Re: New Package: HTML_DB

On Thu, 24 Apr 2003, Bertrand Mansion wrote: > What you do here could also be done using DB_DataObjects, HTML_QuickForm (or > OOH_Form if you prefer), HTML_Table, DB_Pager and Auth. Personally, I don't > see the use to reinvent all these packages that work well and are used by > other developers who provides bug reports and patches. DB_DataObjects: Documentation opaque to impenetrable. HTML_QuickForm: Documentation non-existent. OOH_Form: Documentation non-existent. HTML_Table: Documentation non-existent. DB_Pager: See above. Auth: My god, this one might actually have decent documentation. But I think the OP explained why his class was different (not sure how different, I just HTTP authentication with apache modules and it scratches my itch). There's a list of pretty good reasons why someone might reinvent those packages - because in the manual on pear.php.net, they effectively don't exist. I've provided documentation for QuickForm and Table, and they may be in CVS, but Joe Blow Average is not going to start reading the XML docs to work out what's going on. Here's a hint for PEAR in general - if you want people to use your stuff, you have to document it. If it isn't documented, it effectively doesn't exist to anyone who doesn't have intimate prior knowledge of the code. So people are going to rewrite things, because they don't know any different. Bertrand, this isn't directed at you particularly, but it needs to be said. If PEAR wants to be taken seriously by the larger PHP developer community, it has to be documented well. Commercial developers do not have the time to spare to learn a class from it's code. It's quicker for us to hand-grow our own, which we know how to use, than to dissect someone else's code. Unfortunate fact of life, I'm afraid. -- ----------------------------------------------------------------------- #include <disclaimer.h> Matthew Palmer, Geek In Residence http://ieee.uow.edu.au/~mjp16