[PD] puredatabase

Steffen stffn at dibidut.dk
Tue Feb 6 23:00:26 CET 2007


On 05/02/2007, at 17.12, IOhannes m zmoelnig wrote:

>>> apart from that:
>>> personally i am not convinced that the database should be created  
>>> on the
>>> fly from CVS for various reasons:
>>> - code would have to follow a certain outline in order to make  
>>> this work
>>
>> Ok. I thought that such outline was already established by m_pd.h or
>> "the way" to write externals.
>
> no, this won't help you.
> there is no point in documenting that the object understands "open
> <symbol>" messages, if you don't know what the object does.
> i always thought that pdb is not a help-patch replacement but a  
> place to
> find an object that does certain things (like: being written by  
> somebody
> ;-))

I agree. I would only fetch object names from CVS to get a complete  
list. I assume a complete list of objects can infact be fetched by  
parsing the code in CVS. (Naturally stuff not in CVS would not make  
it to the database that way.)

>>> - separation between code and documentation is rather low (coders
>>> usually hate to documentate their stuff; so a host of volunteers is
>>> needed to do the documentation; they don't necessarily need to  
>>> interfere
>>> with the source-code for this task)
>>> - accuracy tends to be low with automated systems
>>>
>>>
>>> so i think that the database ought to be manually maintained.
>>
>> Ok. I was just suggesting what i thought would be the easiest way to
>> keep the database accuracy high, since, as you say, coders don't
>> necessarily do the docs - or just might not see the use for a  
>> database.
>> That's all.
>
> i think we don't disagree here. i think most things i said are  
> implicit
> in your original email.
> (i said: "use CVS to initially populate the db, but the real work  
> is in
> maintaining the db manually")

Yeah, it seams so. Too bad it took me a few email's to get it.

My question is then; does it makes sense to start writing such "parser"?

And a suggestion: It might be good to debate here how the database  
should be designed to best do it job. Fx. would it be an idea to make  
a set of (not necessarily disjunkt/non-intersecting) categories/ 
labels objects/libs could fit in - like math, audio, control, graphic  
(inspired by http://puredata.info/dev/PdLibraries)? I mean, there  
must be a quite a few opinions on how the database could be organized  
in order to be of most use.






More information about the Pd-list mailing list