Options Management

From AIBenchWiki

Contents 1 Problem 2 Possible solution (current design decissions) 2.1 New concept "option" 2.2 Extend the plugin.xml schema 2.3 New file: /conf/options.conf 2.4 Extend the AIBench Core API 2.5 Options validation 2.6 Extend the Workbench 2.7 Add a new operation annotation: @Option

Problem

It will be useful that AIBench contains a sub-system to manage user preferences. Some plugins need a few "global" properties to be configured in order to perform their operations. Today this is done making ad-hoc operations to configure global properties.

Possible solution (current design decissions)

New concept "option"

An option has:

• id.
• Name.
• Type: number or string.
• Default value. Mandatory. The option should always have a value.
• Closed set of values. A list of a closed set of possible values.

Extend the plugin.xml schema

Allow the programmer to add a new item (at a root level) similar to:

<options>
  <option id="option_name" name="option happy name" type="string" defaultValue="foo">
    <value>bar</value>
    <value>bar2</value>
  </option>
</option>

New file: /conf/options.conf

The preferences will be stored in this file, which is managed by the AIBench Core. It is a Java properties standard file. Each option should be prefixed by its plugin uid.

aibench.core.httpproxyhost=proxy.foo.com
aibench.core.httpproxyport=8080
my.plugin.uid.option_name=myvalue

Extend the AIBench Core API

The API should give access to read and modify the options via a programatically view. It will access and manage the /conf/options.conf file.

• Create a new class: es.uvigo.ei.aibench.core.PreferencesManager, which can be retrieved from the Core, similar to Clipboard or History:

 Core.getInstance().getPreferencesManager();

• The PreferencesManager should have a few methods:

void addValidator(Validator validator);
HashMap<String, Collection<String>> getPropertiesNames(); //a plugin-options mapping
Object getProperty(String uid, Object option);
void storeProperty(String uid, String name, Object value) throws IllegalArgumentException; //if any validator fails

Options validation

The PreferencesManager has a method to add validators: addValidator(Validator v).

• Create the interface Validator

public interface Validator{
   // called from the storeProperty method
   void validate(String option, Object value) throws IllegalArgumentException;
}

Extend the Workbench

In order to display a dialog to see and set the properties.

• It could show the options from each plugin (separatted in some visual way).
• The options with a closed set of possible values, should be rendered with a combo-box.
• The Workbench MUST rely in the Core to retrieve and save the user preferences. Add a new option to the /conf/workbench.conf to set how this menu is accessed. For example, add a path to place it in the menu:

preferencesmenu.path=/edit/preferences

Add a new operation annotation: @Option

Optionally, it will be very useful to avoid operations to call the Core API directly in order to retrieve a property value. This can be achieved more declaratively by adding a new method level annotation to the operations: @Option.
AIBench will call this method (before any port) if this annotation is found and the requested option is available. The @Option annotation has two properties:

• Option name (not followed by the plugin name)
• Plugin uid (optional). By default, AIBench looks for the option in the operation's plugin.
• Example:

@Operation(...)
public class MyOperation{
  @Option(name="my_option" uid="the_plugin_uid")
  void setOption(Object value){ ... }
  ...