> I can't help feeling, despite all the work and all the proofs to the > contrary, that someday, somehow, sentinels are going to go away. It will be > the result of a major expansion of point of view. Something like c.db or > c.zodb.
Let's imagine the impossible for awhile. Let's pretend that we don't know what a .leo file is. Let's pretend that we don't know what an external file is (a file derived from an @<file> node). Let's pretend we don't know what a clone is. Let's pretend that we don't know what bzr can do, or rather, let's pretend that bzr can do anything we want :-) Let's pretend that we can *compute* sentinels by magic. The great thing about creativity, and the creative unconscious, is that it loves to be teased. It delights in the impossible, the paradoxical, the illogical. It *loves* confusion, the mess, the not knowing. The great thing about thought experiments is that the impossible is, by definition, possible. The great thing about Leo's community is that contains brilliant designers. People who are not afraid of change, who are not satisfied with what we have, even if what we have is Leo :-) Some of these brilliant designers are great programmers, some can barely write a Python script. No matter. All can confront what is not yet in existence. Given this base, what can we say? Well, if we are to "get rid" of sentinels, then we must compute them. This requires magic. Suppose we "compute" sentinels (or any other needed data) by asking a demon (like Maxwell's demon) for help. Suppose the demon's task is quite simple: it just looks it up in leoDB. Suppose it's not possible to commit anything to bzr without (in effect), committing leoDB. This is magic, but who cares? Suppose no derived file contains any sentinels, except one, at the very start of the file. Something like: #...@leo-db:unique-id-and-timestamp Suppose bzr magically handles conflicting updates to local db's. Alternatively, suppose bzr handles a single, worldwide, leo db. Suppose that we truly don't know what a .leo file is, but whatever it is, it allows us to read derived files, and it provides the outline view we know and love. Suppose that reading a .leo files computes the data that is presently contained in sentinels, using the version of the leo db implied by the single #...@leo-db sentinel in each derived file. Wouldn't this work? Edward --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "leo-editor" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/leo-editor?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
