[PROPOSAL] Excalibur stratification (was Re: Status of Excalibur build)

[Nicola Ken Barozzi <ni...@apache.org>]

Though technically excellent, the dependency checking system is not
something I particularly like.
When I see such dependency, I usually question if the separation in packages
was done well afterall.

IMH(and very personal)O, a jar package from a software module must not have
complex dependencies with another jar package from the same module.
Dependencies should be usually inter-module, not intra-module.

This keeps things cleaner and more manageable.
What's the use of having different dirs, when you still have to build the
code "together"?
It's like recreating by hand something that javac does automatically.

In the spirit of KISS, what I would like to see is a more clear
stratification of excalibur packages: groups of packages are build one on
top of the other. So there would be

excalibur-foundation (basic _excalibur_ framework)
excalibur-dungeons (excalibur utils)
excalibur-castle (excalibur proper)
excalibur-tower (excalibur avvanced features)

Each group is compiled before the other, in a simple and clean manner.

This doesn't mean that you should change the dirs again... it's just the
build.
Packages are assigned to a group and compile that way; there would be only 4
jars, but with a dependency that is much easier to resolve for the excalibur
user.

--
Nicola Ken Barozzi                   nicolaken@apache.org
            - verba volant, scripta manent -
   (discussions get forgotten, just code remains)
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Re: [PROPOSAL] Excalibur stratification (was Re: Status of Excalibur build)

[Jeff Turner <je...@socialchange.net.au>]

The purpose of the breakup was simply to allow certain components to be
used separately. That aim has been achieved; there are now 13
subprojects with *no* dependencies, and 4 or so more with deps on just
Framework/LogKit.

Most current users (like Cocoon) probably don't care about all this, and
can continue to use the standard avalon-excalibur.jar that is built by
typing 'ant' in the root.

So we have now offer flexibility (hordes of little jars) and convenience
(one big jar).

I agree that it's a PITA keeping track of dependencies between lots of
little jars. I think we need a way of sucking in all deps for one
project into one big jar. So if you want, say, datasource, you can have
a jar containing datasource, pool, collections and instrument.
Suggestions for how to do this are welcome.


--Jeff

On Thu, Apr 18, 2002 at 10:12:01AM +0200, Nicola Ken Barozzi wrote:
> Though technically excellent, the dependency checking system is not
> something I particularly like.
> When I see such dependency, I usually question if the separation in packages
> was done well afterall.
> 
> IMH(and very personal)O, a jar package from a software module must not have
> complex dependencies with another jar package from the same module.
> Dependencies should be usually inter-module, not intra-module.
> 
> This keeps things cleaner and more manageable.
> What's the use of having different dirs, when you still have to build the
> code "together"?
> It's like recreating by hand something that javac does automatically.
> 
> In the spirit of KISS, what I would like to see is a more clear
> stratification of excalibur packages: groups of packages are build one on
> top of the other. So there would be
> 
> excalibur-foundation (basic _excalibur_ framework)
> excalibur-dungeons (excalibur utils)
> excalibur-castle (excalibur proper)
> excalibur-tower (excalibur avvanced features)
> 
> Each group is compiled before the other, in a simple and clean manner.
> 
> This doesn't mean that you should change the dirs again... it's just the
> build.
> Packages are assigned to a group and compile that way; there would be only 4
> jars, but with a dependency that is much easier to resolve for the excalibur
> user.
> 
> --
> Nicola Ken Barozzi                   nicolaken@apache.org
>             - verba volant, scripta manent -
>    (discussions get forgotten, just code remains)
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> 

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