[kepler-dev] configs/ directory

[Xiaowen Xin]

Hi Everyone,

Following up on a couple of my emails from last week, I would like to
propose that Kepler creates a separate configuration profile rather than
overwriting Ptolemy II's files for that effect.

Ptolemy II uses the "full" configuration by default, and Kepler deletes
a few files referenced by that configuration from the Ptolemy II
directory, and replaces them with its own.

Rather than doing that, it would be much cleaner to create a separate
profile for Kepler, and put all its changes in there.  This way, Kepler
doesn't need to touch Ptolemy II's installation.

More specifically, I would like to create this directory hierarchy:

-configs/
	-ptolemy/
		-configs/
			-kepler/
			-geon/
			-seek/
			-spa/

where Kepler, and all its member groups can have its own configuration
profile.

A user can run the kepler profile by doing:

java -classpath "..." ptolemy.vergil.VergilApplication -kepler

while a user who's more interested in running only geon can do:

java -classpath "..." ptolemy.vergil.VergilApplication -geon

This mechanism is already built into Ptolemy II, so it would be much
cleaner for us to take advantage of it.

The major benefits of this is that we wouldn't have to muck around in
Ptolemy II's installation any more.  Also we can organize our
configuration files more cleanly.

The only downside is that it would be a change that would affect all
Kepler developers.

I'm not sure whether I should propse a vote on this.  Ideally, I'd like
to go ahead and implement this by the end of this week, if there are no
objections.  What do you all think?

Thanks,
Xiaowen