Forum OpenACS Improvement Proposals (TIPs): Re: TIP #141: Implement true global package parameters

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16: Re: TIP #141: Implement true global package parameters (response to 13)
Posted by Dave Bauer on 01/31/10 05:01 PM
Ooops,

Jeff Davis already TIPed this a long time ago. It was approved but not implemented.

Don, do you think Jeff's ideas add anything to your proposal?

Torben,

This is a concrete example why we need gloal parameters. File storage has a paramter for the maximum upload file size. I have never had a site where this made sense to be instance specific. Generally this is an issue for long lived sites where the average file upload size increases as newer types of files are used. ie: IN the past videos were not common but now videos in the hundreds of megabytes are uploaded on some sites. This file storage paraemter is specific to the file storage package, but should be set site-wide in one place. In some dotlrn installs there are hundreds of file storage instances.

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17: Re: TIP #141: Implement true global package parameters (response to 16)
Posted by Don Baccus on 01/31/10 05:20 PM
Oh, that's funny, Daveb, we've discussed it in the past but I hadn't realized it had gone that far!

Now, since you found it, and I'm lazy - what TIP # was it?

Linky linky please!

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18: Re: TIP #141: Implement true global package parameters (response to 16)
Posted by Torben Brosten on 01/31/10 05:28 PM
Dave,
I've always wondered why file-storage didn't get the maxfilesize value from config.tcl for consistency since it is bound by that value anyway.
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19: Re: TIP #141: Implement true global package parameters (response to 18)
Posted by Nathan Lunt on 01/31/10 06:02 PM
In that case, I'd rather see config.tcl have some outrageously value and let file-storage reign it in.  This way admins aren't confused as to why uploads are failing even after they've updated the parameter. (A bit off-topic, but still.)

Don, that global parameters feature would be a god-send for those of us that have many instances of some packages.  The way I pictured your implementation is that each package would see an uneditable value for global parameters, but that makes me wonder how you would handle any package-specific overrides.  Then, if you have admins overriding global parameters on a per package basis, they've defeated the whole point, right?

I guess what I would suggest is the admins should be able to override the values per package, but they need to see an explanation of why it's not a good habit to get into.  Additionally, it might be a good idea to have a list of packages that have overridden values on the page they set global values.

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20: Re: TIP #141: Implement true global package parameters (response to 17)
Posted by Dave Bauer on 01/31/10 08:08 PM
Previous TIP about parameter scope
https://openacs.org/forums/message-view?message_id=271910

Oops it was still in my clipboard!

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21: Re: TIP #141: Implement true global package parameters (response to 20)
Posted by Torben Brosten on 01/31/10 08:18 PM
Nice find, Dave,

I was thinking about permissions with regards to parameters, in the context of sensitive data in ecommerce package for example.

The CONTEXT attribute solves that with the addition of your "none" suggestion.