Re: Suggestions on cosmetic changes

[Carol Burt <cburt@2ab.com>]

Hi,

>1. General, types that express mean "many" are called in the submission in
>variety of ways: Multiple<X>, <X>List, <X>s. Where <X> is the name of the
type
>expressing one item (for example, PolicyName). I suggest to use uniform
way of
>calling such types. For instance, use form XList for all such types.
>
This is one of those religious discussions I've been avoiding...  since we
have AttributeList from CORBASec you might think we'd want to use XList...
however, some people like to use List to imply an ordered list and Set or
Seq to imply non-ordered.  Others just like Xs. or XSeq (see PIDS and Lexicon)
.  
So, since you brought it up, I propose we follow the pattern followed by
Pids and Lexicon and use XSeq (although this isn't my personal favorite).
I suggest we also use a little common sense and not typedef AttributeList
to AttributeSeq, however :-)   I'm not changing this until I hear an OK
from the other submitters... I've been around the block on this before :-)

>2. page 16 and other corresponding places: Rename "PolicyRefs" to
>"PolicyReferences"
>
This had been renamed to PolicyDecisionEvaluators - but it isn't a
sequence.. it's a struct so those with Xs religion have already complained.
 :-)

>3. page 16 and other places: Rename AccessDef to AccessDefinition
>
All I ask is that we have consensus on terminology before I start changing
types.    Similar structs (in spirit) in Lexicon use "Def". 

>4. page 17 and other places: Rename "MultipleAccessDef" to
>"AccessDefinitionList" or whatever you choose according to my comment #1
>
As soon as we discover what religion we are.

>5. page 18, the sentence describing get_policy_evaluators: put word
"decision"
>before word "combinator"
>
I've lost track of the text this was in, but I think I've reworked all this
text and changed the method name.

>6. page 18, operations set_default_evaluator and set_default_combinator:
either
>both of them or none should have parameter of type "ResourceName".
>
This isn't a typo, although it raises an issue I'd like to discuss.  

The default combinator could be for all ResourceNames (the enterprise might
use a simple "ANY" combinator).  An apply_combinator for a resourcename
overrides the "system" default as there is only one for a ResourceName.
This avoids having to applying combinators for all ResourceNames
individually.  

PolicyEvalutors are different because there are many.  The way that Bob
described these methods working is that applying a default resets the
ResourceName to only have the single evaluator and then you have to apply
each of additional evaluators individually.  It is this  implied reset that
means you can't do a set_default_evaluator without specifing a
ResourceName.... or at least you need a set_default that specifies a
ResourceName.   Personally, I'd prefer to add a remove_evaluators or
reset_evaluators method and stop the overloading of functionality in the
methods (here and elsewhere).... we should discuss... but as written, this
isn't a typo.

>7. page 18: The first sentence in section 3.3 does not look to me like an
>English.
>
Russian maybe?  I think I fixed this.

>8. Through out the IDL: sometimes parameters of operations are named with
full 
>names like "requested_access" and some times in cryptic names like "rname". I
>suggest to use full names to name operation parameters. This comment is very
>optional.
>
Again, all I ask is consensus before I rip thru the IDL... some people like
the long names, others the short ones.... I can go either way.  If we reach
consensus I'll do a global search and replace... I was just being lazy with
my typing to get the idl to compile.  

I think we kept the "terminology issue" open -- we can extend it to syntax
if you'd like :-)

Carol  
_________________________________________________________
Carol Burt                                             2AB, Inc.
cburt@2ab.com                                     Integration Architects
205-621-7455                                        www.2ab.com
Member, OMG Architecture Board          OMG Domain Member

   --  integrating yesterday's systems with today's technology --
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