Brian Pinkerton wrote:
| Sheesh. Next time I want to stimulate a rant on proper application
| design I'll be sure to ask an innocent little API question.
Or, better yet, explain why the obvious approach *won't* work. Or describe the problem in enough detail that people know what you're *really* trying to do. You got "rants" because your stated solution was far too elaborate for the problem you claimed you were solving: giving applications access to preference files.
It's not at all uncommon for people (novices and experts alike) to ask "How do I do X?" because they've gotten locked into X as a solution for their problem, when the *real* problem (the one X is a solution to) can be solved much more easily using some other approach. Often, the clue that that's what's happening is that trying to make X work involves a great deal of effort, effort that the problem *as stated* doesn't require.
For better or worse, you presented your problem in just that way: the desired solution was far more complicated than was needed to solve the *stated* problem. Had you troubled to explain why the applications *couldn't* use the Preferences API out of the box--that is, why the server, rather than the applications themselves, had to read the preference files--you'd not have gotten the recommendations you did. If you don't state the problem clearly, how can you expect useful responses?
And, by the way: you seriously need to recalibrate your "rant" standard. What you got was not "ranting", but honest efforts to suggest *simple* solutions to the problem *as you described it*. If you failed to describe it well enough for others to understand what you were *really* doing, that's hardly the fault of those trying to help.
Glen Fisher
_______________________________________________
Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored.
Java-dev mailing list (email@hidden)
Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription:
http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/java-dev/email@hidden
This email sent to email@hidden
