[OpenAFS-devel] Selecting a configuration file format for OpenAFS Services

[Derrick Brashear]

On Sat, May 16, 2009 at 9:48 AM,  <u+openafsdev-t07O@chalmers.se> wrote:
> Hello Derrick,
>
> On Sat, May 16, 2009 at 09:10:38AM -0400, Derrick Brashear wrote:
>> Consider the case which pushed us here. You have an array of numbers.
>> It's a set of timeout values, which apply when you have between a
>> certain number of callers.
>>
>> You can, of course, just pass an argument which is a comma separated
>> list of timeouts. What do they mean? Well, you don't need to pass
>> those numbers, so, well, just make sure you order things right.
>>
>> But wait. What happens if you want to also make the ranges the
>> timeouts apply in tunable? Do you now pass 2 lists, one for the bucket
>> ranges and one for the timeouts, or a set of pairs? How do you
>> delineate the pairs?
>
> Whatever is the challenge, it is about formulating some information
> as text, either in a configuration file or on the command line.
>
> Note that a configuration file is a sequence of bytes usually representing
> a sequence of characters and a command line option is a sequence of
> bytes usually representing a sequence of characters.
>
> What makes you think that they are differently capable
> of representing a certain piece of information?

A command line has a very limited syntax. It's not my limit. The OS
lets me enter, effectively, one long line of stuff. That's it. They
*are* different.

> Note also that I do not advocate actually typing the options on the
> command line. It hardly happens in production environments anyway,
> one writes scripts which do the job.

If it's possible to do, someone will do it.


-- 
Derrick