On Mon, 20 Aug 2001, Robin Berjon wrote:
> On Monday 20 August 2001 04:12, Rich Bowen wrote:
> > Bah, now I can't find the article in the archived. Basically he said
> > that 3-level names (foo::bar::baz) were unnecessarily hard to find,
> > and did not do anything to improve the situation. I'm still looking
> > for the actual postings, and I can't figure out where I saw them.
> > Skud, do you recall where that discussionwas?
>
> I've heard this 3-level names argument several times from several different
> people, but I still fail to understand what's so wrong with them. I never
> noticed that they were hard to find, and for some vast namespaces (eg Date) I
> think that they provide a nice partitionning. In fact, I feel that
> restricting namespaces to two levels makes things actually harder to find, I
> prefer a nice conceptual "hashing" over an n-page long sequential search.
Except that CPAN does not work that way. That is, all Date::* module
appear on one page, regardless of how deep the namespace is. (Note to
those that take umbrage at comments about CPAN. I am just stating the
way that things are, not making a judgment call about that state of
affairs.) So, within a particular "top level domain", we have a flat
namespace, with some names just longer than others. There is already a
Date::Convert::FrenchRevolution, but it appears in the main Date::
directory with everything else.
If there were a subdirectory structure, I agree, things might be
rather easier to find, *if* there were a naming structure that we
could get people to agree with, and more importantly, adhere to.
Apparently, however, it also makes the CPAN/PAUSE code more
complicated. I don't know, having never looked at that code. Likewise,
I don't know how files are placed in directories. I would assume that
it would just s!::!/!g on the module name, but I don't know all the
intricacies involved. And I'm reluctant to make a change to my modules
if I don't have the support of folks that are willing to back me up in
the change, if/when others think it was an intrinsically bad thing to
do.
--
Rich Bowen - [EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.rcbowen.com/kenya/
