RE: [alf-dev] ALF SCM Vocabulary compared toWebDAV VersioningExtensions

[Mark Phippard <markp@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

alf-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote on 05/03/2006 11:59:46 AM:

> Re: "failed projects": Doesn't Subversion use WebDAV/Delta-V as its
> client/server protocol? ( http://subversion.tigris.org/webdav-usage.html 
).

That was an intent at one point.  Subversion currently implements WebDAV 
pretty well but it does not have much if any support for DeltaV.  Some of 
the Subversion features were designed with the idea that they might 
eventually head in this direction but that has largely not materialized 
and there has been talk of removing some of those features in the 
interests of optimizing the code for how it is really being used.

> Some might argue with this characterization of WebDAV and JSR-147.

I did not intend to flame those projects.  I think that DeltaV is actually 
quite an achievment.  However, the fact that it has not been adopted is 
undeniable and there has to be a lesson in there somewhere.  I agree that 
we should look to these projects in terms of borrowing the terminology 
they used but I am not sure we should use them for much more.

> But fundamentally, I agree with you. You're making essentially the same
> point I and Tim were making. In the context of ALF, we are only 
concerned
> with the higher-level requests that a non-SCM tool might make of an SCM
> system (e.g., update-workspace, checkin new revisions, etc). If we get
> bogged down in the internal protocols of an SCM system, or in supporting 
the
> functions of an SCM systems (e.g. moving files around, or workspace
> management) then we lose. I was going to make that point right after 
last
> week's meeting: I don't think ALF should be providing 
workspace-management
> services or distributed filesystem services for SCM systems, any more 
than
> it should be providing record/playback services to testing tools. ALF 
really
> needs to focus on the inter-tool interfaces. I was going to write a 
message
> to that effect, but got bogged down in other work instead...

My main concern is that I think we need some kind of high level statement 
that describes what we are really trying to do here so that we can use 
that to limit the scope of this effort.  There are undoubtedly a lot of 
valid SCM actions that we could spend time describing but in reality we 
should be focusing on the ones that are likely to be used within the 
context of an ALF Service flow.  Things like checkout, creating a label, 
gathering history etc... 

Mark



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