[PEAK] Re: Proposal for another Wiki "tutorial"

[Phillip J. Eby]

At 07:29 PM 7/15/04 +0100, Paul Moore wrote:

>So, a key point of the point I want to make (or, conversely, the benefit I'm
>looking for from PEAK) is the ability to improve an existing application by
>increasing the decoupling and configurability incrementally. Ground-up design
>isn't what I'm looking at right now (and it's covered by other documentation,
>anyway). The biggest learning issue for me with PEAK was the "how do I get
>there from here" question. I have working code, I want to improve it. I can't
>see how to switch to PEAK ini-style files, DMs, etc without rewriting the
>whole thing from scratch (and reworking how I think about the problem at the
>same time). I'm looking for baby steps here :-)

Based on the above, and the fact that my mental model was way off from what 
you are trying to do, I'll withdraw my design suggestions and replace them 
with an editorial suggestion.  :)

I'd like to suggest that you not try to turn this into a "tutorial" as 
such.  Instead,  simply blog the refactoring of your existing app, and just 
treat it as an example of refactoring an existing application to use PEAK.

This will achieve several things.  For one, you'll feel freer to delve into 
the details of your use cases, right from the start.  Second, since you 
want to take an XP approach, you won't need to get bogged down in 
presenting an upfront design or trying to generalize it in some way.  Just 
show what code you've got today (or snippets of it), and note your progress 
in refactoring, as you go.

Third, there aren't any tutorials of this sort available currently, so it 
will offer another perspective, one that may be helpful to others who are 
seeking to do similar refactorings.  And last, but not least, if I offer 
any future design suggestions I'll do so knowing what your actual use cases 
and situation are, which means my suggestions will be more likely to be 
relevant and helpful.  :)