Re: [eclipse-incubator-e4-dev] Initial discussion onthe'modelled'workben

[Tom Schindl <tom.schindl@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

[...]
> 2) The protocol currently enforced in the ControlFactory's 'createGUI' 
> and 'disposeGUI' methods be the -only- path through with rendering 
> elements are managed. This is needed to enforce the CSS styling (as well 
> as a way to maintain sanity in the world...;-). Tom, the reason that the 
> 'clientArea' gets added to the 'contents' as well as being its own 
> property is to get the rendering for take place in the ControlFactory's 
> 'processContents' part of the protocol).

well so it is a "workaround" to make the generic method work. I think 
what's happening is that because your model is so generic and it is easy 
to abuse its features adding the attribute has no modeling reason you 
but the only reason is an implementation detail.

That's why I don't overly generic models like e.g. JavaScript-Objects 
whose counterpart in Java is a Hash because you can add/remove 
properties like you want. Freedom is good but too much freedom leads to 
anarchy.

What do you really gain with code like this:
-------8<-------
element.setProperty(GuiModel.WIDGET,comp);
-------8<-------

against code like this:

-------8<-------
element.setWidget(comp);
-------8<-------

In fact IMHO you have the same amount of API (your Property-Constants 
are API as well but one has to do a lot of reading documentation/code to 
find out it is) but the latter is documenting itself: The Model-Element 
has the possibility to restore a property named widget which is of type 
Widget.

I've done a lot of JavaScript programming and always hated that I had to 
switch between the HTML-Documentation and my code. A browsers DOM is a 
well defined structure that's why tooling can help this is not true for 
any model and kills productivity.

Tom

--
B e s t S o l u t i o n . a t                        EDV Systemhaus GmbH
------------------------------------------------------------------------
tom schindl                               leiter softwareentwicklung/CSO
------------------------------------------------------------------------
eduard-bodem-gasse 8/3    A-6020 innsbruck      phone    ++43 512 935834