Subject: [Disman] Clarifications for mteObjectsEntry and mteObjectsIndex DESCRIPTIONs: Issue-3

From: Benoit Claise <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 19 Jul 2005 12:09:48 +0200

Dear all,

Regardless of the order (trigger, trigger test, event) discussion just 
posted as an Issue-2, I would like to come back to the DESCRIPTIONs of 
mteObjectsEntry and mteObjectsIndex.

mteObjectsEntry OBJECT-TYPE 
    SYNTAX      MteObjectsEntry 
    MAX-ACCESS  not-accessible 
    STATUS      current 
    DESCRIPTION 
        "A group of objects.  Applications create and delete entries 
        using mteObjectsEntryStatus. 
 
        When adding objects to a notification they are added in the 
        lexical order of their index in this table.  Those associated 
        with a trigger come first, then trigger test, then event." 
    INDEX       { mteOwner, mteObjectsName, mteObjectsIndex } 
    ::= { mteObjectsTable 1 } 

I think that the last 2 sentences are not very clear.
I guess that the correct behavior is that the second one takes 
precedence over the first one, and that the goal is to say:
trigger object group first, trigger test object group next, and event 
notification object last. Within the object group (mteTrigger*Objects or 
mteEventNotificationObjects), then we take the numerical order of the 
mteObjectsIndex, the third index in mteObjectsEntry.

If this is the correct behaviour, I'm confused by "When adding objects 
to a notification they are added in the lexical order of their _index 
_in this table. Those associated with a trigger come first, then trigger 
test, then event.".
Which index do we speak about? mteOwner, mteObjectName, or mteObjectsIndex?

mteObjectsIndex OBJECT-TYPE 
    SYNTAX      Unsigned32 (1..4294967295) 
    MAX-ACCESS  not-accessible 
    STATUS      current 
    DESCRIPTION 
        "An arbitrary integer for the purpose of identifying 
        individual objects within a mteObjectsName group. 
 
        Objects within a group are placed in the notification in the 
        numerical order of this index. 
 
        Groups are placed in the notification in the order of the 
        selections for overall trigger, trigger test, and event. 
        Within trigger test they are in the same order as the 
        numerical values of the bits defined for mteTriggerTest. 
 
        Bad object identifiers or a mismatch between truncating the 
        identifier and the value of mteDeltaDiscontinuityIDWildcard 
        result in operation as one would expect when providing the 
        wrong identifier to a Get operation.  The Get will fail or get 
        the wrong object.  If the object is not available it is omitted 
        from the notification." 
    ::= { mteObjectsEntry 2 } 

Again, I think the second and third sentences are confusing. If I read 
first "Objects within a group are placed in the notification in the 
numerical order of this index.", I'm asking myself what a group is! I 
guess/understand that a group in the case of mteObjectsIndex refers to 
trigger, trigger test, or event but this don't think this is specified 
anywhere in the draft. What is even more confusing is that 
mteObjectsEntry refers to "a group of objects" but the meaning is 
completely different.

Am I the only one to consider this very confusing?
Should we think of some improve text?

Regards, Benoit.

---

From: "Randy Presuhn" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 26 Jul 2005 21:30:33 -0700

Hi -

> From: "Benoit Claise" <[email-masked]>
> To: "Disman (E-mail)" <[email-masked]>
> Sent: Tuesday, July 19, 2005 3:09 AM
> Subject: [Disman] Clarifications for mteObjectsEntry and mteObjectsIndex DESCRIPTIONs: Issue-3
>
> Dear all,
>

Clearly it's mteObjectsIndex.  For a group, all the entries will have the same value
for their mteOwner and for their mteObjectName.

>         numerical values of the bits defined for mteTriggerTest.

Note that this last paragraph provides some of the missing information
about ordering!

> numerical order of this index.", I'm asking myself what a group is! I

A group is a set of entries with the same values for the (mteOwner,
mteObjectName) tuple.  If that's not clear, we should make it explicit.

> mteObjectsEntry refers to "a group of objects" but the meaning is

No, it's identical: the set of entries with the same (mteOwner, mteObjectsName)
tuple in their indexes constitutes a group.  If it's not clear enough, we
should make it more explicit.

> Should we think of some improve text?

If a document's editor finds it confusing, that alone is good reason to
improve the text's clarity, in my opinion.

> Regards, Benoit

Randy