+------ Glenn Fowler wrote (Tue, 3-Oct-2006, 14:46 -0400):
|
| [ I dropped ARC reply addrs ]
And forgive me for not dropping everyone from the cc.
| ... as a user I can't emphasize enough the difference between
| being able to use a unix text applications to maintain
| a collection of configuration files as a unit, and then apply them
| as a unit, vs. point and click for each 1 / ~10K option settings
| for each 1 / ~100 applications
As a sysadmin I concur most strongly. It pains me that these trends
thwart the productive use of all those wonderful Unix text tools,
including preprocessors and version control. Click'n'drool is such a
big step *backwards*. Provide it if you must, but as an alternative to
rather than a replacement for editing text based config files. PLEASE.
| if syntax/validity is an important issue then provide
| command line lint application(s) to weed out errors in bulk
If necessary, some uniform format might be used, e.g. based on tcl or xml.
I personally hate editing xml, but I much prefer that over any binary,
application specific format.
Best Regards (and relurking...),
Chuck
UNIX was not designed to stop you from doing stupid things, because
that would also stop you from doing clever things. -- Doug Gwyn
GUIs normally make it simple to accomplish simple actions and
impossible to accomplish complex actions. -- Doug Gwyn
