Ideas from Tape Framework

[clyfe]

Sharing some ideas I had in mind when writing Tape Framework; they may find their way in Re-Frame.

1. Ditch the registry (potentially)

Let's say we define handlers/subs as plain functions:

(ns my.handlers)

(defn increment [db _]
  (update db ::count inc))

And that we use namespaced keywords exclusively for event/sub names: (rf/dispatch [:my.handlers/increment]).

The keyword has enough info to retrieve the handler from the global namespaces tree js/window.my.handlers.increment (then again, that does not work with advanced optimizations unless ^:export).
We no longer have to register in a registrar.

How about interceptors? They can be added as metadata (same for subs signals). Assumes the handler lookup will know to wire them:

(defn increment
  {::rf/interceptors [(rf/path :foo)]}
  [db _]
  (update db ::count inc))

2. Fn metadata

On the lines of EP 001-CaptureHandlerMetadata, if we follow the above, we can add metadata at the defn level:

(defn increment
  {::rf/kind :reg-db
   ::rf/id ::inc
   ::rf/interceptors [(rf/path :foo)]}
  [db _]
  (update db ::count inc))

:doc, :ns, :line :file follow from normal defn metadata.

Using such metadata can also automate registration, by walking ns-publics of namespaces under a path, and registering in re-frame according to metadata.

3. Write symbols, use kws behind the scenes ("Ergonomic API")

Making things navigable (ie. "jump to definition") is really helpful in dealing with legacy codebases.
Subscribe/dispatch could have macro based equivalents that take the handler symbol as argument and compile to the keyword:

(rf/dispatch+ [my.core/increment]) ; => (rf/dispatch [:my.core/inc])

Tape MVC

Some of this stuff is already present in Tape MVC if you want to have a feel for it.