Client API philosophy

[Daniel van Vugt]

BTW, I do actually agree with half of your points. Just feel that 
over-generalising in a discussion like this one is counter-productive. 
Because it always is (<- over-generalisation).


On 10/11/14 11:31, Daniel van Vugt wrote:
> Definitely controversial; factually false or easily arguable.
>
> Sounds like a response to one of my merge proposals. So please put
> arguments in the code reviews...
>
>
> On 10/11/14 10:48, Christopher James Halse Rogers wrote:
>> Hey all.
>>
>> We're getting into the meaty bit of client API support I thought I'd
>> write some things about API design philosophy to see if they're
>> controversial.
>>
>> *) An API with lots of functions that do one thing each is simpler than
>> an API with few functions that do different things depending on other
>> state.
>>
>> *) A function with unclear semantics is harmful
>>
>> *) Mir will not have an external reference for window management policy.
>> Window management semantics will be associated with the API. There is no
>> equivalent for http://standards.freedesktop.org/wm-spec/wm-spec-1.3.html
>> outside the client API documentation.
>>
>> *) The client API should be implementing policy, not mechanism.
>>
>> *) Where state transitions are allowed, it should be possible to
>> transition from one valid state to another valid state without
>> temporarily being in an invalid state.
>>
>> Some thoughts.
>>
>>
>