[TYPO3-dev] to eID or not to eID?

[Jigal van Hemert]

On 10-8-2010 1:36, Lina Wolf wrote:
> As far as I understand the eID was developed to create quicker response, for
> example in surrounding of Ajax. The advantage of the eID would be that a lot
> of things that are usually initialised don't need to be in case of using
> eID.

With eID the programmer has to decide what to initialize and what not. A 
very minimal system is started and the programmer has to understand that 
everything (s)he starts takes resources.

Such a minimal system is needed for AJAX responses, but it can also be 
useful is other cases.

> But if I do need the full program in my Ajax response: typolinks, therefore
> a cObject, Typoscript, therefore the whole TypoScript building process,
> localised strings, therfore...

If you need the full TYPO3 system then eID would not have many 
advantages over the normal, full system, wouldn't it? :-)

OTOH if you need a full TYPO3 system for an AJAX response I would 
question the way the client side system which uses that AJAX response is 
built. Most client side applications that use AJAX just want "raw" data 
from the server and handle all the presentation stuff themselves.

Using AJAX is a kind of trade-off: you want to user data from the 
server, but want it fast and you don't need the "overhead" of creating a 
whole new page. It will take up server resources so the client side code 
needs to be friendly to the server and not require too much resources.

> Is there still a real advantage in using eID then? Is there any advantage in
> using the alternative (witch would be page types?)

I think you can give a list of advantages and disadvantages :-) A page 
type will give you an entire page (although you might render a rather 
simple page), so the entire system will be started. It eats server 
resources, but you have all the bells and whistles available.

> Would you suggest to use eID in pingback responses, XML-RPC and other
> not-Ajax maschine to maschine communication? Should XML's like RSS-Feeds or
> FOAF-XML be page types or eID?

RSS-feeds are not requested that often (compared to AJAX auto-complete 
requests, etc.) and they are very similar to HTML pages with content 
(only some kind of other XML structure). They are good candidates for 
page types.

Such decisions can be handled as if you were trying to set up a logistic 
(transportation) system. Will we use ships, planes, trains or trucks? 
Each method has properties like speed, costs per distance, load per 
shipment. But you also have to consider the form of the shipment (do I 
sent a completely built object, or just the parts and assemble it at the 
destination point).

-- 
Jigal van Hemert
skype:jigal.van.hemert
msn: jigal at xs4all.nl
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