So Telepathy Logger currently logs things in something not unlike
Empathy's XML log format. Although XML has some advantages (like being
able to generate logs using XSL), it seems fairly sub-optimal for the
efficient storage of logs.
I've been thinking (and playing) with some ideas for how to replace
this, and am looking for feedback/ideas.
Solution #1: serialising binary structs
This is where we serialise a fixed struct directly into the
file. Something like:
[da...@adelie log-backend]$ xxd test
0000000: 0000 0060 0000 0000 4b9d 7725 0000 0003 ...`....K.w
%....
0000010: 0000 0020 6461 6e69 656c 6c65 2e6d 6164 ...
danielle.mad
0000020: 656c 6579 4063 6f6c 6c61 626f 7261 2e63
[email protected]
This message is formatted (guint32 entry-length)(gint64
timestamp)(guint32 flags)((guint32 string-length)(string id)).
Not really a fan of doing this, because it makes it quite
difficult to extend later on (especially to non-text messages).
Solution #2: binary tag-based thing (similar to Apple DMAP)
This is also a binary format, but a tag based one where there is
a table of tags, where each tag has a length and a data type
(that type can be Container). Unpacked it might look something
like this:
(Format TAG length ..data..)
LOGM 139
NAME 16 "Danielle Madeley"
IDXX 32 "[email protected]"
TIME 8 1268610853
FLAG 4 0x3
MESG 39 "This is a message that is 39 bytes long"
Types:
LOGM container "Log Message"
NAME string "Name"
IDXX string "Id"
TIME gint64 "Timestamp"
FLAG guint32 "Flags"
MESG string "Message"
Packs something like this (exciting intermix of ascii and hex):
LO GM 008B NA ME 0010 Da ni el le _M ad el ey ID XX 0020 da ni
el le .m ad el ey @c ol la bo ra .c o. uk TI ME 0008 0000 0000
4B9D 7725
I kind of like this format because it's compact and extensible.
It's quick to jump from container to container. However it's
still very custom.
Solution #3: EXI or similar
Basically use some binary XML format. This is more or less a
formalisation of the system proposed above. The question is
which format? They all seem incredibly overengineered for our
purposes.
Solution #4: sqlite
Store each message as an SQLite row. Great for searching,
probably won't scale?
Thoughts?
--danielle
--
Danielle Madeley
Software Developer, Collabora Ltd. Melbourne, Australia
www.collabora.co.uk
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