HelloAdrian, in my opinion it would be better to leave the data model as is, but improve the descriptions of the types (and documentation, in the form of comments to xml data) and also enhnce our utils to deal with types (the Product already has something in place).
Regards, Jacopo On Oct 1, 2012, at 8:14 AM, Adrian Crum wrote: > I mentioned this once before as part of another discussion, but I'm creating > a new discussion so it can receive the attention it deserves. > > The Data Model Resource Book describes entity subtypes. OFBiz implements > entity subtypes by adding a field to the supertype that points to a *Type > entity that contains valid subtypes. > > The problem is users (and some developers) do not understand that pattern, > and they add invalid subtypes to the *Type entity. That can cause things to > break. As an example, I have a client who created additional ProductTypes > (that actually represented product categories) and used those added > ProductTypes for their products. Then they were puzzled why their order > fulfillment process stopped working. > > I think what we need is an EntitySubtype entity to store the subtype data. > Instead of multiple *Type entities, we would have a single EntitySubtype > entity, and the supertypes will point to it. The supertype field could be > called something like entitySubtypeId. The EntitySubtype entity will be > clearly documented as to its purpose and proper use. > > EntitySubtype > ------------- > entityName* > entitySubtypeId* > description > > What do you think? > > -Adrian >
