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BlueQuartzSoftware / DREAM3D

Data Analysis program and framework for materials science data analytics, based on the managing framework SIMPL framework.
http://dream3d.bluequartz.net
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Relative paths for prebuilt pipelines #742

Open dumoulins opened 7 years ago

dumoulins commented 7 years ago

Hello,

We are wondering whether it would not be better to allow for relative paths in json files that start from the location of the json file itself rather than the exe. Indeed the position of the exe will change from user to user while the json files and their input/output files will most likely always have the same relative positions (especially when one develops DREAM3D and provides users with templates and exe).

Regards Stephane

imikejackson commented 7 years ago

I think we will have a problem on macOS platforms where the entire DREAM.3D package is contained inside a .app "folder" ( this design is particular to macOS). According to Apple security guidelines applications are not allowed to write back into the .app package which is where the prebuilt pipelines are contained.

The idea is interesting though. This would place a "relationship" much like the .dream3d and the .xdmf files where you need to keep them side by side in the file system. If we can figure out how to get around the macOS design issues then this might make an interesting feature.

Another aspect to consider is transitioning users from older versions of DREAM.3D to this newer version they may have workflows that assume the relative path based off the .exe and not the JSON file that is being used. All of those workflows would break and require those users to take time to update their workflows.

imikejackson commented 7 years ago

As we just discovered on the latest macOS versions all of our relative paths do not work anyways so we are rethinking this entire setup of supporting relative paths.