[vdr] Re: VDR Plugin System - First Step

[Klaus Schmidinger <Klaus.Schmidinger@cadsoft.de>]

Stefan Huelswitt wrote:
> 
> ...
> One more thing: the value of ConfigDirectory (internal to
> vdr.c:main() should be available to the plugins to load specific
> config files.

Making that directly available to plugins might not be a good idea,
because then two plugins might use the same names for their config files.
So I guess if we need this at all, it should be a function that returns
a directory name that consists of the ConfigDirectory, plus a directory
named like the plugin, as in

  /etc/vdr/plugins/dvd

(assuming that ConfigDirectory has been set to "/etc/vdr").
VDR could take care that this directory and all intermediate directories
actually exist when a plugin requests that name.

> Did I understand it right, that the plugin constructor should
> only be use for initialization of members? Meaning that e.g.
> loading specific config files should be done in Start()?

Yes, that's the idea.

> If yes,
> there should be a return value of Start() to signal that
> starting the plugin failed due to some reason (e.g. missing
> file). VDR could disable/unload the plugin for further
> operation in this case.

Sounds reasonable. But I tend to completely shut down VDR if one
plugin returns 'false' from Start(), because this plugin might be
vital for further operation of VDR.

BTW: you do know that plugins can store setup parameters in VDR's
'setup.conf' file, right? What would these additional config files
be for (just curious)?

Klaus
-- 
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Klaus Schmidinger                       Phone: +49-8635-6989-10
CadSoft Computer GmbH                   Fax:   +49-8635-6989-40
Hofmark 2                               Email:   kls@cadsoft.de
D-84568 Pleiskirchen, Germany           URL:     www.cadsoft.de
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