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#1 2020-05-28 12:23:30

Bloke
Developer
From: Leeds, UK
Registered: 2006-01-29
Posts: 11,436
Website GitHub

Unlimited lists

Although not specifically related to them, with the advent of pageless sections and calling content in from other (hidden) sections to a single page potentially being more commonplace, we’ll often use:

<txp:article_custom section="pageless-content" form="some-form" limit="999" />

(among many other traditional uses for article_custom, such as counting total articles, setting variables, filtering articles, and so forth).

Dunno about anyone else but, it’s always seemed a bit of a hack to have to include a limit there to get “everything”. Is there any syntax we could offer that would mean ‘all’ without breaking backwards compatibility?

I wondered if perhaps just valueless limit might work, but that currently returns the same as limit="1".

Any thoughts on this?

Last edited by Bloke (2020-05-28 16:11:05)


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#2 2020-05-28 13:56:01

philwareham
Core designer
From: Haslemere, Surrey, UK
Registered: 2009-06-11
Posts: 3,564
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Re: Unlimited lists

Maybe all="1" which can be shorthanded to all? That would need to override the limit field if both were present.

Or limit="all". Or limit="none" at a push. Both of those could be misinterpreted though, I feel.

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#3 2020-05-28 14:09:41

Bloke
Developer
From: Leeds, UK
Registered: 2006-01-29
Posts: 11,436
Website GitHub

Re: Unlimited lists

Yeah, thanks. I was thinking of some magic non-numeric value for limit too. But, as you say, it’s not so obvious what they mean:

  • limit="none" could mean unlimited, or that limit should have no effect, or that there should be no articles returned.
  • limit="all" could mean unlimited, or that all limits apply (whatever that may imply).
  • limit="0" is unintuitive and could mean unlimited or return no content (which is what it currently does).
  • a new attribute like all is cleanest, but those three letters in a complicated article tag with a tonne of other attributes could be easy to miss/debug.

I dunno. Maybe it’s something we have to live with. Be interesting if anyone has any ideas that might lead us to a solution that’s unambiguous.


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#4 2020-05-28 14:25:34

philwareham
Core designer
From: Haslemere, Surrey, UK
Registered: 2009-06-11
Posts: 3,564
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Re: Unlimited lists

limit="no"? limit="null"? limit="ignore"? limit="ignored"?

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#5 2020-05-28 14:28:52

etc
Developer
Registered: 2010-11-11
Posts: 5,157
Website GitHub

Re: Unlimited lists

Just keep in mind that it is impossible to do globally and hence must be done tag by tag, for consistency.

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#6 2020-05-28 14:31:25

Bloke
Developer
From: Leeds, UK
Registered: 2006-01-29
Posts: 11,436
Website GitHub

Re: Unlimited lists

etc wrote #323369:

Just keep in mind that it is impossible to do globally and hence must be done tag by tag, for consistency.

That’s a good point. Hmmm. Maybe I should just shut up and save us work :)


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#7 2020-05-28 15:52:07

colak
Admin
From: Cyprus
Registered: 2004-11-20
Posts: 9,081
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Re: Unlimited lists

I would think that people who will be using pageless-content sections will be thinking about them in different ways to how we are currently using sections.

A way would be limitless as Stef suggested, and demoncleaner has demonstrated with his ‘teams’ pages, another would be to create a front page of an existing section, similarly to how many use sticky articles. As such, I think that the id or status of the articles would be much more important. Limit would indeed be handy as well, but I think that we are all thinking from within the txp box for now.

As such I agree with Oleg, that pageless sections should have the same attributes as the rest of the sections, until we experiment enough and find the limits of this feature.


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#8 2020-05-28 16:06:01

Bloke
Developer
From: Leeds, UK
Registered: 2006-01-29
Posts: 11,436
Website GitHub

Re: Unlimited lists

colak wrote #323371:

pageless sections should have the same attributes as the rest of the sections, until we experiment enough and find the limits of this feature.

Sorry, to be clear I wasn’t specifically talking about pageless content here (I’ve edited the OP to clarify). It just cropped up because I was thinking about it. I’m referring to our use of limit everywhere, in all tags.

People often use <txp:article_custom section="blah" limit="9999">... some conditional content ...</txp:article_custom> to extract some or all posts, or count stuff, or set variables, and the 9999 thing always seems hackish to me.

Last edited by Bloke (2020-05-28 16:10:23)


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#9 2020-05-28 17:21:17

colak
Admin
From: Cyprus
Registered: 2004-11-20
Posts: 9,081
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Re: Unlimited lists

Bloke wrote #323372:

Sorry, to be clear I wasn’t specifically talking about pageless content here (I’ve edited the OP to clarify). It just cropped up because I was thinking about it. I’m referring to our use of limit everywhere, in all tags.

People often use <txp:article_custom section="blah" limit="9999">... some conditional content ...</txp:article_custom> to extract some or all posts, or count stuff, or set variables, and the 9999 thing always seems hackish to me.

Whoops, as usual I misunderstood. I’m easy either way but I know what you mean. I know it is counter-intuitive but I agree with limit="0" as an option when thinking in binary.

>Edited to add. I also agree that as this is mostly an aesthetic change, which requires more work than just changing a global variable, I would spend my time in something more functional.

Last edited by colak (2020-05-28 17:26:53)


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#10 2020-05-28 18:17:30

gaekwad
Server grease monkey
From: People's Republic of Cornwall
Registered: 2005-11-19
Posts: 4,241
GitHub

Re: Unlimited lists

For the youth: limit="♾️", and for the greybeards limit="&infin;"

(I’m posting this in jest, for clarity, but I would be overjoyed if some sparkly etcMagick© happened and this became an Easter egg.)

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#11 2020-05-28 19:22:00

jakob
Admin
From: Germany
Registered: 2005-01-20
Posts: 4,719
Website

Re: Unlimited lists

I suppose limit="unlimited" is a bit much to type? How about limit="unset", or even limit="..."?


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#12 2020-05-28 19:28:56

michaelkpate
Moderator
From: Avon Park, FL
Registered: 2004-02-24
Posts: 1,379
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Re: Unlimited lists

Bloke wrote #323367:

Yeah, thanks. I was thinking of some magic non-numeric value for limit too. But, as you say, it’s not so obvious what they mean:

  • limit="none" could mean unlimited, or that limit should have no effect, or that there should be no articles returned.
  • limit="all" could mean unlimited, or that all limits apply (whatever that may imply).
  • limit="0" is unintuitive and could mean unlimited or return no content (which is what it currently does).
  • a new attribute like all is cleanest, but those three letters in a complicated article tag with a tonne of other attributes could be easy to miss/debug.

From looking through the discussion:

<txp:article_custom section="pageless-content" form="some-form" limit="unlimited" />
<txp:article_custom section="pageless-content" form="some-form" unlimited />
<txp:article_custom section="pageless-content" form="some-form" limitlesss />

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