Re: Module submission SanCattan

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
> 
> Currently, in my plan, SanCattan contains three sub-modules,
> SanCattan::Totoken(tokenizer), SanCattan::KeywordExtor(keyword
> extractor), and SanCattan::DocClassifier(document classfier). At
> this stage, they are all designed for Mandarin first.
> 
> I checked the module list, but I didn't find a module specified for
> Information Retrieval in Mandarin. So, I guess I can have a new
> namespace.
> 
> p.s. It's my second time filling in this form.

Hrm, should it be under Lingua::, since it's language specific?  That's
where we usually put non-English modules, but I'll admit that this one
is a slightly odd case.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"I have this horrid mental image... Richard Stallman meets the Spice Girls."
"What, 'If you wanna use my software, you gotta share with your friends.'?"
-- Benno and Bron (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Devel::TraceCalls, Devel::TraceSAX

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
> I'm thinking of dropping the below in to the Devel:: namespace; feedback
> (on that and on anything in the modules themselves).

They sound like reasonable names to me, and at least Devel::TraceCalls
sounds pretty damn useful to me too :)

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Fist it. It's my solution to everything."
-- Penny (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Module submission String::Trim

[Kirrily Robert]

Ricki writes:
> The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
> 
>   modid:   String::Trim

How on earth is this worth writing a whole module for?  Surely it's a
single line of Perl to do what this module would do? 

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Fist it. It's my solution to everything."
-- Penny (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Pod::Constants

[Kirrily Robert]

Sam writes:
>
>Has this already been done?
>
>NAME
>   Pod::Constants - Include constants from POD

I don't know, but will it solve the eternal $VERSION problem?

That is, can I use it to include the version number in the documentation
without having to maintain it in two places simultaneously?

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Bron in a short skirt and crop top: 'What's that?' 'It's my sexual
 harrassment suit.'" -- Jai (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: VOTE 1 PHILIP NEWTON

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>Vote 1 Philip Newton for the [EMAIL PROTECTED] cabal!

ping?

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Even had to open up the case and gaze upon the hallowed peace that 
graced the helpdesk that day." -- Megahal (trained on asr), 1998-11-06

Re: Module submission Games::NDGOL

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>Kirrily Robert wrote:
>> 
>> In perl.modules, you wrote:
>> >
>> >The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
>> >
>> >  modid:   Games::NDGOL
>> >  DSLIP:   bdpOg
>> >  description: Conway's game of life in N dimensions
>> >  userid:  GUIDOPIAN (Steve Piantadosi)
>> >  chapterid:   23 (Miscellaneous_Modules)
>> >  communities:
>> 
>> I'd prefer Games::Life::NDimension or even Games::Life::ND
>> 
>
>What about Games::Life::NDim.
>It's short, but not cryptic (ND doesn't tell me anything,
>and NDimension is so long :-) )

Yeah, I can cope with that :)

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Mutate now - avoid the rush.

Re: Module submission Convert::Cyr

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
>
>  modid:   Convert::Cyr
>  DSLIP:   aucfg
>  description: Convert::Cyr, chcp-change cyrillic code page
>  userid:  KDOULEPOV (Konstantin A. Doulepov)
>  chapterid:   17 (Archiving_and_Compression)
>  communities:
>comp.lang.perl.*
>
>  similar:
>
>  rationale:
>
>There is need to place it into Convert:: namespace because of
>nature of conversion that program uses.

I don't understand you.  What do you mean by "chcp-change cyrillic code
page"?

There is already a Lingua::RU::Charset ... is yours the same?  If it is
different, how does it differ?  This may help us choose a good name.

Also, why did you choose for it to go in the "Archiving and Compression"
chapter of the modules list?

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Mutate now - avoid the rush.

Re: Module submission P4

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
>
>  modid:   P4
>  DSLIP:   bdpOb
>  description: Easy to use OO interface to Perforce SCM
>  userid:  SMEE (Tony Smith)
>  chapterid:3 (Development_Support)
>  communities:
>
>  similar:
>P4::Client

Hrm.  We already have a VCS:: namespace in which there are a number of
Perl interfaces to version control systems.  Your P4 module should
probably live under there somewhere, rather than opening up a new (and
cryptic) toplevel.

(Dumb question: Is PVCS the same as Perforce?)

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Monday's tape's in a lot of people's universes, respect flows one way
and one way and one way only.
-- Megahal (trained on asr) 2000-01-30

Re: New module Tasks

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>I expected the extra work would come when somebody answers them after
>the submission that the name is inappropriate. Currently answering is
>the only way to veto a namespace. Any admin can approve by clicking,
>nobody can disapprove without voicing an opinion. That seems
>reasonable to me.
>
>Can you suggest a different procedure?

Perhaps I'm a control freak or something (OK, I *know* I'm a control
freak) but I'm concerned that we can add a namespace with a single
click, even if there hasn't been adequate discussion.  That is, silence
is considered to be assent, and can lead to namespace creation, but in 
fact that silence could just mean that everyone's busy with other work, 
or people put it in their "too hard" basket, or something.  And it's
pretty hard to revoke or change a namespace once it's in there.

I want to see a list of "here's what hasn't been discussed yet" so I can
go through and send email to most of them with "This looks fine" or
sometimes "This looks dodgy for these reasons, please fix".  Only after
a "this looks fine" should the namespace actually be approved.

Sure, it's extra work, but with a good system in place I could have it
send out form letters easily.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Democracy has detected that you're an anarchist.  You must reboot
your society to complete this operation." -- Malcolm Ray, in asr

Re: New module HTML::ParseBrowser

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>The next version of the Module List will list the following module:
>
>  modid:   HTML::ParseBrowser
>  DSLIP:   bdpOp
>  description: OO User Agent string parser
>  userid:  DODGER (Seán Cannon)
>  chapterid:   15 (World_Wide_Web_HTML_HTTP_CGI)
>  enteredby:   ANDK (Andreas J. König)
>  enteredon:   Sat Oct 13 08:30:35 2001 GMT
>
>The resulting entry will be:
>
>HTML::
>::ParseBrowserbdpOp OO User Agent string parser  DODGER

Shirley this should be under HTTP:: or something, not HTML?

Andreas, is the backlog being QA'd as you go through it, or is stuff
just being added indiscriminately?

(yet another reason I'd like a request tracker in place ... we could see
any correspondence (or lack thereof) related to a particular request,
all in one place.)

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Democracy has detected that you're an anarchist.  You must reboot
your society to complete this operation." -- Malcolm Ray, in asr

Re: New module Net::SMS::Web

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>The next version of the Module List will list the following module:
>
>  modid:   Net::SMS::Web
>  DSLIP:   adpOp
>  description: generic module for sending SMS via web
>  userid:  AWRIGLEY (Ave Wrigley)
>  chapterid:5 (Networking_Devices_IPC)
>  enteredby:   ANDK (Andreas J. König)
>  enteredon:   Fri Oct 12 08:35:36 2001 GMT
>
>The resulting entry will be:
>
>Net::SMS::
>::Web adpOp generic module for sending SMS via web   AWRIGLEY

Shirley this should be WWW::SMS?

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Democracy has detected that you're an anarchist.  You must reboot
your society to complete this operation." -- Malcolm Ray, in asr

Re: New module XML::Clean

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>> On Thu, 11 Oct 2001 16:03:13 +0200, Petr Kubanek <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said:
>
>  > Please, prove, if new version is OK..I can't still see it on CPAN
>  > module list.
>
>The next version of the module list is still a few days away, I'm
>still catching up on new submissions. But the CPAN shell already has
>the new data:

How often does the module list get published?  Is it a manual or an
automated process?  If manual, can it be automated?

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
I prefer to remain anomalous.

Re: PAUSE IDs (was Re: Perl)

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.community.perlmongers.london, you wrote:
>On Mon, 15 Oct 2001, Newton, Philip wrote:
>
>> Mark Fowler wrote:
>> > problems getting a PAUSEID so I can upload Open Source stuff
>> What problems are you running into?
>
>Not so much problems as complete silence.
>http://www.xray.mpe.mpg.de/cgi-bin/w3glimpse/modules?query=p3p&errors=0&case=on&maxfiles=100&maxlines=30

OK, there are two issues here.  The first is just getting you a PAUSE
ID, and the main issue is probably that you requested an ID for a
group/company, and PAUSE IDs are usually meant to be for individuals,
not groups.  This is a policy decision, and someone with more experience
will have to answer than me will have to deal with this.  Andreas?

The second is the naming of your module.  The quick answer is, we don't
like people opening up new toplevel namespaces unless it's for something
that's recognised as a biggish category of well known stuff, and/or
something which has no place else to go.  We also aren't too keen on
cryptic acronyms at the top level.  Whether "P3P" is cryptic or not, I
don't know.  It's a W3C standards-track-thingy, but that doesn't
necessarily mean much.

So.  You suggested XML::P3P, which I'd be OK with, except that we're
unsure whether XML::* is the right place to put implementations of
specific XML schemas.  I think we're leaning in the "no" direction...
XML::* should probably be for generic XML modules.

I'd tend towards something in the WWW::* hierarchy, I think.  How do you
feel about that?

K.


-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"All bow before the pointiness of Skud."
-- ESR (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Module submission Unicode::Lite

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>On Sun, Oct 07, 2001 at 02:33:16AM -0400, Kirrily Robert wrote:
>> In perl.modules, you wrote:
>> >
>> >The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
>> >
>> >  modid:   Unicode::Lite
>> 
>> Why "Lite"?  Why not "Light"?  Or why not "Simple" which is the usual
>> suffix for simplified versions of more complex modules.
>
>Really ? Try looking on CPAN
>
>http://search.cpan.org/search?mode=module&query=Lite

Uh.

My CPAN shell's been playing up.  I did a m/Lite/ and got nothing back.
*sigh*

I'll go kick it.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Documentation is the castor oil of programming.  Managers know it must 
be good because the programmers hate it so much.

Re: Module submission Data::html2results

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>> I have the impression you're taking a namespace for a function.
>> Wouldn't it be more logical to have a class HTML::DataConvert or some
>> such and have mthods in there that accomplish all related tasks.
>>
>> There's certainly more than one possible name for such a class, but
>> HTML::DataConvert is the first that comes to my mind.
>
>It might sound like an easy thing to convert html to an array of arrays,
>but I assure you it takes more than a simple method.  The object model
>works well I think.  I just counted and I have 18 subroutines, and it will
>be more once I pull some subroutines from some other shared code that I
>have.  The object method also works well for handling user preferences of
>which there can be several.

Take a look at HTML::TreeBuilder.  I get the feeling this has been done
before, and possibly better.  (I hold the author of HTML::TreeBuilder in
high regard.)

>I would say that in following conventions, perhaps HTML2Results
>would be better for the namespace, case wise, and perhaps it should go
>into the HTML node.  It really is the sister module for results2html which I
>also recently requested.  If you think they should both go into HTML, I
>would be fine with that, but I think Data is a better place for them since
>it is more an array of arrays thing then an html thing.

No.  It's mostly an HTML thing.  Just about *everything* in Perl is
about arrays and other data types if you think of it like that, but that
doesn't mean we put all our modules under Data::

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Documentation is the castor oil of programming.  Managers know it must 
be good because the programmers hate it so much.

Re: Module submission Devel::Constants

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>  rationale:
>
>Devel::Constants captures constant declarations (with the constant
>pragma), allowing values to be resolved to their symbols at runtime.
>It has a special method to resolve bitwise flag markers, such as
>those found in a TCP packet.
>
>This can be very convenient when dealing with users -- names are
>more convenient than magic numbers, which is why constant
>declaration is possible in the first place.
>
>The Perlmonks discussion used a namespace related to the 'constant'
>pragmata. The current suggestion seems more appropriate, as the
>scope of the module has expanded somewhat.

I've read this through three times and I still don't understand what
you're talking about.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Documentation is the castor oil of programming.  Managers know it must 
be good because the programmers hate it so much.

Re: Module submission MNG

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
>
>  modid:   MNG
>  DSLIP:   cd+Op
>  description: Perl I/F to the MNG library from Gerard Juyn
>  userid:  MOTT (David Mott)
>  chapterid:   18 (Images_Pixmaps_Bitmaps)

We're not too keen on opening up new top-level namespaces, especially
not for single modules.  Can you think of an existing namespace to put
this in?  Something like Graphics::MNG?

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"My perl script called me a boring turd. That means it's working."
-- Richard Canning beta-tests Netizen's perl training

Re: Request for PAUSE userid

[Kirrily Robert]

On Tue, Oct 09, 2001 at 08:34:26PM +0900, Keiichiro Nagano wrote:
| Hi, Mr. Robert.

Mr. Robert is my father.  I'm Ms. Robert.

| > I think that Crypt::Memfrob is best.  We don't need to support gratuitous
| > compatibility with legacy languages ;) ... we're aiming at *Perl*
| > programmers here after all, and I think if I were looking for encryption 
| > or bogo-encryption routines I'd look in Crypt:: 
| 
| OK I see.  I'll call it Crypt::Memfrob.  Thank you for your advices,
| Mr. Koenig and Mr. Robert.

You're welcome.

K.

Re: Module submission Games::NDGOL

[Kirrily Robert]

On Mon, Oct 08, 2001 at 12:50:52PM -0700, Steve Piantadosi wrote:
| 
|  Ok, can I use Games::Life::NDimension  ?

Works for me.

K.

Re: Module submission Games::NDGOL

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
>
>  modid:   Games::NDGOL
>  DSLIP:   bdpOg
>  description: Conway's game of life in N dimensions
>  userid:  GUIDOPIAN (Steve Piantadosi)
>  chapterid:   23 (Miscellaneous_Modules)
>  communities:

I'd prefer Games::Life::NDimension or even Games::Life::ND

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Emergency Firewall Kit - Light matches & place under bricks to activate."
-- thorfinn and bekj (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: java classfile reading modules naming

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>Hullo. I ask the module naming gods for advice. 

BOW, SUPPLICANT!

>Here is my goat.

Ewww.  We don't know *where* it's been.  You did at least keep it away
from Greg, didn't you?

>I'm about to finish writing a module which parsers Java .class files
>and reports the structure of the file by returning an object
>containing all information in the file: constants, methods, actual JVM
>bytecode etc. The module will eventually expose JVM bytecodes and,
>well, things to make a Perl / Parrot JVM implementation possible.
>
>The Classfile is strictly part of the JVM and not of Java, so my best
>guess so far is JVM::ClassFile. I'm not a big fan of modules named
>..Parser, as surely everything does that these days (that's worse
>than having XML:: everything). However, JVM:: is a new namespace
>(there's already Jvm though, should I use that instead?).
>
>OK, basically, my question is: Is JVM::ClassFile ok?

Seems moderately reasonable to me at first glance, but let's go digging.

The Jvm module you mention is a single module, not a hierarchy.  And
it's not in the modules list, which means it's not an "approved" name,
for what that's worth.

There is already a Java:: ... why isn't it under Language:: with all the
other languages?  (well, with *some* of the other languages).  There's
also an Inline::Java::JVM, for what it's worth.

IMO, Java should be under Language::Java, but that's unlikely to happen
at this point.  However, wherever the Java modules are, I believe that
your module belongs with them.  Sure, the JVM is separate to the Java
language, but there's such a strong connection between the two that it
doesn't seem to be worth two toplevel namespaces.

So I'd say that your module should be Java::JVM::Classfile.

K.

Re: Module submission System2

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>  modid:   System2
>  rationale:
>
>this is an easier and 'cheaper' alternative to using open3 to
>getting stderr as well as stdio from a child process.

Is "system2" the common Unix name for this feature?  If so, I approve
the name.  If, however, it's just your own way of saying "this is
another way of doing System" I'd suggest System::Whatever (where
"whatever" is the distinguishing feature of your module as compared to
System, eg "Fast" or "Simple" or whatever.)

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
The latest politico-sexual minority: Bisexual separatists

Re: Module submission GMIME

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
>
>  modid:   GMIME
>  DSLIP:   cdcOl
>  description: GMIME - module for MIME handling
>  userid:  MAKLER (Piotr Klaban)
>  chapterid:   19 (Mail_and_Usenet_News)
>  communities:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] on 18 Jan 2001 08:39:38 +0100 (msg04115.html)
>
>I do not know what name whould be reasonable. MIME is already taken
>;-) and short name would be best. But I would accept MIME::GMIME
>(MIME::GMIME::objname). I have asked in
>http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/msg04115.html but
>nobody answered about the name.

What does the G in GMIME stand for?  Is it an easily recognisable name
that people will know to look for, or is it (as it seems) somewhat
arbitrary and obscure?

Your earlier message says that this is an XS implementation, and that
it's faster than the existing MIME tools.  Is this its only (or main)
point of distinction?  If so, I'd go for a name like MIME::Fast::* or
something.  (Some people might suggest MIME::XS::* but we like to make
the name match the *features* not the specific *implementation*).

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
The latest politico-sexual minority: Bisexual separatists

Re: Module submission Software::Packager

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
>
>  modid:   Software::Packager
>  DSLIP:   cdpOp
>  description: Common API for packaging software
>  userid:  RBDAVISON (R Bernard Davison)
>  chapterid:3 (Development_Support)
>  communities:

Whoa, I think you're a) reinventing the wheel, and b) probably giving
your wheel an inappropriate name anyway :)

Michael Schwern's currently working on Archive::Any (a wrapper around
Archive::Zip and friends, I believe) so you might want to talk to him.

Even if you do go ahead with your module, I'd suggest *not* putting it
in the Software:: namespace.  We don't have any such top-level namespace
at the moment, and this doesn't seem like an adequate reason to start
one.  Also, "Software" isn't the important thing about your module (hey,
*every* module is about software, in a sense); "Packaging" is the
important thing.  Now, it happens that we don't have a top-level
Package:: namespace anyway, but we do have Archive:: which serves the
same kind of purpose.  That's why I'm suggesting you go for
Archive::Something.

K.


-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
The latest politico-sexual minority: Bisexual separatists

Re: Request for PAUSE userid

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>Hi, Mr. Koenig.
>
>At 06 Oct 2001 10:36:57 +0200,
>Andreas J. Koenig wrote:
>>  >> I've implemented 'memfrob' bogo-encryption(?) routine provided
>>  >> with GNU libc. It is written in 100% pure Perl, so with this
>>  >> library, you can frobnicate and defrobnicate strings without
>>  >> glibc.
>>  >> 
>>  >> I will name it String::Memfrob.
>> 
>> Maybe Crypt::Memfrob?
>
>I think we should call it String::Memfrob.  Because, in glibc,
>memfrob(3) is provided by , not .

I think that Crypt::Memfrob is best.  We don't need to support gratuitous
compatibility with legacy languages ;) ... we're aiming at *Perl*
programmers here after all, and I think if I were looking for encryption 
or bogo-encryption routines I'd look in Crypt:: 

For example, I'd look for a rot13 module in Crypt:: before anywhere
else.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Non-linear, far from equilibrium, and strangely attractive...

Re: Module submission Apache::Gallery

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>I choose the Apache namespace since the gallery is implemented as a
>mod_perl handler. It seems like all other mod_perl applications on
>CPAN are in the Apache namespace.

Yuh, sounds analogous to Apache::MP3.  I have no problems with this
name.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Non-linear, far from equilibrium, and strangely attractive...

Re: Module submission Unicode::Lite

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
>
>  modid:   Unicode::Lite

Why "Lite"?  Why not "Light"?  Or why not "Simple" which is the usual
suffix for simplified versions of more complex modules.  Not that I know
that's what you're doing, since you didn't bother to fill in the
form completely.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Non-linear, far from equilibrium, and strangely attractive...

Re: Reserving namespace for RT (Request Tracker)

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>> On Wed, 3 Oct 2001 19:24:40 -0400, Jesse Vincent <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said:
>
>  > Heya modules folks,
>
>  >RT is a trouble ticketing system in use at several thousand sites
>  > around the world. most of RT is perl modules in the RT:: namespace.   Might
>  > I be able to reserve the RT:: namespace for RT and related modules?
>
>In general, we do not encourage two-letter acronyms as top level
>namespaces. 
>
>Don't you have a nicer top-level idea? Maybe Tasks::RT?

No, RT's in that category of "complex applications with lots of modules"
that makes sense to have a top-level namespace, and it's been going
under the name of "RT" for years and years and years.  It's pretty well
known and has quite a following in the Perl community.  I think this one
is reasonable, as the "RT" is the name of a well known application
rather than just a random acronym.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Is that the time? Damn this hack mode shit."
"Yeah, it's terrible."
-- Benno, Thorfy (from the Netizen quotes file)

Fwd: Taking over Apache::RedirectDBI

[Kirrily Robert]

--- Begin Message ---

I download Apache::RedirectDBI and modified it in order to get the
functionallity I needed.
I kept the orginal functionality.  Subsequently, I emailed the authers, who
stated that I could take over the updates to the module.   The following is an
email exchange:
=
Hi George,
Thanks for getting in touch again.
Apache::RedirectDBI provided something that was needed at the time, but for 
which I have no future need, so I'd be very happy to tranfer CPAN ownership 
to you - not sure exactly how that works, but I'll do what I need to do to 
make it happen.
I'm happy for you to handle any announcements (and anything else) in the way 
you see fit.
Hope this all sounds OK.
Michael
-Original Message- 
From: George Sanderson [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] 
Sent: Thursday, September 27, 2001 10:46 PM 
To: Michael Smith; [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
Subject: Apache::RedirectDBI mod

I needed something close to what Apache::RedirectDBI provided.
I modified version 0.01 to allow it to get the URI from a DB field and then 
also to be able to do an external REDIRECT.
The original functionality of the module was maintained.
I think others would benefit from the new capabilities.
I am willing to take over the module if you are willing to work with me to 
do the CPAN transfer.
Please, let me know and I will pursue the CPAN update. Let me know up 
front, how you want me to handle any anouncements or what ever wishes or 
objections that you may have. 
++ 
| George Sanderson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 
| http://www.xorgate.com 
++
http://www.iii.co.uk 
Interactive Investor International is a leading UK Internet personal 
finance service that provides individuals with the capability to identify, 
compare, monitor and buy online a number of financial products and services.
Interactive Investor Trading Limited, a subsidiary of Interactive Investor 
International plc, is regulated by the SFA.
=

How do we go about shifting the ownership of the module to myself?


++
| George Sanderson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
| http://www.xorgate.com
++


--- End Message ---

Re: Request Tracker

[Kirrily Robert]

On Mon, Sep 24, 2001 at 04:39:19PM -0700, Kurt D. Starsinic wrote:
| > 
| > No sodding way.  We use it at work and it's a complete pile of crap.
| > 
| > To put it bluntly.
| 
| Could you be a little less specific?  Given your response, we almost
| have half a snowball's chance in hell of coming up with something that
| suits your needs.

OK, in short:

1) difficult to configure
2) poor email integration
3) unattractive and unusable user interface
4) the code's a mess, hard to work with if you want to change stuff

The worst part, though, is the poor email integration.  I don't think
it's much good for auto-generating bugs in response to email to a set of
specified addresses, and it's hard to update a bug by email.  

Imagine having to manually open a bug for each request that came into
[EMAIL PROTECTED], by pointy-clicking in this nasty web interface.  Then
imagine deciding that you wanted to automate it and hook it into PAUSE,
but it turned out to be a scary collection of random Perl scripts with
no consistent database interface or anything.

Just don't go there.

I recommend RT2, the main benefits of which are:

a) good email integration
b) clean underlying code in OO Perl
c) the author is a Perl community type, hangs out on #perl, and will
offer good support.  There's also a strong RT user community among the
#perl crowd.

K.

Re: Request Tracker

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>On and before Mon, Sep 17, 2001 at 09:54:20PM -0400, Kirrily Robert
>(amongst others) requested a request tracker for [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>What about Bugzilla?  I'd be happy to set up and maintain a product
>on http://bugs.zevils.com/ .   --Matt

No sodding way.  We use it at work and it's a complete pile of crap.

To put it bluntly.

K.


-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"So i get the chance to reread my postings to asr at times, with a
corresponding conservation of the almighty leviam00se, Kai Henningsen."
-- Megahal (trained on asr), 1998-11-06

Re: Module Submissions - Gentle Poking

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>A couple of months ago (July 24th), I submitted namespace requests for
>Net::OSCAR and Parse::ABNF.  Haven't heard anything since.  Did they
>get lost in the shuffle or are you folks just a bit backlogged?  In
>the thread "Request Tracker", Skud said it takes up to a week and to
>give a gentle poking if you haven't heard anything by then.

Oops, I see on further examination that Andreas has gone through and
caught up with a heap of backlog.  Yay!

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"So i get the chance to reread my postings to asr at times, with a
corresponding conservation of the almighty leviam00se, Kai Henningsen."
-- Megahal (trained on asr), 1998-11-06

Re: Module Submissions - Gentle Poking

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>A couple of months ago (July 24th), I submitted namespace requests for
>Net::OSCAR and Parse::ABNF.  Haven't heard anything since.  Did they
>get lost in the shuffle or are you folks just a bit backlogged?  In
>the thread "Request Tracker", Skud said it takes up to a week and to
>give a gentle poking if you haven't heard anything by then.

*grin* ... up to a week if things happen sequentially I guess.  It seems
like a few things fall through the cracks, which is why I think a
request tracker would be nice ("Which requests haven't been dealt
with yet?  Are any of them approaching a week old?")

Anyway.  Sounds like your requests were before my time, but I'll try and
dig them up.  Or you could resubmit if you wanted to make life easier
for me ;)

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"So i get the chance to reread my postings to asr at times, with a
corresponding conservation of the almighty leviam00se, Kai Henningsen."
-- Megahal (trained on asr), 1998-11-06

Re: module namespace question

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>--=_NextPart_000_01B6_01C14446.9AE8EBC0
>Content-Type: text/plain;
>   charset="iso-8859-1"
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
>
>I've written some perl code to interface to a Davis Vantage Pro weather
>station. I'd like to repackage it as a CPAN module with a proposed namespace
>of:
>
>Device::VantagePro

I'd recommend Weather::VantagePro, actually.  The most interesting thing
about the module is that it does weather stuff, not that it uses a
specific device.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Madi, yours is the one with Renee's lip prints on it."
"Yes, and so's my Guinness."
-- Sharkey, Madi (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: PAUSE registration

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>fileh.pl -- Similar file locator,
>which walks along the given dirs to find all
>similar files, not only identical ones:
>different version (.txt, .html, or .pdf) and
>different compression methods (.zip, .gz,
>.tar.gz, .bip2), MP3 files with different
>sample rates, etc. It uses advanced
>soundex vector algorithm to determine the
>file similarities. 
>
>
>mailh-1.1.tgz:  The tool can generate mail filter
>rules for different mail clients from one
>source. The mail clients currently
>supported are kmail, Netscape and
>mahogany. 

Are these modules or scripts?  (Well, the first one is obviously a
script.)  I strongly suggest packaging them as modules so they'll
be more useful to a wider variety of people.

Also, we don't maintain listings of scripts.  While you can stick it in
your CPAN author directory, nobody will ever find it there, and what's
the point?

I'd suggest naming them something like File::Similar and
Mail::Filter::MultiClient.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"I have every excuse for [getting electrocuted while working on a hub
 naked]... I just wish I hadn't had it in my lap at the time."
-- Morgan (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Developer ID request/module contribution

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>Hi,
>
>I'd like to request a CPAN/PAUSE developer ID:
>
>- Matt Luker
>- [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>- http://www.redstarhackers.com/
>- MLUKER
>- I have created a Date object that can be used mathematically.  It
>  allows you to create dates from strings (e.g. "2001-09-22") and then
>  add days to it ($tomorrow = Date::Object::Date->new("2001-09-22") + 1)
>  or just treat it like a normal number (++, +=, etc.).  It might not
>  be the most ideal design (just wraps perl ctime funcs), but it does work
>  well (IMO).

Before you submit this to CPAN, I think you should subscribe to
[EMAIL PROTECTED] and talk to the folks over there. I know of *at least*
three modules that aim to do what you've described, and we're trying to
amalgamate some of them rather than proliferate more.  The Date::
namespace is already confusing enough without umpteen nearly-identical
modules in there.  So perhaps you could contribute your coding efforts
to an existing module.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"I have every excuse for [getting electrocuted while working on a hub
 naked]... I just wish I hadn't had it in my lap at the time."
-- Morgan (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Registration for CPAN

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>  Notify::* works. So the three modules would be:
>
> Notify::Pool,
> Notify::Notice,
> and Notify::Email.
>
>  So do I need to do anything special to register the namespace and
>get the first version uploaded?

Upload the module via PAUSE, and submit a namespace registration request
(also via PAUSE).  Apparently you now have a login there, as MGILFIX.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Usenet: open mouth, insert foot, propagate internationally

Re: Request for new account

[Kirrily Robert]

On Fri, Sep 21, 2001 at 11:14:52AM -0700, Pasha Sadri wrote:
| > What does XBX stand for?  It seems like a pretty unintuitive name to me,
| > and doesn't tell me anything about what the module does.
| >
| 
| It stands for XML By eXample.  The reason behind that name: the
| configuration file for parsing the XML document into a perl data structure
| is structurally identicial to the XML that needs to be parsed, in other
| words, the module looks at an example to figure out what to do with the
| data.  Here is very simple example:

I'd suggest XML::ByExample

K.

Re: CPAN ID Request

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>On Fri, Sep 21, 2001 at 07:24:09AM +0200, Philip Newton wrote:
>
>>[Disclaimer: I am not a PAUSE admin. Feel free to ignore this message.]
>
>I think it's important to clear up misunderstandings, so I'm
>not going to ignore it :-)
>
>> Shouldn't this belong in the Net:: namespace, alongside such modules as
>> Net::AOLIM, Net::AIM, Net::ICQ, and Net::IRC?
>
>Not really. Jabber is not just an IM or chat system. Jabber is 
>a development architecture and platform for building distributed
>services, just as e.g. Apache is a development architecture and
>platform for building services and so on. Many of the developments
>I and other people are doing with Jabber have nothing to do with
>Instant Messaging. Jabber doesn't really belong in this area.

In this case, I think DJ is right.  I know I'm usually
anti-toplevel-namespace, but Jabber *is* a broad application with wide
recognition, and I don't think it's wrong in this case.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Well-behaved women rarely make history." -- Laurel Thatcher Ulrich

Re: Registration

[Kirrily Robert]

In perl.modules, you wrote:
>Name:  Jay Wheeler
>E-Mail:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>Homepage:  http://www.geocities.com/jaywheeler.geo/
>UserID:JW-GEO
>
>I would like to contribute a DBI wrapper module,
>QueryDBI.pm, designed to wrap the functionality of the
>DBI module and ease in software design.

Have you talked to the people on [EMAIL PROTECTED] yet?

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"I've gone through over-stressed to physical exhaustion... what's next?"
"Tuesday."  -- Simon Burr & Kyle Hearn 

Re: REGISTER NEW DEVELOPER

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>I plan to contribute an interface for Ecommerce, described in detail under:
>  http://www.nightmedia.net/epi/index.html
>The main module name will be "EPI" (E-Payment Interface)
>There are 8 gateway modules available for this interface:
>
>AuthorizeNet : EPI::authorizenet
>PayBill:  EPI::paybill
>Echo Inc.:  EPI::echoinc
>PCCharge:  EPI::pccharge
>CyberCash:  EPI::cybercash
>VeriSign:  EPI::verisign
>NovaInfo:  EPI::novainfo
>IntelliPay:  EPI::intellipay

You know, I think these should be under WWW::*, i.e.
WWW::EPI::authorizenet and so on.  It seems (to me) to be analogous to
stuff like WWW::Search::Google, WWW::Search::AltaVista, etc.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Morgan opened the drawer and there was a dismembered sheep there that
 had been there for, like, two months."
-- Skud to Bek (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Missing modules on PAUSE

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>I have a module on CPAN now that isn't showing up on PAUSE
>when I try to edit Module Metadata.  Is there something I'm missing?

Probably the fact that we take a while to get around to stuff :-/

What's the module, and what's your author ID?

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Morgan opened the drawer and there was a dismembered sheep there that
 had been there for, like, two months."
-- Skud to Bek (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: cpan id change :(

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>hello
>
>this craven individual has realised that what he thought was a 
>private login id is actually the public author id displayed on cpan. 
>The login name that he chose because it was unlikely to be taken is 
>now looking rather stupid.
>
>is there any chance of changing the stupid cpan id THPFFT to the more 
>sensible WROSS or something like that?
>
>I apologise for wasting your time with this daft mistake: I'm sure i 
>can live with a silly name if necessary.

I think my brane is on holidays.  On closer examination, it appears that
there is no form on PAUSE to register as a developer, only to change
your information once you're already registered.  Silly me.

Never mind.  I'll see if I can sort it out for you.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"My secret weapon is PMS."  -- Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Re: cpan id change :(

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>this craven individual has realised that what he thought was a 
>private login id is actually the public author id displayed on cpan. 
>The login name that he chose because it was unlikely to be taken is 
>now looking rather stupid.

Silly boy! :P

I believe the usual method is for you to fill in another author ID
registration on PAUSE, we'll set it up, then you re-upload your stuff to
the new account, and/or reassign ownership if they're registered
modules, and delete the files in the old author directory.  Then you
tell everyone about the new one, and the old one just sits there and
gathers dust until the last trump.

>I apologise for wasting your time with this daft mistake: I'm sure i 
>can live with a silly name if necessary.

Oh, I'm sure we can figure something out :)

Fill in the author ID request again, and make a note so we remember that
it's you.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"My secret weapon is PMS."  -- Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Re: Apache::OpenIndex release

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>Friday (14Sept01) I uploaded OpenIndex-1.00.tar.gz and requested
>Apache::OpenIndex space.
>What needs to happen in order to release Apache::OpenIndex?
>Can you help me out?
>If there is anything I am suppose to do let me know.
>I not sure how a new module get released.
>Please help.
>My account name is sanderson.

Hi George,

You've done everything you need to.  Now we need to approve your
namespace registration.  This takes a few days... we're all busy people
:-/  Meanwhile, people can still download the module from your author
directory, and it'll still show up in places like search.cpan.org.
When we approve the namespace registration, your module will show up on
certain other lists that we maintain, but your module is effectively
released *now*.

Anyway, sorry for the delay... "your request has been placed in a queue 
and will be answered by the next available operator" :)

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Real World: A bizarre dimension in which the standard dress is shirt 
and tie and in which a person's working hours are defined as 9 to 5.

Re: CGI.pm and uploading 4096 byte file

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>Dear Perl Module authors,

We're not the authors, we're just the people who help the authors upload
their modules to CPAN.  

>I am using the CGI.pm module from the CPAN, and came across a bug
>when uploading a file of 4096 bytes.  The last 2 bytes of the file
>were being truncated, so that the uploaded file only contained
>4094 bytes.   I investigated this a bit and made the following
>one-line change to fix this:

You want to talk to the author of CGI.pm, which you can find in the
perldoc for that module or by a quick search on search.cpan.org.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Real World: A bizarre dimension in which the standard dress is shirt 
and tie and in which a person's working hours are defined as 9 to 5.

Re: Request for new account

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>Hi,
>
>I would like to register for a PAUSE account.  Here is my info:
>
>name: Pasha Sadri
>email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>homepage: none
>preferred id: PASHA
>description of module:
>XML::XBX is a module for parsing XML documents into perl data strctures.
>Unlike other modules, It allows the user to control the output data
>structure by using an XML configuration file that closely resembles the
>input XML.  It is currently based on XML::Twig.

What does XBX stand for?  It seems like a pretty unintuitive name to me,
and doesn't tell me anything about what the module does.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Real World: A bizarre dimension in which the standard dress is shirt 
and tie and in which a person's working hours are defined as 9 to 5.

Re: Registration Request

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>I currently have some small modules that I would like to share with others.
>One example is 
>an adaptation of Dave Cross' Array::Compare, called Array::Compare_Elem.
>While Array::Compare
>returns a boolean on whether the compared arrays differ, this one goes a
>little furhter and 
>returns the values in the second operand (array) that are different.  I have
>found this useful
>for searching for differences in directory structures after installing
>software on different machines.

Have you talked to Dave about this?  I think it would be a useful thing
to fold into Array::Compare, rather than creating a new module for it.

Which is not to say you can't have a PAUSE ID, just that I think this
particular module might be worth folding into an existing one.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Real World: A bizarre dimension in which the standard dress is shirt 
and tie and in which a person's working hours are defined as 9 to 5.

Re: Registration for CPAN

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>  Hi! I'd like to contribute a suite of modules to CPAN. Here's the info you
>guys need:
>
>Name: Michael Gilfix
>Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>Homepage: http://www.eecs.tufts.edu/~mgilfix
>Preferred-ID: MGILFIX
>
>  The contribution would come in the form of three modules under the
>Net::Notification namespace (I'm open to another namespace if you guys
>have any suggestions):
>
>Net::Notification::Notice
>Net::Notification::NoticePool
>Net::Notification::Email
>

Usually Net:: is used for implementations of networking protocols (eg
SMTP, FTP).  It doesn't seem like the right place for these modules.
I'm not sure what *is* the right place, but I'll ponder on it.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Real World: A bizarre dimension in which the standard dress is shirt 
and tie and in which a person's working hours are defined as 9 to 5.

Re: Request Tracker

[Kirrily Robert]

On Mon, Sep 17, 2001 at 07:12:16PM -0700, Ask Bjoern Hansen wrote:
| On Mon, 17 Sep 2001, Kirrily Robert wrote:
| 
| Ok; I think somewhere in the PAUSE stuff on CPAN would be more
| appropiate for that. It doesn't strike me as what you would expect
| on "modules.perl.org" (that would be more like what search.cpan.org
| is).   :-/

OK, fair enough.

Meanwhile, here's a suggested autoresponder mail/FAQ/whatever:


Hi, and thanks for mailing [EMAIL PROTECTED]   This is an automated
response to your email.

We get lots of mail, and sometimes it takes us a while to get to yours.
Please be patient, we *will* try and respond as soon as we can gather
enough tuits.

In the meantime, here are some pointers which may help you find your
answer, along with some hints for making your [EMAIL PROTECTED]
experience easier.

[EMAIL PROTECTED] has several roles:

1. creating PAUSE accounts
2. keeping the CPAN module list updated
3. responding to enquiries about modules and especially module naming

If you mailed us about getting a PAUSE account
--
It will probably be set up in the next few days.  You will receive email
notifying you when your account has been created.  In the meantime, read
the PAUSE documentation at:
http://pause.perl.org/pause/query?ACTION=pause_04about

If you mailed us to register a module namespace
---
This may take up to a week.  If you haven't received email confirming
your namespace registration by then, please poke us (gently).

You can make it easier for us next time by using the namespace request 
form on PAUSE; this gives us your request in a standard format with
links we can just click on to approve it.

If we have problems or comments with your proposed namespace, we'll
respond within a week with our opinions.  Note that you can still upload
a module before we approve the namespace -- it just won't appear in the
official modules list, and we may ask you to change the name before
we'll list it there.

In the meantime, or for next time, we recommend you discuss your
proposed namespace with any appropriate mailing lists or other fora of
Perl developers.  Some of these include:

Places to post your ideas etc (general):
comp.lang.perl.modules
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

Places to discuss specific types of modules:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]  (Date::* and Time::*)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (DBI::*)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Test::*)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (MacOS::*)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Crypt::*)
etc...
(check http://lists.perl.org/ for a full list of Perl lists)

Another good idea is to look back through the [EMAIL PROTECTED] archive,
at http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/, and see if we've
dealt with a similar issue before.

If you had a general module-related enquiry
---
We'll try to get back to you within a week.  If we don't, and the
resources listed below don't help you find your answer, please prod us
(gently).

If your enquiry was related to module naming, the resources listed in
the above section will probably be useful to you.

If you want to know if anyone's written a module similar to one you're
thinking of writing, check http://search.cpan.org/ and search for as
many relevant keywords as you can think of.

If you're writing a module for the first time and want advice, read the
perlnewmod manpage, at http://perldoc.com/perl5.6.1/pod/perlnewmod.html 
or "perldoc perlnewmod".

If you need help installing Perl modules, read the perlmodinstall
manpage, at http://perldoc.com/perl5.6.1/pod/perlmodinstall.html or
"perldoc perlmodinstall".

If your email was unrelated to Perl modules
---
Sorry, wrong address.  Don't expect a response.

Re: Request Tracker

[Kirrily Robert]

| Links to what?

PAUSE
http://pause.cpan.org/
http://pause.perl.org/pause/query?ACTION=pause_04about

perlnewmod
http://perldoc.com/perl5.6.1/pod/perlnewmod.html 
or "perldoc perlnewmod" 

The [EMAIL PROTECTED] archive
http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/

Places to post your ideas etc (general):
comp.lang.perl.modules
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

Places to discuss specific types of modules:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]  (Date::* and Time::*)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (DBI::*)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Test::*)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (MacOS::*)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Crypt::*)
etc...

Stuff I want to write:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] FAQ

| Maybe it would be better to shape up old resources than to create
| even more. :-)

That too.

K.

Re: Request Tracker

[Kirrily Robert]

On Mon, Sep 17, 2001 at 02:53:29PM -0700, Ask Bjoern Hansen wrote:
| On Mon, 17 Sep 2001, Kurt D. Starsinic wrote:
| 
| > > I'd like to see a thing where people who contact us get a form message
| > > that says:
| >
| > Boy, I'm really in favor of an autoresponder.  I am behind this 1000%.
| 
| send me the text and I can install it. We have that for
| [EMAIL PROTECTED]  It's setup so each address will only get one
| autoresponse per week.

Sure!  But first, can we make http://modules.perl.org/ be a place where
we can put general information to point them at?  Initially just a
static HTML page with links on it, perhaps eventually growing into a
module author's "portal".  I'll maintain it.

K.

Re: Request Tracker

[Kirrily Robert]

On Mon, Sep 17, 2001 at 02:34:59PM -0700, Kurt D. Starsinic wrote:
| 
| > . . . . And from our point of view, we could check the ticketing system and
| > think "oh, that guy with the question about the Frobnitz:: namespace
| > still hasn't had a reply, I guess we'd better get back to him."
| 
| The point is that we're not _forgetting_ to get back to people.  None
| of us has been willing to take responsibility to make sure that everybody
| gets responded to.  Perhaps you wish to become that special somebody?

Sure.  That's what I'm more interested in, to be honest.  You've
probably noticed me being pretty chatty since I joined -- I tend to
follow the policy that if I'm not sure whether it needs a response, I
respond anyway so they get a "Hi, I don't have a firm answer for you, 
but at least you heard back from us."

I would find RT useful for this.

| P.S.  None of the above is meant to indicate any lack of interest on
| my part for serving the Perl community better.  I'm just trying to
| emphasize that, IMHO, the proposed solution (a request tracker) doesn't
| match the actual problem (dearth of tuits).

OK, so can we recruit people with more tuits?  I realise that we want
people who are experienced in Perl, CPAN, etc, but I'm sure we could
find a couple who could spend an hour a week on it?

(I'm currently spending about an hour a week, usually on Sunday nights,
making a concerted effort to get back to people with opinions etc.  I
think I'm getting about 50% coverage, i.e. ideally I'd like to be able
to respond to twice as many, or twice as deeply.  So two more people
doing similar stuff might cover it nicely.)

K.

Re: Can not edit module metadata

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>I am trying to edit module metadata, and Pause thinks there are no =
>modules for me. But I=20
>have registered Lingua::RU::Antimat in August 2001 - almost three weeks =
>ago.
>
>My user name is ILYAS

OK, I've registered it.  It may be editable now from PAUSE, or perhaps
in a short while.  Let me know if there are any problems.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"I used to think Discordianism was a funny joke. Then I realised Eris
was having the joke, and it was on me." -- Jenny with the Axe

Re: Can not edit module metadata

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>I am trying to edit module metadata, and Pause thinks there are no =
>modules for me. But I=20
>have registered Lingua::RU::Antimat in August 2001 - almost three weeks =
>ago.

Yes, there's a bit of a backlog.  I'll try and find out just how much of
a backlog and see what we can sort out.

K.


-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Insert into employee..." -- Benno (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: PAUSE registration request

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
> name:  Chris Radcliff
>email:  [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> homepage:  http://www.globalspin.com/
>prefered CPAN ID:  RADCLIFF
>
>I'd like to contribute the Template::PSP and Apache::PSP modules, as 
>well as a WSDL parsing module. The PSP (Perl Server Pages) provide a 
>template-based framework for Web application development. The WSDL 
>module provides a Perlish interface to reading and writing WSDL (Web 
>Services Description Language) files.

WSDL should probably be under WWW::WSDL, I guess.

What's the difference between Template::PSP and Apache::PSP?  Could you,
or would you, ever use them separately?  If you wouldn't use them
separately, they should probably live together under Apache::PSP.

K.

Re: ArrayCompare.pm

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>Name: Yuandan Zhang
>Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>Username:YDZHANG-pl
>I would submit a module for compare two arrays. This module intakes two arrays
>  and returns three arrays: an array of elements common to both input arrays, an
>  array of unique elements of the first input array and an array of elements
>  unique to the second input array

Have you looked at Array::Compare and talked to its author?  Also, you
may find that something like this already exists on CPAN... it's
certainly already in the Perl FAQ (perldoc perlfaq4, "How do I
compute the difference of two arrays?  How do I compute the intersection 
of two arrays?")

Which is not to say that you shouldn't write it and contribute it, just
that you shouldn't reinvent the wheel.  Also, don't call it
ArrayCompare.pm as a) there's a perfectly good Array:: namespace
already, and b) Array::Compare is already taken.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Insert into employee..." -- Benno (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Module submission Lingua::ES::Numeros

[Kirrily Robert]

On Mon, Sep 17, 2001 at 09:04:54AM -0500, José Luis Rey wrote:
| Hi, since I'm not shure I can write to modules list I'll write this to
| you, please let me known if I may answer to all the addresses in this
| mail.

Sure you can talk to [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- that's what we're there for!

| > It's a tough one.
| 
| Yes, it is.  One of reasons I've though about using Lingua::ES:Numbers
| is that numbers in spanish doesn't have the same customization as in
| english, as an example my module manages sex on the numbers, I would
| like to study a little bit more before providing Lingua::ES::Numbers as
| compatible as possible with the EN variant, but that may imply making
| some extensions and/or changes to Lingua::EN::Numbers to be a fully
| generic module to provide all funcionality needed by other
| Lingua::XX::Numbers modules, that seems very difficult without the help
| of people that speak different languages and want to develop a generic
| interface for Lingua::XX::Numbers.

While it would be nice for all the Lingua::XX::Numbers modules to follow
a common API so you could easily switch between them, I don't think this
is currently the case, and I wouldn't let it stop you or slow you down.

Note also that there is stuff like Lingua::EN::Numbers::Ordinal which
turns "1" into "1st", "23" into "23rd" and so on.  You can always have
similar add-ons for your Spanish module.

| By now, it should be not to difficult to make a wrap called
| Lingua::ES::Numbers arround my module following the same interface as
| Lingua::EN::Numbers.  I may install the later automatically with the
| former.

Why not talk to the author of Lingua::EN::Numbers and see if you think
it'd be useful to have a common API?  You might also want to talk to the
author of Lingua::JA::Number and Lingua::ID::Nums2Words, if you're going
to go down that route.

K.

Re: Request Tracker

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>You might be able to convince me otherwise, but I don't think
>that `request tracking' is a pressing issue for modules@.

I think it is.

Having just recently come from "out there" I think I have a fairly good
idea on how the rest of the Perl community sees this list.  I think they
mostly see it as a mysterious black box, where you throw in requests,
and maybe (if you're lucky) something comes out again, at some
indeterminate time.

Most of the Perl community think of [EMAIL PROTECTED] as a sort of advice
line for module authors, particularly wrt naming conventions.  When they
email us, or when they apply for a namespace through PAUSE, they want to
hear back from us.  They want words of wisdom.  If there isn't any
wisdom to be had, they'd rather hear "sorry, no wisdom today" than just
silence.

There are three sets of stuff that come in to [EMAIL PROTECTED], as far
as I can tell.  People out there see each group of stuff in a certain
way:

1. personal email ("Hi, I'm thinking of writing this module...")
- wants thoughtful human response
- wants it to be timely (a few days?)
- if there's no response, wants to know that too
- doesn't want to upload a module until a response is seen
- will upload anyway after a certain period of unresponsiveness
- eventually stops asking if no advice is forthcoming

2. author ID and namespace requests
- realises it's at least semi-automated
- expects just a form-letter response unless there are problems
- if there are issues, expects a real human to reply thoughtfully

3. other stuff (eg Author updates, new module submission notifications)
- doesn't even know it exists 

I've noticed, since I've been on [EMAIL PROTECTED], that the modules
cabal (for want of a better word) have a very different idea of what's
important than what the rest of the Perl community do.  The cabal see
modules@ as an email interface to PAUSE which sometimes also gets asked
questions about modules, whereas the Perl community sees it as a place
to ask questions but which also does stuff with PAUSE.

So yeah, the PAUSE stuff is what the modules@ cabal are mostly
interested in, and RT probably wouldn't be very useful for that.  But RT
*would* be useful for the stuff requiring human response, and I think it 
would be seen as a *major* improvement by the Perl community.

I'd like to see a thing where people who contact us get a form message
that says:

Thanks for emailing [EMAIL PROTECTED]  We'll try to get back to you
ASAP, but in the meantime:

Have you read this documentation?
- PAUSE documentation
- module naming guidelines
- etc

Have you asked on suitable mailing lists and other forums?

Have you looked for similar modules on CPAN?

Have you searched our online ticket database for similar questions?

Your request has been assigned a ticket number, 12345.  You can view
the progress of your ticket at http://blahblah/12345.  Any ticket
that hasn't been answered within three days, or hasn't been closed
in a week, will automatically move to a higher priority.

Thanks,

the [EMAIL PROTECTED] team


Then when we respond to them, we Cc the ticketing system, so it can keep
track of our response.

Then, the whole thing could be searchable so if we're thinking "Didn't
we just deal with a bunch of Lingua:: stuff a few weeks ago?" we can
check the database.  Or anyone who is interested can do a search on the
website and see what our previous comments on that namespace have been.

And from our point of view, we could check the ticketing system and
think "oh, that guy with the question about the Frobnitz:: namespace
still hasn't had a reply, I guess we'd better get back to him."

I read a thing recently, talking about dealing with customers for
software projects.  It said that you could improve customer relations in
two ways:

1. actually serving them better
2. at least letting them know what you're up to

Ideally, of course, you do both :)  But the point was that communication
and openness and transparent processes that the customer can feel
involved in, all make them feel like they're getting better service.
Even if that's just an automated thing saying "thanks for your message,
we're really badly backlogged, if we don't reply don't take it
personally."

So that's why I think RT would be an excellent thing.  I didn't mean to
go on for so long, but, well, *shrug*.

>What would be /great/ would be a PAUSE Administrators' Manual.  I
>would maintain it if people would use it.

Yeah, that would be great :)

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Welcome to the Internet.  Here's your handbasket."  -- Rev. Peter da Silva

Re: Module submission Lingua::ES::Numeros

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>Perl Authors Upload Server wrote:
>
>> The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
>> 
>>   modid:   Lingua::ES::Numeros
>>   DSLIP:   bnphg
>>   description: Traslates numbers to spanish text
>>   userid:  JREY (Jose Rey)
>>   chapterid:   11 (String_Lang_Text_Proc)
>>   communities:
>
>I don't know what the rest of Perl community is thinking about,
>but I would prefer Lingua::ES::Numbers.
>
>In my opinion Perl modules should by named in an English way,
>of course only if possible.

It's a tough one.

On the one hand, it seems like Lingua:: is an obvious place to allow
non-English names.  

On the other hand, it would be handy if an English speaker could wander
into Lingua:: and easily find any number conversion modules.

Both kinds are found on CPAN.  For instance:

Lingua::FI::Hyphenate
Lingua::RU::Antimat (strips obscenity)

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"I'm not afraid of you, you're a vegetarian!"
-- Thorfy, to Bron (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Request for a CPAN Id

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>On Sun, Sep 16, 2001 at 11:40:20AM -0400, Thomas Stanley wrote:
>
>> Name: Thomas Stanley
>> Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>> Homepage: N/A
>> Preferred User Id: TSTANLEY
>> Description: I would like to contribute a module called Date::Lastday.  
>> This module can be used to calculate the date of the previous day (i.e. 
>> Today is 16 Sep 2001, the module will accurately calculate the date of 
>> yesterday, which was the 15th.) This module is accurate enough to provide 
>> coverage for the 1st of each month (including New Year's Day), and for 
>> leap years.Get more from the Web.  
>
>Like this?
>
>   #!/usr/local/bin/perl
>
>   use Date::Manip;
>
>   $yesterday = ParseDate("yesterday");

And it's a one-liner to do it in pure perl.  Here's a very simple
version:

print scalar localtime(time - 24 * 60 * 60);

Thomas, I strongly recommend that you don't bother with this particular
module, except perhaps as a learning exercise. 

But if you're interested in date and time calculations in Perl, or
intend to write any more complex date/time modules, I suggest you
subscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and talk to the other date/time hackers
over there.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"4 December, 1668. Had a venison Pastie at The Liver-Spotted Hande that was 
palpable Beefe. Mrs. Pepys and Myself thrown into ye Microwayvve, where we 
did Expand Mightily, to a Frighteningly Enormous Syze. And so to Bed."

Re: PAUSE registration request

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>Hi, I'd like to register with PAUSE to contribute to CPAN.
>
>Name   :  Stephane Peiry
>EMail  :  [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>WWW:  N/A
>User ID:  PEIRY
>
>Desc   :  a package to setup connections to "Palm like" devices
>  and allow data transfers to it (contacts informations
>  or applications, etc.)

Take a look at the existing stuff under Palm::* first, and see if
there's any common ground.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"4 December, 1668. Had a venison Pastie at The Liver-Spotted Hande that was 
palpable Beefe. Mrs. Pepys and Myself thrown into ye Microwayvve, where we 
did Expand Mightily, to a Frighteningly Enormous Syze. And so to Bed."

Re: Request for PAUSE ID

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>Hi Perl module people,

Hi Brendan, good to see you here :)

>News::NewsML, a module that subclasses XML::DOM to read and write files 
>in the open NewsML standard for the syndication and distribution of news 
>content (articles, images, PDFs, video, etc), created by the 
>International Press Telecommunications Council (http://www.iptc.org)

Hrm.  The News:: namespace is mostly for NNTP stuff.  This might cause
some confusion.  

Is there any relation between NewsML and the existing XMLNews::*
modules?

Just looking at what's out there at the moment, I'd suggest putting
NewsML under the XML namespace.

XML::NewsML
XML::NITF

(similar to XML::RSS for instance).

>I'm considering writing some related modules, eg News::SportsML 
>(currently being designed by IPTC), News::NITF (another news markup 
>language), possibly News::Syndication::ICE -- hence the News:: prefix. I 
>figured it wouldn't clash with Usenet modules as they use NNTP:: as 
>their prefix. Please let me know if you have any better ideas.

Nope, everything currently under News::* is NNTP.  The only thing
currently under NNTP is NNTP::Server.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"4 December, 1668. Had a venison Pastie at The Liver-Spotted Hande that was 
palpable Beefe. Mrs. Pepys and Myself thrown into ye Microwayvve, where we 
did Expand Mightily, to a Frighteningly Enormous Syze. And so to Bed."

Re: Account Request

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>Constants.pm ( name yet to be decided )

I'd recommend against Constants as a top-level name, but you knew that
anyway.

>A module that imports a number constants into a script from a simple
>rc like file. Works like;
>
>use Something::Constants '/path/to/rcfile';
>
>where rcfile looks something like
>...
>
>A_CONSTANT = 'a string'
>ANOTHER_CONST = 10
>
># A comment
>
>...

Are you suggesting that it would actually assign the variables using
"use constant"?  If you're not talking about that sort of constant, I'd
advise against using "constant" in the name.  

>HTML::QPTE.pm 

What does QPTE stand for?

>A _very_ simple easy to use templating system designed for systems
>where only CGI is available ( no mod_perl ). Is useful as you can
>quickly change a html page to a CGI script. looks like
>...
>#!/usr/bin/perl
>use HTML::QPTE 
>
>
>
> 
>
>
>
><$ $a_var $> 
>
>
>
>
>Works similar to that of Acme::Bleach . 

Looks like a useful tool and a good approach.  My only concern would be
with the proliferation of yet-another-templating-module.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Sure, only 2 percent of the Internet population uses lynx, but they're 
the top 2 percent."  -- petro, on a.s.r

Re: How to consolidate unit conversion modules?

[Kirrily Robert]

Sorry for taking so long to reply, but for what it's worth:

>Does anybody have any advice for:
>
>How to merge modules together or otherwise
>share a namespace between several authors? I
>think there was recently a big effort to merge
>time/date modules. Any lessons I should take
>from that?

The date/time efforts are still in progress over on [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Nothing concrete yet, just some namespace suggestions and some further
suggestions that modules with similar functionality should have similar
APIs.

>How to find all the affected people? Authors
>of related modules, users of unit modules, etc?
>Neither Robert or I are really keen on breaking
>code by moving around modules.

I don't know that there's really any way to contact users other than by
posting to comp.lang.perl.* or relevant mailing lists or websites.  

One thing I've seen done with some success is to make your Makefile.PL
print out a big warning:

***
WARNING! The interface of this module has changed significantly between
versions X.XX and Y.YY.  Installing this module may cause older code
to break.  Are you sure you want to install this module?
***

Of course you should also increment the major version number, eg. going
from 1.XX to 2.XX.

Another thing you could do is provide a backwards compatibility mode,
where the old stuff was left in there but undocumented.

>Any tips for keeping up on how/where a module
>is used or referred to? Frankly I was surprised
>that Convert::Units existed, even though Robert
>knew about (and referred to!) my Math::Units
>module. I was also surprised to find out that
>Math::Units was being actively used even though
>I never advertised it.

There's no real way to do this.  A note in your POD saying "please
contact me if you're using this" might help a little, but not much.
A google search might be useful, but again not much.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Sure, only 2 percent of the Internet population uses lynx, but they're 
the top 2 percent."  -- petro, on a.s.r

Re: user-ID please

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>Hi, folks,
>
>I've been developing some PDL-related modules and also have some
>patches to other modules (such as Math::Units) that are apropos to
>PDL.  I'd like a PAUSE ID to submit them.  Here's my info:
>
>Name:  Craig DeForest
>email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>homepage:  http://www.boulder.swri.edu/~deforest
>Preferred UID: zowie [or drzowie if zowie isn't available]
>Contributions: Patches to some scientific-computing-related modules;
>  goodies for the PDL:: tree (I've been discussing said
>  goodies on the appropriate PDL list).

You don't need a CPAN id to submit patches for modules, you know.  Just
mail them to the listed author and/or mailing list.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Metal is for wearing. Flesh is for changing. You wouldn't understand 
- it's a cyborg thing.

Re: author registration request

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>Dear CPAN administrators,
> modules: StateMachine: event driven with centralized event
>dispacher
> (now in design level)

Have you looked at POE yet?  It's an event driven state machine which
already has wide acceptance in the Perl community.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
Metal is for wearing. Flesh is for changing. You wouldn't understand 
- it's a cyborg thing.

Re: Naming Apache configuration file parser and tree builder

[Kirrily Robert]

Also, talk to [EMAIL PROTECTED] (aka sungo), who says:

 Skud: point that APache file parser guy my way
 i have some code he can take over
 i've got Apache::Htaccess

K.


-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
My name is sendmail.cf. You killed my process. Prepare to vi.

Re: [ID request] PCSC-Perl

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>I have written a wrapper that allows to use PCSC/lite with perl.
>
>PCSC/lite is a library which can be used to communicate with ISO
>compliant smart cards and other secure tokens like the iButton. This is
>done regardless of which smartcard reader you are using because
>PCSC/lite is indeed an abstraction layer.

Sounds good.  Got a name in mind for the Perl module?

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
My name is sendmail.cf. You killed my process. Prepare to vi.

Re: Naming Apache configuration file parser and tree builder

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>I'm working on a module to parse an Apache configuration file into a
>tree structure to allow external programs to understand the various
>configuration options and sections, such as directives that are
>specific to a  or .  It is a superclass of
>Tree::DAG_Node so the normal tree manipulation operations can be run
>on it.
>
>The name of the module right now is Apache::ConfigParser.  Does
>this work for people?

Most of the stuff in the Apache:: namespace is mod_perl stuff.  I'd
suggest talking to the mod_perl folks first.  Their mailing list is at
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

However, I think your suggested name makes good sense from a purely CPAN
point of view.

K.


-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
My name is sendmail.cf. You killed my process. Prepare to vi.

Re: Module submission Net::HTTPMail

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>This module has an interface compatible with Net::POP3. However
>rather than get mail from POP3 servers it gets mail from HTTPMail
>servers. It is in the Net:: namespace because it plays the same role
>as Net::POP3 so it should be in the same namespace. Many people have
>requested a module that accesses email on HotMail--this module
>achieves this end and so will be widely applicable.

Nope.  The difference is that Net::POP3 implements a networking standard
(in this case RFC 1081)

I'd much prefer WWW::Mail::Hotmail for your module.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"So its like an armwrestling contest between Netscape and the OS to
 see who goes down first ... oooh."
-- Benno (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: name for module (tentatively IPC::Editor)

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>
>I've been working on IPC::Editor (available at 
>http://www.etla.org/misc/IPC-Editor-0.01_05.tar.gz).
>
>It's a module to encapsulate the small but repetitive task of starting
>a text editor on a hunk of text, and then getting the results back into
>your program.
>
>Is IPC::Editor a good name, or should I change it to something else?
>(I also toyed with Text::Editor, or some variant on this, but it isn't
>a text editor)

Hey.  Sorry it took a week to get back to you.

I don't know about the name.  It seems weird to me, but I'm not sure
why.  I just get that "ick" feeling.  But I can't think of anything
better off the top of my head.  

Grab me on IRC and let's brainstorm.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"So its like an armwrestling contest between Netscape and the OS to
 see who goes down first ... oooh."
-- Benno (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Test::Cmd subclass module?

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>I have a new version (1.05) of the Test::Cmd module ready in a package
>that includes an additional, new Test::Cmd::Common module.  The
>Test::Cmd::Common subclass is a wrapper that provides some common
>exception-handling routines, useful for most normal command testing.
>
>I was just about to upload it to CPAN, when I realized that I didn't
>know if being the maintainer of Test::Cmd gave me the authority to
>create new subsidiary modules in its namespace, or if I needed run it by
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] first.  So I figured I'd play it safe and check.
>
>If I don't hear any objections in the next day or so, I'll go ahead and
>upload.  Thanks.

That sounds fine to me.  There should be no problem about subclassing
the module, especially if you comply with its license terms.  Miss Perl
Manners says let the T::C author know you're doing it, but there's no
need to actually seek permission.

K.


-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"So its like an armwrestling contest between Netscape and the OS to
 see who goes down first ... oooh."
-- Benno (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: PAUSE Registration Request

[Kirrily Robert]

Rob wrote:
>
>Immediately I am planning to contribute WINS::Winsdmp, a module
>for working with the CSV data generated from the unique Windows
>winsdmp utility. This module has immediate application to WINS
>admins everywhere struggling with the transition to AS or trying
>to get off of it. The module includes "guess" (sometimes that's
>all you can do with MS) algorithems that associate a unique IP
>with most recent host and user login, useful for finding out
>who was last on an IP. (Take a look at the anonymous CVS tree
>on http://cvs.sourceforge.net/cgi-bin/viewcvs.cgi/winsdmp/
>or better yet, add yourselves as developers and help me put
>the polish on this thing.)

Surely this should be under the Win32 namespace>

>I'm also working on Array::Shell in my spare time.  It is
>a module for helping authors create quick array-centric
>command-line apps for interactively manipulating their favorite
>arrays.

I'd suggest Shell::Array or something for this.  The Array isn't the
important part, the Shell is.

K.


-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"So its like an armwrestling contest between Netscape and the OS to
 see who goes down first ... oooh."
-- Benno (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: PAUSE ID request

[Kirrily Robert]

J. Merelo wrote;

>Es::Nif : a module for checking spanish ID Number and letter; described
>in professional Perl programming (Wrox press)

Is Es:: really the best top-level namespace for this?  I'm sure I
recently saw a similar module for another country, and it wasn't under a
top-level namespace indicating the language.

Also, the spanish ID number *isn't* in espanol, unless it's some meaning
of "number" that I don't understand.  Espanol refers to a language
spoken in many countries in the world, and modules related to that
language should be under Lingua::ES::*.  

I'd suggest putting this module under Number::ID::Spanish or similar
(see Number::Phone::US for an analogous module).  And yes, I mean
*spanish* as in related to Spain, because presumably these numbers
aren't also used in, say, Mexico?

K.


-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Warning: Netizen may contain traces of nuts."
-- Sharkey (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: New OO interface to handle time

[Kirrily Robert]

Winfried wrote:
>
>I wrote a set of modules to deal with time in an object oriented
>fashion. Example:
>
>   use Time::OO;
>
>   my $time = Time::OO->new();
>   $time->import(time());
>   $time->month->next();  # oh isn't this "becautiful" ;)
>   print $time->as_string("%d.%m.%Y %H:%M:%S\n"); # POSIX::strftime
>
>A comparable module is Time-Objects, but that is more an OO interface
>for localtime. Date::Calc also matches partly, but has no OO. A wrapper
>to Date::Calc would also have been possible, but writing from scratch
>seemed easier and more interesting to me.
>
>I used a brute force method with massive amounts of simple perl code.
>The modules are a year old now and I think they are more useful on CPAN
>than on my hard disk. What do you think about the naming Time::OO? Or
>better Time::YesItIsSlow aka Time::BetterHaveAFastProcessor? Or
>Time::SteenkingOO? :)

I'd suggest talking to the people over on [EMAIL PROTECTED] who are
currently discussing naming conventions for date and time modules.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Warning: Netizen may contain traces of nuts."
-- Sharkey (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Core modules and CPAN indexing priorities

[Kirrily Robert]

>This also provides an incentive to keep CPAN versions and core
>versions synced.

... which should be enough reason in itself ;)

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Warning: Netizen may contain traces of nuts."
-- Sharkey (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: New interface styles

[Kirrily Robert]

On Sat, Sep 01, 2001 at 08:02:33AM -0700, Kurt D. Starsinic wrote:
| > >The second is 'o' for 'other'.  A lot of stuff just doesn't fit.
| > >Test::Inline lets you put code in POD.  What the hell kind of
| > >interface is that?
| 
| I don't see how that affects what kind of interface it is.  It's
| still functional, OO, declarative, procedural, whatever.

Well, Test::Inline's main interface is a command-line script (pod2test)
which acts as a preprocessor.  WWW::Chat is similar.  While you could
theoretically use OO interfaces to either, they're not the primary or
intended interface for the vast majority of users.

K.

Re: Module submission Units::Calc

[Kirrily Robert]

Steve wrote:
>It doesn't make sense to me to put it under Convert::, since
>conversion isn't the focus of its functionality. Math:: makes more
>sense, but calling it Math::Units::Calc implies a nonexistent
>relationship to Math::Units, and I'm not sure where else to put it
>in there. Math::Calc::Units?Suggestions appreciated.

I prefer Math::Calc::Units to Units::Calc.  I also prefer Calc::Units to
Units::Calc.

The first question to ask is, what does this thing provide?  It provides
a calculator.  Hence Calc.  What sort of calculator?  A units
calculator.  Hence Calc::Units.  The primary thing it provides is a
calculator, not a unit.

The issue of whether to put it under Math:: or whether to leave it at
its own top level has to do with:

- would/could there be other calculators under Math::Calc?
=> yes, I can envision Math::Calc::Scientific, etc

- would/could there be other calculators NOT under Math::Calc?
=> perhaps, but it seems odd to me.  I could conceive that a
hypothetical Calc::Business or Calc::FabricYardage might feel 
out of place in Math.

- are deeply nested CPAN module names a good or useful thing?
=> *shrug*  People seem to be OK with three-level names.


So, I personally have no firm advice, but perhaps that at least gives
you some ideas.

K.


-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
On-line, adj.: The idea that a human being should always be accessible 
to a computer.

Re: New interface styles

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>I believe this was discussed a while ago, but no action was taken.
>
>Two new interface styles are needed.
>
>First is 'p' for 'pragma'.  This is for things like
>Lingua::Romana::Perligata, y2k, AnyLoader, etc... that actually alter
>the behavior of the program just by their being used.
>
>The second is 'o' for 'other'.  A lot of stuff just doesn't fit.
>Test::Inline lets you put code in POD.  What the hell kind of
>interface is that?

I strongly agree with Schwern's point here.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Why is it that all the good ones are either gay or BSD weenies?"
-- Sharkey (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Module submission Wx

[Kirrily Robert]

On Wed, Aug 29, 2001 at 08:45:34PM +0100, Tim Bunce wrote:
| On Wed, Aug 29, 2001 at 10:01:07AM -0400, Kirrily Robert wrote:
| > This seeks reasonable to me, given that Tk:: and Gtk:: and other GUI
| > toolkits have similar top-level namespaces.
| > 
| > (Though I do think it'd be nice to group them all under GUI sometime, if
| > we could ever get all the authors together to do it.)
| 
| I know it seems tempting, but what significant value would it _really_
| buy you that the section groupings in the module list don't already provide?

Searchability via m /GUI/ in CPAN.pm

Searchability via search.cpan.org

Searchability of modules which, for some reason or another, are not in
the modules list (eg it hasn't been updated recently).

Easy navigability of a CPAN archive via FTP, or on a CD-ROM.

That's just off the top of my head.  How many more do you want me to
come up with?

K.

Re: Module submission Image::OrgChart

[Kirrily Robert]

Matt wrote:
>The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
>
>  modid:   Image::OrgChart
>  DSLIP:   bdpOg
>  description: OrgChart generator for hash data.
>  userid:  MZSANFORD (Matt Sanford)
>  chapterid:   18 (Images_Pixmaps_Bitmaps)
>  communities:
>Perlmonks

Hrm, I think that this would be better named Business::OrgChart
(according to the theory of "what it does, not how it does it").

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"So, which photo did you choose?"
"The one where no one is snogging or fellating anything."
-- Renee, Skud (on Netizen staff photos)

Re: Module submission Wx

[Kirrily Robert]

Mattia wrote:
>
>A new top level namespace ( like Gtk, Qt, Gnome, etc ... ) seems
>the most logical choice; I chose Wx because the C++ class names
>wxButton, wxWindow ... ) are translated into Wx::Button, Wx::Window,
>... wxWindows is a cross platform ( Win/Gtk/Motif/Mac/OS2 in the
>works ) GUI toolkit with native look and feel; built on top of the
>GUI capabilities there are a rendering engine for simple HTML, a
>cross platform help system, a printing framework, clipboard and
>drag-and-drop, and more is planned for the next version.


This seeks reasonable to me, given that Tk:: and Gtk:: and other GUI
toolkits have similar top-level namespaces.

(Though I do think it'd be nice to group them all under GUI sometime, if
we could ever get all the authors together to do it.)

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
How do I set my LaserPrinter to "Stun"?!

Re: Module submission Lingua::RU::Antimat

[Kirrily Robert]

Ilya writes:
>The following module was proposed for inclusion in the Module List:
>
>  modid:   Lingua::RU::Antimat
>  DSLIP:   RdpOp
>  description: Removes Russian slang from a string
>  userid:  ILYAS (Ilya Soldatkin)
>  chapterid:   11 (String_Lang_Text_Proc)
>  communities:
>newsgroup fido7.ru.perl

Is it actually "slang" (i.e. popular idiomatic terms) that it removes,
or is it "bad" words such as offensive or explicit sexual language?

If the latter, I'd recommend changing the description to read: "Removes
offensive language from a Russian text string".

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"If we're going to have eight women in latex klein jumpsuits then I want
them at my place." -- Skud (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Developer Registration

[Kirrily Robert]

James wrote:
>File-Seektar.gz of proposed first contribution attached - full details in pod.
>In short a series of widgets that implement fast searches and extractions of
>data from sorted flat files implementing the halve the difference search
>algorithm. Several orders of magnitude faster than while () { next unless
>/$some-cond/; #blah } type searches as algorithm is geometric rather than
>linear. Somewhat similar in utility to File::Readbackwards in being ideal for
>logfile data extraction amongst other things but can extract data between any
>date range in very short order.

Why "Seektar"?  To me it sounds like a thing that finds tar archives.

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"If we're going to have eight women in latex klein jumpsuits then I want
them at my place." -- Skud (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: namespace registration request

[Kirrily Robert]

In lists.projects.perl.modules, you wrote:
>I'm requesting to register a namespace
>
>Parse::Nibbler
>
>It's for a parser which parses a large file
>a little bit at a time. (it nibbles at the file).

I have no complaints with this one.  It's a little gimicky but not too
much, and at least it does describe what it does.  Shall I email him to
that effect?

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"If we're going to have eight women in latex klein jumpsuits then I want
them at my place." -- Skud (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: author ID request

[Kirrily Robert]

On Mon, Aug 27, 2001 at 12:21:06AM -0400, Andrew M. Langmead wrote:
| 
| I'm sorry, if I realize that I'd wind up defending the name, I'd have
| put the rational in my original message. The OS specific name spaces
| nearly universally run under the OS they are named for. Under the
| Macintosh, one would be best served by using the OS's native API (as
| accessed in perl with the Mac::Resource module) and not this perl
| level re-implementation. As a comparison, would you expect to find a
| Unix implementation of COM in Win32::OLE? A windows version of popen()
| in Unix::PipedFileHandle? 

Those two examples aren't analogous.

I'm expect to find platform-independent tools for identifying Windows
file types or for manipulating the Windows registry under Win32::,
however.  I'd expect to find popen under POSIX::.

| When initially developing this module, I asked around for suggestions
| on both the name of the module and the design (although the only
| evidence I can find is this thread in comp.lang.perl.modules which the
| only common answer for a hierarchy is Mac::
| 
| http://groups.google.com/groups?q=group:comp.lang.perl.modules+
| author:aml%40world.std.com&hl=en&safe=off&scoring=r&rnum=9&
| selm=F25vyu.IB5%40world.std.com>

I just asked on #perl and the response was unanimously "Mac", and
unanimously against "Data".  One mac-knowledgeable person there asked
what resource-fork model your module worked with, and suggested
Mac::Resources::Netatalk or Mac::Resources::LinuxHFS or similar.

| I guess to bring it to a point, I strongly feel that Mac:: is the
| wrong hierarchy for the module to be in. The choice of Data:: wasn't
| done without any thought or consultation, although I agree it isn't
| ideal.
| 
| Do you have any suggestions besides Mac:: for a namespace?

A suggestion was made for starting a top-level namespace for
cross-platform tools, but no good name was suggested for it.

The general process you should be doing is drilling down on this blurry
"data" thing and saying "what sort of data is it?"  Well, it's a file.
OK, so how about File::?  Perhaps something like File::Mac::Resources?
Or if it's more like a file system (I'm not very knowledgeable about
macs) then perhaps Filesys:: 

But *not* Data.

K.

Re: Registering

[Kirrily Robert]

David wrote:
>Upload plans:  I have recently written a DHCP module (Net::DHCP) that
>enables a programmer to create a handle ($scalar = new Net::DHCP) and
>thereby interact with a DHCP server through the internal methods of the
>module.  The module was written in compliance with RFC 2131(BOOTP) and
>2132(DHCP).

What relationship, if any, does your module have to Net::DHCPClient,
which already exists in CPAN?

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Bad Benno!  Stole an elephant!"
-- thorfinn (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: author ID request

[Kirrily Robert]

Andrew Langmead wrote:
>%  your name: Andrew Langmead
>%  your email address: [EMAIL PROTECTED]:
>%  your homepage if you have one: 
>%  your preferred user-ID on CPAN: LANGMEAD
>%  a short description of what you're planning to contribute:
>
>The first thing I want to contribute is a cleaned up version of
>Data::MacResFile, a module for non-Macintosh systems to read
>compontents out of a Macintosh resource file.

Data:: is so generic it's almost meaningless... almost everything a Perl
module could deal with is data, and it wouldn't make sense to put every
perl module under Data.  So let's save Data for stuff that's really
generic data manipulation and which don't obviously fit elsewhere.

I'd suggest putting your module under the Mac:: namespace.  Although
Mac:: is mostly modules that run on Mac, there is at least one other
example of a platform-independent module in there
(Mac::FileSpec::Unixish).  The real issue, though, is where would people
look for a Mac-related module?  I'm thinking they'd look in Mac::

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Bad Benno!  Stole an elephant!"
-- thorfinn (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: Diff.pm => CPAN?, Patch.pm?

[Kirrily Robert]

Barrie wrote:
>I've written a Diff.pm that uses MJD's Algorithm::Diff to
>produce old-style, context, and unified diffs and am planning to send it
>CPAN-ward, either on it's own or as part of Ned Konz's diff package.
>
>I will also be writing a Patch.pm that can read (at first) unified diffs
>and apply them.  I need these for the VCP package so it doesn't need to
>rely on local system having unified diffs and patch available.  Also,
>patch takes a crapper should a NUL sneak in to a file.

I'd suggest looking for an existing top-level namespace to put these
modules in.  Perhaps Devel?  

K.

-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"Bad Benno!  Stole an elephant!"
-- thorfinn (from the Netizen quotes file)

Re: CPAN naming conventions work

[Kirrily Robert]

On Mon, Jun 18, 2001 at 01:46:37AM -0700, Ask Bjoern Hansen wrote:
| On Sun, 17 Jun 2001, Kirrily Robert wrote:
| 
| > As you may be aware, there was a CPAN/CPANTS/modules/etc BOF yesterday
| > at YAPC.  Ziggy's going to be posting full minutes soon (to cpan-workers
| > and use.perl.org if I recall correctly) but one of the action items that
| > I volunteered for was to review current module naming conventions on
| > CPAN (if any),
| 
| watch out or you'll offend people. (1/2 :-) )

I know.  One of the reasons I'm taking this on is that I think I have
the skills and experience to do it with... well, let's not say without
offending people, since some people seem to want to be offended no
matter what one does, but at least with the minimum offense for the
maximum result :)

| http://www.xray.mpe.mpg.de/mailing-lists/modules/
| http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/

Yup.  I'll be poring over them.

| > I'm emailing you just to let you know what I'm up to and to solicit your
| > assistance if you're interested.  Let me know if you have any thoughts.
| 
| [EMAIL PROTECTED] has lots of experience in this and the nice people
| there have over the years put lots of thought into the issues.

And it's greatly appreciated!  I'm just hoping to capture some of that
experience on (virtual) paper so that people don't have to read 5 years
of mail archives to find out about it :)  Think of it mostly as a 
summarisation process, and secondly as a "making decisions and doing
stuff" process if the summarisation process turns up a lot of issues.
My guess is that it'll turn up a lot of small issues that people would
like clarification on, and a bunch of big meta-issues that are probably
way out of scope for now.

For the meantime, I'm just trying to answer the question "What is the
current best practice for CPAN module naming?" and publish the results.

K.

CPAN naming conventions work

[Kirrily Robert]

As you may be aware, there was a CPAN/CPANTS/modules/etc BOF yesterday
at YAPC.  Ziggy's going to be posting full minutes soon (to cpan-workers
and use.perl.org if I recall correctly) but one of the action items that
I volunteered for was to review current module naming conventions on
CPAN (if any), look at any discrepancies, and start thinking about
resolving them in time for the inevitable "Great Perl 6 Module
Rewriting".

My plan of attack at the moment is to look through the modules lists on
CPAN, talk to people about what they see as mixed up (for instance I
know that Date::* and Time::* aren't clearly organised), and write this
up somehow.

I hope to deliver a document describing current "best practice" for
module naming, and a set of recommendations for Perl 6.

I'm emailing you just to let you know what I'm up to and to solicit your
assistance if you're interested.  Let me know if you have any thoughts.

Yours,

K.
-- 
Kirrily 'Skud' Robert - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://infotrope.net/
"RTFG - Read the fucking genome."
-- Benno (from the Netizen quotes file)