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I did a quick scan of the new User Guide text that describes the
proposed 0.96 config conventions.<br>
<br>
I feel we need to re-examine the mechanism for backwards
compatibility with 0.95, and decide on a few things.<br>
<br>
- default property file names have changed: swift.properties vs
swift.config<br>
<br>
- the search path implemented by 0.95 is (I suspect) not yet carried
forward here, and that needs discussion. My inclination is that it
should be.<br>
<br>
- the include mechanism is new. I think its nice and likely is
very useful, but I wonder how it will interact with or supplement
the property search path.<br>
Did that come from the underlying config classes used, or was that
done from scratch? We should also consider hos this works with
respect to the use of cpp in stc, if we see ourselves heading to the
use of stc as a universal front end for the Swift toolchain.<br>
<br>
- as we discussed before, but never resolved - we should decide if
the documented/encouraged format will have colon separators and
quoted string values. I prefer the visually simpler format without
either, and I think 0.95 also allows an optional "=" separator as in
standard properties files. (
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.properties">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.properties</a> is a nice summary, and says
"
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Several formats are possible for each line, including key=value, key
= value, key:value, and key value.")<br>
<br>
I think we can work all these issues out as we go. I'm eager to
test trunk in its current state before we address any of the issues
above. Lets concentrate first on manual testing and on getting the
property names stabilized and the more important semantic changes.<br>
<br>
Also, we need to work out issues in application location
specifications that were started but not yet fully developed in the
0.95 effort. David and I discussed these, and we need to capture
and post the recommendations that were still in progress for this.<br>
<br>
- Mike<br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
Michael Wilde
Mathematics and Computer Science Computation Institute
Argonne National Laboratory The University of Chicago
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