[TxMt] Re: C Library bundle MONSTER

[Kevin Ballard]

On Dec 6, 2006, at 8:15 PM, William D. Neumann wrote:

> On Wed, 6 Dec 2006, Jacob Rus wrote:
>
>> Three reasons:
>>
>> 1. It serves very little useful need.
>
> The need it serves seems more to be providing useful documentation  
> regarding the types and purpose of the parameters than to save on  
> typing. Which, according to section 7.1 of the textmate help is a  
> valid reason for using a snippet.

Man pages already exist to document this stuff. Having more  
documentation of the same stuff isn't any better.

>> 2. The things which are in the subversion repository represent the  
>> consensus of the TextMate community.
>
> Really?  Since when?  I don't remember getting any ballots to help  
> judge the consensus.  And as far as I can tell, yours is the only  
> complaint so far against the C Library bundle.  Do your wishes now  
> equal community consensus?

There's been discussion all day on the IRC channel about your bundle.  
It's not just Jacob that doesn't like this.

>> 3. It is not impossibly difficult to make a completion command  
>> which is vastly more useful, can be pushed into the existing C  
>> bundle (meaning I don't need to go to my list and filter something  
>> else out), works the way users coming from other editors would  
>> expect it to, is more flexible (i.e. can be adapted for  
>> unanticipated libraries), and is just in every respect better.
>
> "It doesn't work as well as it could" <> "compelling reason to  
> delete".  I think most folk here would agree that the current  
> syntax definition system isn't working as well as it could.  Should  
> we just go ahead and scrap all bundles that contain a syntax  
> definition?

That's a ridiculous exaggeration.

>> 4. I'll toss in a fourth reason: it's inelegant.  Its very  
>> existence bothers the soul of this TextMate user.
>
> Which is about as compelling a reason for deletion as "I don't  
> personally use language X,"  if that's the case, I can give you a  
> huge list of bundles that I'd appreciate if you could delete as well.

It bothers the soul of this TextMate user as well. There's a big  
difference between saying "I don't use that" and saying "the mere  
fact that it exists bothers me".

>> I don't care about any of these reasons.
>
> So?  Pretty much the only discussions I see before new bundles  
> appear are along the lines of:
>
> A: Hey, is there a bundle for X?
> B: Nope.  Why don't you whip one up and add it to the repository?

That's because most bundles aren't comprised of 1300 snippets.  
Usually this sort of talk is about creating a bundles for a new  
language, which in the general case there's no need for discussion  
about.

>> Mainly, it should have never been added.  There was no discussion  
>> before it went in, and I would imagine that within 3-4 days, a  
>> better solution will exist, as there are plenty of enterprising  
>> users on this list who could make such a thing happen.
>
> So why not leave it in until those better solutions appear?

Because it causes problems. Your bundle is 5.3MB in size (not  
counting the .svn metadata). This is a pretty big chunk of stuff to  
download for everybody doing a simple `svn update`. For comparison,  
the entire repository (minus your bundle) is only 43MB (again, not  
counting the .svn metadata). I for one have been putting off updating  
my checkout until your bundle has been removed.

If you want an uncommon but reasonable example of how your bundle  
might cause problems, think of user Joe Shmoe who has a repository  
checkout and is on dialup most of the day. Sure, the checkout itself  
is large, but he got it by letting svn work overnight (or perhaps he  
was at his friend's house with DSL). But he updates his checkout  
regularly over dialup, since the vast majority of updates are small  
in size, and doing it regularly means each individual checkout  
doesn't take long. Now he tries to update after your commit, and,  
oops, that's a few hours wasted while svn updates. And he doesn't  
want to cancel it because that would just mean he has to do it later.

-- 
Kevin Ballard
http://kevin.sb.org
kevin at sb.org
http://www.tildesoft.com


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