Re: Documentation of nnoo.el

[Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org>]

Eric Abrahamsen <eric@ericabrahamsen.net> writes:

> nnoo.el is basically just an object-oriented system replicated with pure
> functions. deffoo creates methods, defvoo creates slots. `nnoo-declare'
> is kind of the equivalent of `defclass'. `nnoo-change-server' is the
> main function for switching servers: it copies the defvoo slot values
> for a single server into the respective global variables.

Yup.  It was written that way (back in...  what?  94?) because there was
some resistance to altering the "interface" defined by previous Gnus
backends.  (See nnnil.el for a basic summary of what that is.)  By
having Gnus switch around variables behind the backends' backs, the
"interface" was preserved while Gnus could go on having multiple servers
of the same type, etc.

I don't know whether that was a good trade-off (keeping the interface
vs. introducing lots of magic), but if I were to write that stuff now, I
wouldn't do it that way.  :-)  I'd pass in explicit object describing
the server state to each backend function, and I wouldn't have any
"global" voo variables at all.

If anybody wants to rewrite all the backends that way -- please go ahead.

> 1. First, only make backends into classes. This would give us the chance
>    to do away with the select-method/secondary-select-method
>    distinction, and just have a list of defined servers.

I think that's a totally orthogonal issue.  We could do that now, but
it'd break the current naming scheme for the groups in Gnus.

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
   bloggy blog: http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no