Developing filePro apps for developers

[Jay R. Ashworth]

On Fri, Jun 15, 2007 at 08:32:57AM -0400, Walter Vaughan wrote:
> I did have an idea that could make your accounting app work in a
> method that would allow for you to keep improving it, and yet allow
> developers to make changes to their systems and not break things.
[ ... ]
> So we worked with (paid) someone who was helped us to setup an SVK
> repository. SVK is a tool that acts as both a svn client and svn
> server. So we can pull down the laterst svn (they call it smerging!)
> from the parent project, and our internal people syncronize with our
> local repository.
>
> I guess since I've not worked in a version control system before, but
> it seemed like magic in that it really worked. I know who changed what
> file and when, and can get diffs, roll back... our developers can
> quickly build patches for the parent project or commit local changes
> and everything works.
>
> And the first place ourside of our internal needs I thought of was the
> problem that was discussed a few weeks ago on the filepro list with
> your accounting system.

But, alas, that won't help him.  His fundamental problem is going to be
field number conflicts between *his own* changes and extensions, and
those of downstream developers or users.  Short of *requiring* that all
changes and extensions be made as one-to-one sibling files -- which is a) 
a pain in the ass and b) unenforceable anyway -- I see no way to get
around that.

It's the fundamental problem with trying to do what John's trying to do
(and indeed, what Fourgen did 20 years earlier) in filePro.  It's not
the *only* problem with trying to apply F/OSS development methodologies
-- or indeed ones which got started there, and moved back into
proprietary development, like source code control -- to filePro, but
it's a biggie.

Cheers,
-- jra
-- 
Jay R. Ashworth                   Baylink                      jra at baylink.com
Designer                     The Things I Think                       RFC 2100
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