On Fri, Apr 2, 2010 at 5:57 PM, Rob Lanphier <robla(a)robla.net> wrote:
On Fri, Apr 2, 2010 at 1:09 PM, Neil Kandalgaonkar
<neilk(a)wikimedia.org>wrote;wrote:
This is interesting. I'm going to look more
into what you've been doing
over the weekend. But in the meantime I have a related question.
I've been working (quietly) on Multimedia Usability, and one major issue
with the whole design of multimedia on mediawiki, IMO, is the unity of
storage filename, URL, and title.
Since you've gone halfway there, how hard would it be to break these
dependencies entirely?
This work is definitely a step in that direction, and probably not too much
more dev work to go all of the way. The test/bugfix cycle is what worries
me the most, for reasons that probably are the same for any feature in this
area.
Luckily the FileRepo code isn't nearly as scary as the Parser, and I have
a pretty good grasp of it. I haven't reviewed the patches in question, but I
can do so. I really don't want us to jump into this too quickly and find out
we've made a bad decision...so let's slow it down a few notches :p
I know the patch/review process can be a bit trying at times, especially
when you hear no feedback. I've been asked before what it takes to get
a bug/patch/branch reviewed and if I've learned nothing in the past few
years it's this: persistence. You have to drive your change and see it
through. Posting a bug (sadly) isn't usually enough to get the right
people's attention. Maybe it's a lack of resources, Bugzilla sucking, who
knows. Anyway...
Decoupling the filename from the URL/Title would
involve not only storing
file extensions in the database, but full filenames, which would result in a
few more megabytes of database space on commons. There's been quite a bit
of debate in Bugzilla since yesterday about the database modifications and
the merits of the feature generally:
https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=4421#c51
It would also open up the possibility of storing uploads in the database,
also a long-standing feature request for third parties[0]. I don't really
agree with stripping the file extensions necessarily (I've said my share
on the bug), but I do agree that decoupling URL/Title/Filename (at least
separate the filename/path) would be a good direction to go in the long
term.
Also, I want a pony.
Not before I get my unicorn.
I took the liberty of opening an enhancement request for Neal's
pony (which I would also like), but Aryeh pointed out that we
might be facing some legal and logistical issues in doing so.
-Chad
[0]
https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/363
[1]
https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/23029