NAME

       md_doc_help_elektra-relatedelektra-related -- related configuration systems
        - Settings and preferences are ubiquitous in every software. For this reason, a vast amount of software
       has emerged on this topic. Most of the other projects, however, do not devote their work exclusively to
       configuration.

       We have already mentioned that Elektra provides the features of a configuration library. There are
       countless libraries out there that parse and some even generate configuration files. But there is a big
       catch: These libraries do not provide an abstract view of configuration. They require programmers to open
       the files themselves or at least to remember the path to them. Such information is itself configuration
       and inherently operating system dependent. Therefore, it is not possible to give default values that just
       work.

       Another feature mostly missing in these libraries is cascading. It is not difficult to implement, but
       disturbing if it is not available at all or does not work correctly.

   Augeas
       Augeas is not intended for applications themselves, so it only creates a new view to configuration files
       which is not necessarily the same as applications see it. Additionally, Augeas has a rather poor level of
       abstraction and many syntactical details must be reflected in the configuration tree. Nevertheless,
       Elektra provides an doc_help_augeas plugin '/src/plugins/augeas/' which allows parts of Elektra's global
       configuration tree to be implemented using lenses. Lenses are a promising technology, which allow mapping
       from and to configuration files to be specified with a single program.

   Uniconf
       A project that shares some of the goals with Elektra, but uses a different approach is Uniconf. Besides a
       stand-alone library it supports a daemon mode. With the daemon running, it has the disadvantage of
       protocol overhead and a single point of failure. On the other hand, Uniconf can also notify applications
       when configuration files change and can work in a distributed mode. The project does not solve the
       problem of how to configure the configuration system. So we still have to pass a so-called moniker string
       that contains the knowledge where to find the configuration. The plugin system is flexible, but does not
       depend on the key name. So it is not possible to use different plugins for different applications and
       still have a global key database.

   Debconf
       Debconf is a set of Debian-tools that separates user interaction from the configuration process for the
       system's configuration when packages are installed or upgraded. Debconf itself does not change the
       configuration files. Instead, the administrator is asked questions depending on template files using
       different front ends. These answers are then cached. The configuration changes themselves are applied by
       post-install scripts of the particular package. Exactly for this last step Elektra could yield much
       better results, because it can compare configuration on a per-key basis and thus handle conflicts in a
       much more fine-grained way.

   Freedesktop.org
       The freedesktop.org initiative unifies different desktops using the X Window System in various ways. The
       main focus, however, lies in KDE and Gnome integration. One of the most disturbing and still unresolved
       problems is configuration. Elektra intends to fill this gap in the future.

       Already available is the so-called XDG Base Directory Specification. Perhaps it will define file formats
       in the future, but currently only the paths are specified. To do so, it introduces some environment
       variables that help to find the actual configuration. Only if they are unset or empty, a built-in
       fallback should be used. If desired, elektrified applications behave in a XDG conforming way. (See the
       configuration x for the resolver).

Version 0.8.14                                   Mon Jul 24 2017           md_doc_help_elektra-related(3elektra)