"Chris Cason" <del### [at] deletethistoopovrayorg> wrote in 
message news:44576d10@news.povray.org...
>I should point out that we already have a DB-driven PHP-based interface for
> editing the links ... the only issue with it is that it's not designed for
> multiple people to use at once (e.g. it won't cleanly handle the situation
> where two people happen to edit the same link at more or less the same 
> time -
> the newest content will nuke the other one). We also need to add user
> authentication for it. As it stands it's really an internal tool for our 
> own use.
>
> Basically if we can solve those (it's really just a time issue) I could 
> open
> it for editing to authenticated users. (Actually the problem with dual 
> edits
> could be solved by a division of labor amongst the editors, so it's really
> just authentication).
>
> -- Chris

Hi Chris,

That sound just the job for maintaining it.

I would think that for methodically dividing up the task and for initially 
updating the database it would be easiest to work with a big 
machine-readable text file (and would sidestep the other issues for the time 
being), though maybe that's just my ludite tendencies emerging :-). Anyway, 
let me know if you'd like me to undertake that.

Best Regards,
Chris. B.

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On Tue, 02 May 2006 14:21:02 +0100, Chris B wrote:

> Jim, are you in?

Sure, I'm willing to help out.  One thing we might do because of the
database issue that Chris mentioned is post the updates here and have one
person take on the job of entering the changed data, that'd avoid the
issue of multiple people attempting to edit links simultaneously.

Jim

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On Wed, 03 May 2006 00:28:12 +1000, Chris Cason wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> Well, sure - Chris had indicated audit was a needed part, so that's what
>> I was suggesting.  You're right that it's trivial to automate - that's
>> why when I saw Chris' message, I was somewhat surprised that it wasn't
>> already
> 
> My phrasing was perhaps too fuzzy; by 'audit' I meant that the entire DB
> needs to be checked for relevency; not only broken links to be fixed, but
> also for links to working sites to be checked to ensure the link
> description is still relevant and correct with respect to the target
> site's content. (Some of those links are in excess of seven years old).

OK, that makes sense - thanks for the clarification, Chris.

Jim

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Chris B wrote:

> Jim, are you in?
> Anyone else like to help?

Sure, I'll chase down a few.


> 
> Once we've got started we'll set a closing date and invite people to give us 
> new links through this newsgroup.
> After that we'll send back the new file for loading into the database.
> 
> Regards,
> Chris B.
> 
> 
> 
>  
> 
>

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Chris B wrote:
> it would be easiest to work with a big machine-readable text file

Fastest way to get this into your hands would be to dump it from the DB
usingg phpMyAdmin. I can export as SQL, CSV or XML. Are any of these useful
to you ?

-- Chris

NB note that there are two tables; one for categories and one for the links
themselves. The links refer to the category by ID. I would be open to
modifying the DB to allow a link to be in multiple categories if this was useful.

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Chris Cason <del### [at] deletethistoopovrayorg> wrote:
> Chris B wrote:
> > it would be easiest to work with a big machine-readable text file
>
> Fastest way to get this into your hands would be to dump it from the DB
> usingg phpMyAdmin. I can export as SQL, CSV or XML. Are any of these useful
> to you ?

I guess it depends how many people are going to help check the links.
Everyone can read CSV, and XML is pretty easy to parse. I don't know SQL
(yet :).

> NB note that there are two tables; one for categories and one for the links
> themselves. The links refer to the category by ID. I would be open to
> modifying the DB to allow a link to be in multiple categories if this was useful.

I think multiple categories would be very useful. You could split things up
into beginner, general and advanced; still and anim; pure POV and scenes
that require external programs. Etc.

PS. I'm prepared to donate time manually checking out links. I'm also not
averse to writing file conversion utilities in awk, if that's any use in
this task. I know nothing about SQL or php, but I'm ok with HTML &
Javascript.

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PM 2Ring wrote:
> I think multiple categories would be very useful. You could split things up
> into beginner, general and advanced; still and anim; pure POV and scenes
> that require external programs. Etc.

I would strongly recommend to first update the links, rather than start two 
things at once (update and reorganization). As it stands, updating itself is 
a lot of work.

	Thorsten

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PM 2Ring wrote:
> I think multiple categories would be very useful. You could split things up
> into beginner, general and advanced; still and anim; pure POV and scenes
> that require external programs. Etc.

I would strongly recommend to first update the links, rather than start two 
things at once (update and reorganization). As it stands, updating itself is 
a lot of work.

	Thorsten

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Thorsten Froehlich <tho### [at] trfde> wrote:
> PM 2Ring wrote:
> > I think multiple categories would be very useful. You could split things up
> > into beginner, general and advanced; still and anim; pure POV and scenes
> > that require external programs. Etc.
>
> I would strongly recommend to first update the links, rather than start two
> things at once (update and reorganization). As it stands, updating itself is
> a lot of work.

Certainly we should update the links first, that is the priority. But I
think Chris Cason was just talking about setting things up at the outset to
allow for multiple categories. I agree there is no need to worry about the
organization of the links until they've all been checked and we know what
we've actually got.

Still, during the process of manually checking links, we could take some
notes about the link, even if this is just a short list of keywords.

FWIW, I haven't looked at the links page for a while, but the last time I
did it was so frustrating. Maybe the links page should have a big "Warning:
Under Reconstruction: most links out of date" notice on it?

I bet a lot of new users go to the links page before they discover these
newsgroups, and get the idea that they won't be getting very much that's
useful from the POV site, apart from the program itself. I was using POV
for years before I bothered checking in here (to my pleasant surprise).

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"Chris Cason" <del### [at] deletethistoopovrayorg> wrote in 
message news:4458afcf@news.povray.org...
> Chris B wrote:
>> it would be easiest to work with a big machine-readable text file
>
> Fastest way to get this into your hands would be to dump it from the DB
> usingg phpMyAdmin. I can export as SQL, CSV or XML. Are any of these 
> useful
> to you ?
>

I can read any of those and freely translate between them. CSV is my 
preferred starting point. It's easiest to chop up and allocate out chunks.

>
> -- Chris
>
> NB note that there are two tables; one for categories and one for the 
> links
> themselves. The links refer to the category by ID. I would be open to
> modifying the DB to allow a link to be in multiple categories if this was 
> useful.

OK. I'll give this some thought, taking on board the observations by 
Thorsten and PM.
I'll send you a copy of the private email address I sent to Thorsten.

Regards,
Chris B.

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