[MOBY-l] Trouble-ticketing for MOBY; unwanted side effect of MOBY::Client::Service->execute

[Frank Gibbons]

Hi,
Two related items:

I think MOBY::Client::Service->execute has an unwanted side-effect in that 
the XMLinputlist argument appears to be modified upon returning from this 
function. The code does some editing on it. I don't think that would have 
been a problem had XMLinputlist been passed in as a scalar, but it's passed 
as an ARRAY ref, and so modifications to it are propagated back to the 
calling code. This is a problem if, like me, you want to iterate over 
services calling each one with the same XMLinputlist. (At least, I think 
that's what's happening - correct me.)

How do we fix something like this? Are there regression tests to make sure 
nothing gets broken when this issue is tackled? Who fixes it? (I'll 
volunteer) The issue of how to fix this raises the other item: while MOBY 
is under CVS control, there's no ticketing system (that I'm aware of). As a 
long-time lurker on this list, I know that most issues just get posted to 
the list, and then fixed. I think there are a lot advantages to having a 
centralized, non-email-based record of what needs to be fixed in the 
future, but also of what was fixed in the past. I'm wondering partly why 
MOBY isn't on SourceForge (which has a ticketing system for bugs and 
feature requests, so that potential users can not only see what issues have 
been fixed, but also what features are likely to appear in the future) - if 
this has been discussed in the past and resolved, I'd appreciate a pointer.

Thanks,

-Frank


PhD, Computational Biologist,
Harvard Medical School BCMP/SGM-322, 250 Longwood Ave, Boston MA 02115, USA.
Tel: 617-432-3555       Fax: 
617-432-3557       http://llama.med.harvard.edu/~fgibbons