[Bese-devel] Keeping the core library separate from the extensions

[hbabcockos1 at mac.com]

On Jul 24, 2006, at 9:23 AM, Lou Vanek wrote:

> Marijn Haverbeke wrote:
>> I'd like to hear people's thoughts about the idea of making a  
>> clear distinction between the core UCW library (request-response  
>> loop, frames, components, actions), andl the extensions to this  
>> system (input fields, validators, dojo stuff, some of the things  
>> Attila is brewing up in the ajax branch), possibly also separating  
>> the extensions into different modules. I personally think this  
>> would have the advantage of clarity, and of being able to re-use  
>> the core in widely different ways (we're all hackers who like to  
>> re-invent stuff) without having to 'fight' the library.
>> For one thing, I feel that the javascript that is generated when  
>> you make a form call an action should be optional. It doesn't  
>> really serve a purpose in the general case, and I'm not using it,  
>> but it is dragging in the whole dojo dependency. I know just  
>> including dojo.js won;'t kill me, but I'm something of an HTML  
>> minimalist who hates to have cruft in his pages that is not  
>> necessary. (I can't help it.) I still haven't really studied the  
>> ajax branch, but I'm a bit worried that there will be a rather  
>> strong coupling between Attila vision of an UCW app and the  
>> library itself.
>> Hope to hear your reactions,
>> Marijn
>
> I completely agree. You've put into words what I have only recently
> come to understand. UCW is turning into an intranet framework, which
> wouldn't bother me at all if the extra cruft were optional, but
> in some cases it isn't. Just to do a 302 redirect you have to make
> sure you've downloaded a 130K+ javascript file first, and this op can
> happen frequently. I know the js should have been cached, but this
> is a symptom of how the framework is requiring too much bandwidth. I
> have to admit I haven't tried the ucw_ajax branch, though, so maybe
> Attila has successfully incorporated dojo. If ucw_ajax were a module
> i would have already downloaded and seen first hand.

I also agree with the sentiment. However, my impression is that UCW  
isn't so far away from this right now. UCW already has simple-form  
for javascript free forms. I understand that Attila has a simple- 
window class in ucw_ajax for creating components that don't  
automatically put a request for dojo.js into the HTML page header.  
That, I believe, only leaves actions, but those don't seem to use/ 
require javascript at the moment.

-Hazen