[Zope3-dev] Re: More thoughts on packaging

[Shane Hathaway]

On Fri, 20 Feb 2004, Paul Winkler wrote:

> On Fri, Feb 20, 2004 at 10:10:00AM -0500, Shane Hathaway wrote:
> > I'll note that our configuration strategy for Zope 2 has always been to
> > configure things through the web.  This mode of operation is highly
> > effective for complex things.  A GUI prompts for information, while a
> > written language requires some level of fluency to be effective.
> 
> OTOH, I've found the TTW configuration for zope 2 leads to maintenance
> nightmares when you have multiple systems (e.g. dev, staging, and
> production).  However, this is an artifact of the implementation -
> TTW configuration in zope 2 usually consists of setting properties
> and security on objects, which cannot easily be separated from 
> the object's data or contents.  Try to duplicate a complex 
> CMF skin configuration without dragging along the contents
> of the actual skin folders and you will see what I mean.
> Or try to duplicate security settings for a folder without
> copying the contents of the folder.

I agree that's a problem.  I think that only means configurable tools need
a clean serialization format, and we need tools for importing/exporting
configurations.  We didn't know that (or we hadn't internalized it) when
CMF was being created.  Fortunately, we know it now. :-)

Shane