Re: Multi Language Support Question

[Axel Beckert <nospam@thanx>]

Hi!

Denis Barbier wrote:
> > But, you're right, it would be nice, to have some slice options to
> >   a) produce no file, if the appropriate slice (or slice term) is
> >      empty (or perhaps just contains white spaces) and
> >   b) produce no file, if the appropriate slice doesn't exist.
> > 
> > Those options should IMHO be appliable a) to each -o solely and b) to
> > all -o's
> > 
> > That would make things a lot easier...
> 
> I just checked wml_p9_slice and it sounds easy to implement, the only
> problem is about interface specification (how will user tell which file
> must be skipped), any ideas are welcome.

Since slice hasn't that much options yet, this shouldn't be that hard. ;-)

Here 's my suggestion, of which I thought first about, when I stumbled
across that problem with non-existent slices:

-o: as before
-a: like -o, but write output file only, if *a*ll slices in the slice
    term exist
-p: like -o, but write output file only, if all *p*ositive (+) slices
    in the slice term exist (to substract something, that doesn't
    exist, doesn't hurt :-)
-n: like -o, but write output file only, if slice term is *n*ot empty
    (means "contains not only whitespaces")

-A: Proceed as if all following -o's are -a's  (also applies to -n)
-P: dito. for -p (also applies to -n)
-N: dito. for -n (also applies to -a and -p)

Those uppercase parameters probably would be nice for use inside the
.wmlrc's and .wmkrc's... :-)

BTW: Are the options of slice like BSD options and do not need any
space between a flag and it's parameter (like "-oENuUNDEF:foo.en.html")?

If not, we could also allow something like "-np ENuUNDEF:foo.en.html",
whose semantic should be "like -o, but write output file only, if all
*p*ositive (+) slices in the slice term exist and the slice isn't
empty". With BSD style options, perhaps "-n -p ENuUNDEF:foo.en.html"
should be used instead.

Another syntax variant:

If we have not BSD style option, another solution would be to append
the characters "a", "p" and "n" just as flags to the -o parameter like
"-opn" or "-oa". This is perhaps more intuitive and doesn't pollute
parameter name space that much. ;-) Although the uppercase parameters
mentioned above, could be used here, too.

BTW: If I hadn't made any error in reasoning, there's no need to make
a difference between "-n and -a/-p" and "-n [x]or -a/-p". But it's
already late... :-)

P.S.: Those suggestions are more a brain dump than a fully evaluated
user interface. See it as discussion base. :-)

		Regards, Axel
-- 
Axel Beckert - abe@cs.uni-sb.de - http://abe.home.pages.de/
Student of Computer Science, University of Saarland (Germany)
Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (AI Lab), Prof. Dr. W. Wahlster;
WWW-/FTP-Administrator IBFI Schloß Dagstuhl; Students Representative CS
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