[sword-devel] .conf-only updates (was: Re: 3-letter language character codes)

[Eeli Kaikkonen]

On Mon, 9 Nov 2009, Chris Little wrote:

>
> Nic Carter wrote:
> > The other thought I had was the suggestion from a week or so ago
> > about the versioning of the conf files...  if the version numbers
> > were X.Y.Z we could say that a change in X or Y means there's a
> > change in the text, requiring a redownload of the entire text.
> > However, a change in Z simply means that the conf file has changed &
> > so the user doesn't need to redownload the entire text but simply
> > grab the new conf file (generally less than 1K, but also available in
> > mods.d.tar.gz).

Not only is it available there, but it's already in the destination
machine. The remote list must have been downloaded already if the user
wants to see the contents at all.

> >  This would be useful for if we later on also want to
> > add Feature=Paragraphs, or whatever other tags we want to add that
> > simply change the conf file (which is how this suggestion came up
> > last week)? But would also mean we could silently update a conf file
> > with a new language code and as long as the front-end is keeping
> > up-to-date with the ISO codes, everything should work?  :)
>
> I really like this idea. We've always reserved use of the revision
> number (Z in X.Y.Z), but our SWVersion code can recognize it.

On the other hand, there's no need to use that scheme. If the .conf file
is versioned, it can as well be 0,1,2,3... 0 (or no version number
entry at all) is always the same as the module version itself. 1 is the
first updated .conf file for that module version. When a new module
version is created the .conf version will be 0 again. Very simple and
should work as well. But I don't see downsides in the other approach,
either.

> I'll start implementing this in a day or two, if no one raises an objection.
>

There was a discussion about some batch module updates once concerning a
change in copyright notices or something else I don't remember anymore.
I then proposed this idea, but apparently it then went unnoticed. I'm
glad it was a good idea after all :)


  Yours,
	Eeli Kaikkonen (Mr.), Oulu, Finland
	e-mail: eekaikko at mailx.studentx.oulux.fix (with no x)