RE: [wsrp][interfaces] Portlet instance handles

[Alan Kropp <akropp@epicentric.com>]

Agree with Mike here..from the WSIA side, we've been talking about the
handle as a reference constructed expressly for, and for the exclusive use
of a given Consumer.  To the extent that the service (portlet provider)
needs visibility as to 'who' the End User really is, this should be
information that's passed along with the request the Consumer constructs on
behalf of the End User, within the bounds of the trust relationship in
effect between Consumer and Producer.

Alan





-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Freedman [mailto:Michael.Freedman@oracle.com]
Sent: Thursday, May 09, 2002 2:47 PM
To: WSRP
Subject: [wsrp][interfaces] Portlet instance handles


Folks,
   In a number of subcommittees I believe it has been expressed/assumed
that:
        a) Portlet instances have unique persistent ids/handles that
will be retained both by the portal and the portlet service.
        b) A portlet instance (handle) corresponds to a given user of a
given portlet on a portal page.
        c) This handle will be generated by the portlet service.

   I have been surprised by (b) being part of the assumption and would
like to understand better why folks feel this the right way to model
things.  I am surprised because it seems to require the portal maintain
N instance references per portlet on a page where N corresponds to the
number of users (who have visited this page).  Representing a database
company I guess I should be happy that we want this data bloat ;-)
Seriously, however, I would like to understand why we think its
proper/necessary to manage this persistent id when a more lightweight
mechanism exists -- namely one persistent id that represents the portlet
instance on the page + the current user identity.  Basically, it seems
the downside of the assumed/proposed approach are large(r) data sets
being maintained in the portal that likely makes export operations,
upgrades, etc. more expensive.  In addition it requires the portal to
runtime map from an obvious key (the page's portlet instance and the
user id) to this handle.
   On the surface it seems that portlets need an id that represents a
portal's portlet page instance on a per user basis as a key to that
user's personalization data for that portlet instance.  Are there other
needs for this key?  If not why do we need to generate such an id if
there is no personalization data or if the personalization is being
managed by the portlet itself (in this case the portlet can choose to
generate its own id and managed the mapping itself)?  And even if the
portal is maintaining the personalization data why can't it choose the
key itself?
   -Mike-




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