LAUPRETRE François (P) wrote:
May I say that, on this subject and others, I am quite disappointed by the attitude of people
on this mailing list. I tried to get some reactions about two projects I had been working on
during several months (the Autoload handler and the PHK manager) and the few ones I got were
mostly of the let-us-alone-and-keep-your-f..-ideas-for-you sort... It looks like you are the
only one to understand that the process of getting the classes through corresponding filenames
is quite primitive and can be improved. Even in the Zend framework, they implemented this
stone-aged handler.
Maybe it is normal because the list is regularly polluted by newbies who think they have
solutions for everything when they have been working with PHP for 10 mins.
That's why I have proposed to start a more formal RFC-like process where people who have really
worked on a subject could propose changes and enhancements. This would eliminate the buzz of
newbies and it would also provide a place to keep an history of proposals and decisions. It
would also allow to implement a clean place for polls, instead of the poor process we saw
during the last days about the filter extension. But, for this proposal like others, I didn't
have any reply... Actually, I really think that, on this list, when you do not belong to a
group of about 10-15 gurus, everything you say is systematically rejected. It is sad for PHP
because (I'll get flames for this) this attitude is generally considered as an early
characteristic of organizations on the decline.
As a 'newbie' who has been hanging out on this list (for the most part
quietly) I feel I have to respond to this. This list is not 'polluted'
by newbies - the regular posters to this list are the core PHP developers.
Anyway, to your points. Let's start with your assertion that "the
process of getting the classes through corresponding filenames is quite
primitive and can be improved". The mechanism provided by PHP for
autoloading classes is by no means restricted to mapping classnames to
filenames, but that is the simplest and most common implementation of
__autoload that you will come across. Ever since this functionality was
introduced to PHP I have been using a system that maintains a PHP
include file containing an array of classes and the files they are
defined in. This requires no work from the developers to maintain since,
if it fails to find a class that has been requested it'll kick off a
refresh of that cached file. It only fails completely if that rescan
still cannot find the requested class.
To me this is the logical way to implement functionality within the PHP
engine itself. It doesn't enforce a certain way of implementing your
class to file mapping. Instead it provides the basic framework so you
can implement any mechanism you choose.
As for the opinions of non-gurus being "systematically rejected" there
is an element of truth to that. However, in my experience the "gurus"
generally provide a good explanation of why a particular idea or comment
is being rejected and most of the time it is completely justified. You
have to understand that the "todo" list for PHP is extremely lengthy
which means the devs have a difficult task when it comes to choosing
what idea to implement and how. The fact that most individuals needs
generally don't convert into high priorities is simply down to the fact
that there are limited resources and literally thousands of people
wanting different things to be added/changed.
This is where you can get involved. If you have a particular need, grab
the PHP source, implement it yourself and submit a patch. I've done this
a coupla times, one (pathetically simple patch) was accepted, the other
which was my first attempt highlighted that I did not understand the
inner workings enough to make such a change.
Finally, you suggest that "this attitude is generally considered as an
early characteristic of organizations on the decline". I have to admit
that made me chuckle. I've been lurking on this list for several years
and the "attitude" has not changed much in that time but PHP is still
going strong. Considering what they have achieved using that attitude I
would think twice before criticising it.
Bit of a ramble, sorry about that. Hopefully this won't be taken as a
flame, just a response from an outside observer.
-Stut
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