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jBrout doesn't match FreeDesktop directories specs #56

Closed GoogleCodeExporter closed 9 years ago

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
I've tried jBrout _0.3.174 on Ubuntu 8.10
and it seems that jBrout places its configuration files in
/home/.jbrout directory which doesn't match FreeDesktop directories specs :

The default for $XDG_CONFIG_HOME is $HOME/.config, the default for
$XDG_DATA_HOME is $HOME/.local/share. So all applications should look for
those environment variables and use those default values if the variables
are not set.

This is quite important since it's not possible to easily backup config
& data files if these files are not stored at the right place

See http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/basedir-spec
See also
http://ploum.frimouvy.org/?184-cleaning-user-preferences-keeping-user-data
(main post and comment#8)

Original issue reported on code.google.com by thibaut....@gmail.com on 31 Jan 2009 at 6:24

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
I think something to remember is that traditionally applications under Linux 
place
their configuration data in ether $HOME/.apprc or in the directory $HOME/.app/
Look at Firefox (in ~/.mozilla/firefox/ or ~/.mozilla/firefox-3.5) for example.

It will take time for all applications to migrate to the FreeDesktop specs.

Tim

Original comment by weir...@gmail.com on 24 Jul 2009 at 3:50

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
yes, that was BEFORE basedir-spec
As far as know, all GNOME applications ARE changing location of their datas to 
match
the spec (i'm not a KDE user but KDE is also supposed to follow FreeDesktop 
specs)

There even is a tracking bug http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=523057

On Ubuntu, if you look at the $HOME/.config, you will see that things are 
changing

Original comment by thibaut....@gmail.com on 24 Jul 2009 at 4:19

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
Code in jbrout.py shows that it has been taken in account.

Unfortunately it first tries with ~ and (with my computer) it works, so it 
stops with that.
Lines 100-106 need to moved more at the bottom of the block, so 
$XDG_CONFIG_HOME, and $HOME/.config will be tried first.

http://code.google.com/p/jbrout/source/browse/trunk/jbrout/jbrout/conf.py#87

Original comment by p...@gmx.fr on 26 Oct 2010 at 10:39

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
Also, this is an extraordinarily ugly code IMHO ... exception should be used 
for exceptions not as a replacement of if ... else construct.

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 26 Oct 2010 at 11:35

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
Suggested solution for this bug (see 
http://gitorious.org/jbrout/jbrout/commits/issue56 for the VCS location of this 
patch).

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 26 Oct 2010 at 11:58

Attachments:

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
os.path.expanduser("~") seems to work on both windows and linux, it's why it's 
useful.

Can you try to add the .config folder at this time?
(For example i don't have $XDG_CONFIG_HOME, but i have still some app using 
.config)

So, adding between your lines 45-46

                conf = os.path.join(home,".config")
                if os.path.isdir(conf):
                    home = conf

Or maybe trying $HOME between expanduser("~")

Original comment by p...@gmx.fr on 27 Oct 2010 at 9:00

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
Right, I have no $XDG_CONFIG_HOME either. Let me dig into spec again.

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 27 Oct 2010 at 12:10

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
Moreover, it is not just about ~/.config, but also ~/.cache (where IMHO db.xml 
should go) and ~/.local/share/ (where configuration should go). See 
http://live.gnome.org/GnomeGoals/XDGConfigFolders for more information.

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 27 Oct 2010 at 12:43

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
This http://standards.freedesktop.org/basedir-spec/latest/ar01s03.html seems 
like very relevant.

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 27 Oct 2010 at 12:44

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
Hmm, how is XDG spec supposed to work on MS Windows? Should I create non-hidden 
dot.folders (~/.config, ~/.cache, ~/.local/share) or non-dotted hidden ones?

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 27 Oct 2010 at 12:50

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
On Windows, it would depend on the version (98-Me/NT/XP/Vista/Seven). First 
does someone know which versions of Windows jBrout works on? We should avoid 
handling 95/98/Me if jBrout stars working on XP!

What are the Linux directories for? I expected ~/.config to contain 
configuration, but ceplm said it should go into ~/.local/share/ , why?

I suppose ~/.cache is for temporary files, anything which can safely be erased 
when closing a session, there would be only a time penalty for rebuilding 
whatever was destroyed. If so, db.xml could indeed go there, but not tags.xml.

Original comment by davito...@gmail.com on 27 Oct 2010 at 1:35

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
http://ploum.net/post/184-cleaning-user-preferences-keeping-user-data

> The concept is fairly easy : if you can't afford to loose it, it's an user 
data. If a usable default exist, it's a preference. If I restore or reinstall 
my desktop, I don't mind if I must re-set my wallpaper, re-choose my favourite 
gnome applets,re-set the nautilus spatial mode and home-is-desktop options. But 
I highly care to get my files back, my songs statistics and playlists in 
Rhythmbox, my emails/contacts/calendars in evolution, my tomboy notes, my 
bookmarks, my highscores, my rss feeds and my IM contacts. Those are data ! 
Yes, just like my plain old files. But knowing that I have french spell 
checking enabled in Gedit and last.fm plugin enabled in Rhythmbox is not.

So yes, looking at my current ~/.jbrout I can see

jakoubek:~ $ ls .jbrout/
db.xml  jbrout.conf  tags.xml
jakoubek:~ $ 

The first one should IMHO go to ~/.cache/jbrout, second to ~/.config/jbrout, 
and the third one (and any other data we may produce in the future) to 
~/.local/share/jbrout

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 27 Oct 2010 at 2:11

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
On the other hand, if we accept this spec we could have much less problems ... 
just create particular folders if they are not there in ~/ (modulo Windows ... 
I am really not sure which folders are supposed to be created there) and you're 
done.

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 27 Oct 2010 at 2:12

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
I believe I understand:
.cache = rebuildable data
.config = configuration
.local = actual user data

Then in Windows Vista, from what I can see on my system:
.cache = %TEMP% (which translates to c:\users\[user name]\AppData\Local\Temp)
.config = %LOCALAPPDATA% (which translates to c:\users\[user 
name]\AppData\Local)
.local = %APPDATA% (which translates to c:\users\[user name]\AppData\Roaming)

XP did not have %LOCALAPP_DATA%, so for XP, .config and .local directories 
would both map to the same %APPDATA%:
.cache = %TEMP% (which translates to c:\users\[user name]\AppData\Local\Temp)
.config = %APPDATA% (which translates to c:\Documents and Settings\[user 
name]\Application Data)
.local = %APPDATA% (which translates to c:\Documents and Settings\[user 
name]\Application Data)

In XP, there is a "c:\Documents and Settings\[user name]\Local 
Settings\Application Data", but I don't know why one should use it rather than 
%APPDATA%, and no environment variable leads directly to this directory.

There is one issue, though: all these folders are non-browsable, the average 
user is not supposed to know these folders even exist. While this is perfectly 
OK for db.xml, I believe tags.xml should be visible, in order to be backupable. 
In order to allow backuping tags.xml, it must be put either outside the user 
directories (probably not a good idea), or in the user documents folder, which 
can be accessed through %USERPROFILE%\[localized documents folder name] The 
problem here is that this [localized documents folder name] is... localized 
("My Documents" in US, "Mes Documents" in France...) but no environment 
variable gives the localized name for the current user :-( This page 
http://ginstrom.com/scribbles/2008/09/26/retrieving-common-windows-folder-names-
with-python/ seems to show how to retrieve it with Python.

Original comment by davito...@gmail.com on 27 Oct 2010 at 3:55

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
Ha, so I've made some interrogations among my Gnome colleagues, and I found 
this:

> everybody does stuff differently on Windows and Mac
> you can take a look at Tomboy, Banshee, and MonoDevelop for a few different 
examples
> http://live.gnome.org/Tomboy/Directories

but then I've also got a reference to the official Glib functions 
g_get_user_*_dir().

See 
http://library.gnome.org/devel/glib/stable/glib-Miscellaneous-Utility-Functions.
html for documentation and http://git.gnome.org/browse/glib/tree/glib/gutils.c 
for implementation.

Now the question, are they provided by PyGtk? Couldn't we just use them? 
Investigation continues.

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 27 Oct 2010 at 8:58

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
Hmm, we have

glib.get_user_cache_dir()
glib.get_user_config_dir()
glib.get_user_data_dir()
glib.get_user_special_dir(directory)

in PyGObject.

Could somebody run this script on Windows? I wonder what it gives:

import glib

print glib.get_user_config_dir()

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 27 Oct 2010 at 9:05

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
There's one thing I hate in Python: it's library system :-( Although, "system" 
may be too intelligent for what is actually going on. I tried to test your 
instructions, but I couldn't make it work because I couldn't install glib 
properly. Tomorrow, I'm going to download and install Pythonxy. I hope it will 
enable me to answer your question.

Original comment by davito...@gmail.com on 27 Oct 2010 at 10:31

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
shouldn't you have PyGtk (and thus python-gobject) installed already for 
jbrout? Given jbrout's dependence on PyGtk (and PyGObject) would make me 
believing that using these function would be a good idea.

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 27 Oct 2010 at 11:16

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
I should, but it still fails on "import glib"

Original comment by davito...@gmail.com on 28 Oct 2010 at 9:57

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
According to forums, this is a recurring problem, a problem with default paths. 
I tried to install PortablePython as well as Python(xy), but they did not solve 
my problem since neither seem to have glib pre-installed. So I'll have to 
install the necessary libraries 1 by 1, which is going to take time. Maybe on 
sunday.

I have 2 versions of python, the one which is installed with jBrout and one I 
installed separately. In the jBrout version, help("modules") does not show glib 
nor python-gobject, only pygtk (plus close to 400 other modules)

Original comment by davito...@gmail.com on 29 Oct 2010 at 9:04

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
OK, giving up ... mysteries of the Windows world never stop to amaze me. Given 
that we are importing gobejct many times in jbrout:

jakoubek:jbrout (issue56) $ grep -r 'import gobject' .
./jbrout/jbrout/db.py:import gobject
./jbrout/jbrout/folderselect.py:import gobject
./jbrout/jbrout/listview.py:import gobject
./jbrout/libs/gladeapp.py:import gobject
./jbrout/plugins/bulkTag/bulkTag.py:import gobject
./jbrout/plugins/download/nameBuilder.py:import gobject
./jbrout/plugins/download/download.py:import gobject
./jbrout/jbrout.py:import gobject
jakoubek:jbrout (issue56) $ 

I would tend to believe it is possible to import it directly somehow. But 
apparently I am too dumb for Windows.

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 29 Oct 2010 at 9:09

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
Currently, I am much more perplexed by Python terminology than by Windows 
strange behaviors :-)

The following tests were done in jBrout's Python installation.

1 - when I try "import glib", I get "ImportError: No module named glib", which 
is consistent with the fact help("modules") did not list it.

2 - when I try "import gobject", I get an "ImportError: DLL load failed" on 
"from gobject" or "from _gobject" (I don't know enough python yet to determine 
which line is most relevant)

I tried finding another glib function in the jBrout source code, but could not 
find any.

Original comment by davito...@gmail.com on 29 Oct 2010 at 9:46

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
I have taken over for a moment a Windows computer of my mom and when I have 
installed python 2.7.1 (.msi from python.org) and PyGtk 
(http://ftp.gnome.org/pub/GNOME/binaries/win32/pygtk/2.22/) then I was able to 
run "PyGtk prompt" where both python.exe and import glib was possible. The 
result seems to make at least sense:

C:\Windows\system32>python
Python 2.7.1 (r271:86832, Nov 27 2010, 18:30:46) [MSC v.1500 32 bit (Intel)] on
win32
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import glib
>>> print glib.get_user_config_dir()
C:\Users\zuzana\AppData\Roaming
>>> print glib.get_user_cache_dir()
C:\Users\zuzana\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files
>>> print glib.get_user_data_dir()
C:\Users\zuzana\Documents
>>>

So, I strongly suggest to remove all this logic from jbrout itself and just 
rely on glib to do The Right Thing.

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 8 Jan 2011 at 9:38

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
So, what do you think about this as a solution?

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 4 Jul 2011 at 10:01

Attachments:

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
great !

Original comment by manat...@gmail.com on 5 Jul 2011 at 8:34

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
This issue was closed by revision r334.

Original comment by r...@wallace.gen.nz on 5 Jul 2011 at 11:34

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
Damn ! this breaks my old install on ubuntu 9.10 (python-gobject 2.16.1 and 
apparently, 2.18 is needed, according to 
http://developer.gnome.org/pygobject/stable/glib-functions.html)

I guess I'll have to hold back conf.py on an older revision...

Original comment by chartier...@gmail.com on 13 Jul 2011 at 1:36

GoogleCodeExporter commented 9 years ago 
To the comment 27: maintainer of jbrout for Ubuntu 9.10 (is it still 
supported?) has always chance to back out this patch.

Original comment by matej.c...@gmail.com on 6 Dec 2011 at 7:09