Gentoo Archives: gentoo-user

From: Neil Walker <neil@×××××××.nu>
To: gentoo-user@l.g.o
Subject: Re: [gentoo-user] Devicekit - especially just for Dale
Date: Mon, 18 Jan 2010 08:57:11
Message-Id: 4B542247.8010609@ep.mine.nu
In Reply to: Re: [gentoo-user] Devicekit - especially just for Dale by Alan McKinnon
1 Alan McKinnon wrote:
2 >> The only way to be sure of that is to write your own replacement for HAL.
3 >> ;)
4 >>
5 >
6 > That might not be a bad idea....
7 >
8 > I never agreed with the implementation of hal. An abstract layer sounds good,
9 > but why must it abstract ALL hardware? Most software already knows what type
10 > of devices it is going to use, so that software should either do it's own
11 > abstraction, or a utility library should do it, but be limited to what devices
12 > it deals with.
13 >
14 > Most devices fall into one of two groups: storage and I/O. Auto-mounters do
15 > not care about your keyboard, whereas X needs to know about your monitor,
16 > card, keyboard, mouse. Why does hal try and abstract both? Seems silly to me.
17 >
18 > One could also argue that the developer's state of mind is reflected in the
19 > chosen method of configuration - xml files. This just defies all
20 > understanding. Apart from the fact that real-world xml is almost unreadable,
21 > the conditions that make xml useful are simply not present in hal...
22 >
23 > xml works well when you have system A talking to system B and neither A nor B
24 > (nor user C) know in advance exactly what the other is. They might not even
25 > know much about the data schema being used, so that metadata is in the xml.
26 > This is so completely not the case with hal on a local machine, that it defies
27 > description why the dev thought it might be useful.
28
29 I can't argue with any of that, which is why I decided to quote it in
30 full - it's worth
31 repeating.
32
33 It seems xml is the fashion with certain programmers. Totally
34 unnecessary. :(
35
36
37 Be lucky,
38
39 Neil
40 http://www.neiljw.com

Replies

Subject Author
Re: [gentoo-user] Devicekit - especially just for Dale Dale <rdalek1967@×××××.com>