed to be reusable pipelines, but *complete* ones! Later, they were implemented to be usable as pipeline fragments but, IMO, they impose some readability problems in the sitemap. The above aims to correct that.
In fact, if the above is introduced, I would deprecate the use of resources that do not have a complete pipeline.
What is the purpose of resources if this new syntax goes into effect (which I like by the way)? What can a resource do that an overloaded pipeline element cannot?
Also, would this add to the learning curve? The docs would need to reflect
overloaded generator contains exactly one generator and one or more transformers
overloaded tranformers contain two or more transformers
overloaded serializers contain one or more transformers and exactly one serializer
Once people grasp the concept of a pipeline and understand it completely, this will be a no-brainer. But I expect there will be a large number of people who will come to the list asking about why their overloaded generator doesn't work because they added a serializer to the definition as in:
<map:generators>
<map:generator name="html" src="tidy stuff"/>
<map:generator name="html">
<map:generator type="html"/>
<map:transformer type="linkrewriter"/>
<map:serializer type="html"/>
</map:generator>
</map:generators>and then
<map:pipeline>
<map:match pattern="foo">
<map:generate type="html" src="foo.html"/>
</map:match>
</map:pipeline>I think the expectation that a "super()" method would be called by overloading the pipeline element is asking for trouble with regard to user confusion.
Personally I would be happy to see the new syntax (pipeline component groups), but is all of the baggage accounted for? Or would clear error messages be sufficient to mitigate major problems?
- Miles Elam
