Template prototyping limitations?

[rome]

I love the idea of prototyping the templates, and I created one to play with.

I did notice, however, a strange behavior I wouldn't expect -

 

1. Changing settings doesn't seem to update -

Say I change

<IgnoreFileInformation>true</IgnoreFileInformation>

to

<IgnoreFileInformation>false</IgnoreFileInformation>

After updating the applications, the checkbox is still checked.

 

2. Reverting changes doesn't take effect:

Say I change

<Name><placeholder name="Name of application" variable="name" /></Name>

to

<Name><placeholder name="Name of application" variable="name" /> (Portable)</Name>

and then back again,

Ketarin doesn't even notify me the xml was changed, and I have to manually remove the (Portable).

 

It wasn't throughoutly tested, but could it be quirks of the templating system?

[rome]

I also noticed that the WebsiteUrl and UserNotes don't accept variables like others,

and I have to place a placeholder with the variable, which of course doesn't update as well.

[shawn]

1) It sounds like you're talking about updating the template to apply static values across a group. That's not really the way templates work - it's more for coping with specific changes in the variable assignment classes. While I haven't looked at the code for this specific functionality, I would assume that it does not alter non-variable-related values, since they could have been modified to any value by the user. If it did, it could really screw up customized app profiles with stuff like 'share' and 'watch' altered.

 

2) To really provide much of a response to this we'll need to see examples of your template code and how it's used. The snippets you've included above just aren't enough to go on. It's probably related to 1 above, in that once a value is assigned, "it's in there".

[rome]

What does variable assignment classes mean?

 

Here is the code if it would help to explain.

Note that I changed name to appName (I realize it's not conventional to XML using camelCase).

 

<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?>
<Jobs>
 <ApplicationJob xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">
   <Name>
  <placeholder name="Name of application" variable="appName" />
   </Name>
   <Category>
  <placeholder name="Category" />
   </Category>
   <UserAgent>{sfua}</UserAgent>
   <CanBeShared>true</CanBeShared>
   <CheckForUpdatesOnly>false</CheckForUpdatesOnly>
   <DeletePreviousFile>true</DeletePreviousFile>
   <DownloadBeta>Default</DownloadBeta>
   <Enabled>true</Enabled>
   <ExclusiveDownload>false</ExclusiveDownload>
   <FileHippoId />
   <FixedDownloadUrl>{dlUrl:urldecode}</FixedDownloadUrl>
   <HttpReferer>{dlRedirect:urldecode}</HttpReferer>
   <IgnoreFileInformation>true</IgnoreFileInformation>
   <PreviousLocation />
   <SetupInstructions />
   <ShareApplication>false</ShareApplication>
   <SourceType>FixedUrl</SourceType>
   <TargetPath>{target-install}</TargetPath>
   <UserNotes>
  <placeholder name="Application description" variable="appDescription" />
   </UserNotes>
   <VariableChangeIndicator>appVersion</VariableChangeIndicator>
   <WebsiteUrl>
  <placeholder name="Application website" variable="appWebsite" />
   </WebsiteUrl>
   <Variables>
  <item>
    <key>
	  <string>appDescription</string>
    </key>
    <value>
	  <UrlVariable>
	    <RegexRightToLeft>false</RegexRightToLeft>
	    <VariableType>RegularExpression</VariableType>
	    <Regex>(?<=tagline.*?<p>)(.*?)(?=</p)</Regex>
	    <Url>{dlPage}</Url>
	    <Name>appDescription</Name>
	  </UrlVariable>
    </value>
  </item>
  <item>
    <key>
	  <string>appName</string>
    </key>
    <value>
	  <UrlVariable>
	    <RegexRightToLeft>false</RegexRightToLeft>
	    <VariableType>RegularExpression</VariableType>
	    <Regex><title>(.*?)(?=\sPortable)</Regex>
	    <Url>{dlPage}</Url>
	    <Name>appName</Name>
	  </UrlVariable>
    </value>
  </item>
  <item>
    <key>
	  <string>appSource</string>
    </key>
    <value>
	  <UrlVariable>
	    <RegexRightToLeft>false</RegexRightToLeft>
	    <VariableType>Textual</VariableType>
	    <TextualContent>
		  <placeholder name="Source of application" value="PortableApps" />
	    </TextualContent>
	    <Name>appSource</Name>
	  </UrlVariable>
    </value>
  </item>
  <item>
    <key>
	  <string>appType</string>
    </key>
    <value>
	  <UrlVariable>
	    <RegexRightToLeft>false</RegexRightToLeft>
	    <VariableType>Textual</VariableType>
	    <TextualContent>
		  <placeholder name="Type of application" value="Portable" />
	    </TextualContent>
	    <Name>appType</Name>
	  </UrlVariable>
    </value>
  </item>
  <item>
    <key>
	  <string>appVersion</string>
    </key>
    <value>
	  <UrlVariable>
	    <RegexRightToLeft>false</RegexRightToLeft>
	    <VariableType>RegularExpression</VariableType>
	    <Regex>(?<=Portable_.*?)[0-9.]{2,}(?=\.paf)</Regex>
	    <Url>{dlPage}</Url>
	    <Name>appVersion</Name>
	  </UrlVariable>
    </value>
  </item>
  <item>
    <key>
	  <string>appWebsite</string>
    </key>
    <value>
	  <UrlVariable>
	    <RegexRightToLeft>false</RegexRightToLeft>
	    <VariableType>RegularExpression</VariableType>
	    <Regex>^.*href="(.*?)(?=".learn more)</Regex>
	    <Url>{dlPage}</Url>
	    <Name>appWebsite</Name>
	  </UrlVariable>
    </value>
  </item>
  <item>
    <key>
	  <string>dlPage</string>
    </key>
    <value>
	  <UrlVariable>
	    <RegexRightToLeft>false</RegexRightToLeft>
	    <VariableType>Textual</VariableType>
	    <TextualContent>
		  <placeholder name="Application Page URL" />
	    </TextualContent>
	    <Name>dlPage</Name>
	  </UrlVariable>
    </value>
  </item>
  <item>
    <key>
	  <string>dlRedirect</string>
    </key>
    <value>
	  <UrlVariable>
	    <RegexRightToLeft>false</RegexRightToLeft>
	    <VariableType>Textual</VariableType>
	    <TextualContent>
		  <placeholder name="Download redirect path" value="http://portableapps.com/bouncer?t=" />
	    </TextualContent>
	    <Name>dlRedirect</Name>
	  </UrlVariable>
    </value>
  </item>
  <item>
    <key>
	  <string>dlUrl</string>
    </key>
    <value>
	  <UrlVariable>
	    <RegexRightToLeft>false</RegexRightToLeft>
	    <VariableType>RegularExpression</VariableType>
	    <Regex>[^"'=]+(?>\.exe)</Regex>
	    <Url>{dlPage}</Url>
	    <Name>dlUrl</Name>
	  </UrlVariable>
    </value>
  </item>
   </Variables>
 </ApplicationJob>
</Jobs>

 

And one last thing -

If I do want to change static values, the only way would be to export, search and replace and import back?

[rome]

Never mind, answered both of my questions by playing around with the templates.

Thanks:)