Re: RFC: a plugin architecture for git extensions?

From: Jon Seymour <jon.seymour@gmail.com>
Date: May 6, 2011, 06:20 UTC
Message-ID: <BANLkTi=zrWR0GAm6n1Gs9XDCR6kXtjDW0A@mail.gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <7vbozg4eqw.fsf@alter.siamese.dyndns.org>

On Fri, May 6, 2011 at 2:47 PM, Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com> wrote:

Show 8 quoted lines

> Jon Seymour <jon.seymour@gmail.com> writes:
>> It would be good if something like:
>>
>>     unzip -d $(git --plugins-dir) foobar.zip
>>
>> installed scripts, info files and man pages into a place where git
>> would find them and then have git foobar start working without any
>> additional effort by the package author or user.

> That should be doable without any elaborate "plugin management".  We only
> need to enhance the git potty and help system to look for things in a set
> of new directories, and have these unzip installation put their stuff
> there.

I do agree - plugin management is superfluous to current requirements.

Show 35 quoted lines

>>>
>>> *1* I admit that I didn't read all of them carefully, as I was repelled by
>>> them as soon as I saw phrases like "for people who can grok this concept".
>>
>> Junio: at least quote me accurately. I actually wrote:
>>
>> "Contributors who grok the concept as I conceive it are welcome to
>> submit pull requests."
>>
>> I am a little mystified why use of the word "grok" in this way, given the
>> circumstances, caused you to be "repelled".
>
> What repelled me was not any particular word (and that is exactly why I
> did not even bother to "quote") but your general attitude in the
> discussion.  Your tone throughout the discussion appeared at least to me
> that you thought anybody who did not agree with you was incapable of
> understanding something so obvious and clearly right, and only those who
> could "grok" it deserved to join the discussion.  We occasionally have
> seen such people on this list in the past, but luckily not very often.
>
> I am not saying that your thinking should always start from "I could be
> wrong".  However, I do not think "What is so hard about the concept ...?"
> is the question you should be asking others before asking yourself "Is
> there a better way I could have explained this idea I want others to agree
> with?  The reason why they are still not on the same page as I am could
> well be because all of them are morons, but it may be possible that it is
> because the way I have explained my idea to them was not optimal.  Perhaps
> I did not present the motivation and the background well enough to justify
> that the problem I am trying to solve is worth solving, before throwing my
> idea on how to solve it".
>
> After all, different people have different needs and expectations.  The
> discussion on a particular _solution_ can only start after you get people
> on board and share the sense of _need_ to solve something common.
>

Ok, well thanks for taking the time to explain what you really meant.

I agree that I have come across as arrogant; I reacted badly to what I considered to be insults being heaped in my direction by some. However, I did myself and my ideas no favors by treating such criticism with the public disdain that I did.

I also agree that I did a lousy job explaining the concepts let alone convincing others of their merits.

Finally, I agree that it would be more productive for me to be more sensitive to what is agreed to be a common need and to try to restrict my proposed solutions to exactly those needs.

I would appreciate any feedback you (or others) have about:

    http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.comp.version-control.git/172419

In particular, I would be interested in feedback about how to best support:

- multiple extensions - do we want support installing extensions in
their own directories, per Pau's suggestion or simply allow them to
write to a common directory?
- multiple extension directories - how to support Jonathan's
requirement to allow user specific extension directories?

I have some ideas about how to do this which I will propose in a patch over the next few weeks, but any input I have now would be useful.

Regards,

jon.