Why Not Files instead of a database?

Quote from: lossendae at May 02, 2011, 05:39 PM

Revo absolutely needs files based chunks and snippets.
Since it is not already there, i assume that it is a difficult feature to implement efficiently. And probably not a priority for you, the core team ? :p

It’s on the roadmap for 2.2 (Static Elements). 2.1 released later this month brings multiple database support (starting with Microsoft SQL Server), massive improvements for scaling large sites along with the regular addressing of bugs and usability issues.

That’s a fraking good news.

one possible benefit is instant porting of existing sites, or possiblity to install modx on top of an existing site in order to start editing it with modx right away.

maybe some automated import routines to convert files to resources?

Evo has a rudimentary HTML import feature that converts existing .html pages to resources.

surely a pure db-driven system must have some advantages, otherwise why do it at all? see
http://modxcms.com/forums/index.php/topic,64131.0.html

i’m asking, when i create a new resource, why would i choose to put it in the db? still have not heard convincing arguments.

Well, what if you wanted to display part of that document or information about it on another part of your site - such as it’s title or the date it was published. That is easy to do with a db-driven site such as modx, but how would you accomplish that with static html pages?

Could you easily create a dynamic menu (such as Wayfinder) that updates whenever new pages are added to the site? Could you set certain pages to be excluded from the menu?

What if you want to store information about your site users, allow people to create an account, make lists, publish their own content, comment on articles, access restricted areas...

What if you wanted parts of your page to change dynamically depending on the user input. Could you build an interactive web site such as facebook or Twitter using static html pages? Don’t think so.

How about searching your website? Sorting and filtering search results?

Sure, there are ways to do some of the above without a database. But why make things more complicated - and probably much less secure - than they need to be? With properly cached pages there is hardly any performance advantage gained from serving static pages over dynamic ones.

Just a few reasons I could think of

if i’m understanding you, you’re comparing a database-driven cmf such as modx to a non-database-driven system (not modx).

that’s not my question.

i’m comparing resources stored in the db in modx vs resources stored in the file system in modx.

or, are you saying that i cannot have custom fields, tv’s, etc for files stored in the file system in modx ?

Quote from: johnywhy at May 05, 2011, 11:41 AM

i’m asking, when i create a new resource, why would i choose to put it in the db? still have not heard convincing arguments.

Well, that was your question and my answer was a list of reasons in favour of putting a resource in a database as opposed to static html. And by resource, I mean the modx definition. What do you mean by ’resources stored in the file system’?

Also, I cannot think of any reason why you would want to store TVs or resource fields in the file system. But I’d be very interested to hear your suggestions...

sorry, to clarify, i mean making a webpage a modx resource (in the db) rather than a static html file in the file system. and i think you’re saying that all the goodies of modx, TVs, chunks, custom fields, etc, are not available with static html files.

if so, that answers the question. using the db is the way to go!

i’m not suggesting storing TVs or resource fields in the file system at all. i’m just loving what modx does, the way it does it.

so, i don’t understand the desire of some to get more static html file feature in modx.

I think we’re on the same page now. That’s pretty much it - no db, no goodies

What others are looking for in terms of static files is more to do with the ability to edit templates, chunks and snippets outside of modx. Some (myself included) would prefer to work on these directly using a code editor rather than having to copy and paste code into manager. We’re not talking about content here, rather structural markup and php code.

I guess it would be one of those ’nice to have’ features that would speed up development, but doesn’t really impact on MODx’s performance that much.