From: Curt Hibbs <curt@...>
Date: 2003-12-09T22:25:40+09:00
Subject: Re: Idea: Linux PIM in Ruby

Emmanuel Touzery wrote:
>
> Hal Fulton wrote:
>
> >> I would also like to reinforce this theme: A core "engine" with no
> >> gui. The
> >> gui can then be developed independently or, if you wish, separate (but
> >> similar) gui applications can be written that all use this same core
> >> engine.
> >
> >
> > In practice, I find this difficult.
> >
> > To get back to basics: I think the GUI serves as an I/O mechanism.
> >
> > Sometimes the engine drives (calls) the GUI, to fill a window with data
> > or throw up a window or whatever.
> >
> > Sometime the GUI drives the engine: The user pushes a button, and an
> > engine method gets called.
> >
> > Hmm, can we separate these logically? Make two modules or classes,
> > perhaps?
>
> the engine doesn't need to know the user entered the data, or whether
> it's from a preference file etc. no need for the engine to open up a
> window. the engine justs gets parameters with the input values and spits
> out output values. if the engine wants to display warnings or whatever,
> it should send "events" or exceptions for the GUI to pick up. the GUI
> can display a dialog box, something in the system tray etc. the engine
> doesn't know and doesn't care. this exists and is quite spread. consider
> mp3 playing libraries and mp3 players, libavcodec and xine and mplayer
> etc, or even cdrecord and CD burning apps under linux (although then the
> connection engine/GUI is more loose because the engine is a full-blown
> text app).

I think its a good approach. The idea is to embody the interface between the
engine and the UI with an api. This is a worthy goal whether or the api is
call-based or message-based.

Also, while there would be an initial learning curve, you should consider
using FreeBASE. This would give you a ready-built, dynamically-extendable
plugin system (always a good idea in a complex system), plus a built in
messaging engine and data-store (with persistence). The time you would save
by using it would be way more than the time you spent learning it. Plus Rich
and I would be happy to help you get up-to-speed as it would be nice to see
it used somewhere besides FreeRIDE (I'm going to use it in Naked Ruby).

Curt
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