When I read the conclusion, it immediately reminded of the assertion about the common Perl object orientation pattern (using an anonymous hash to store instance data) that Abigail strived to correct by inside out objects.

I think the problem Abigail addresses with Inside Out Objects is, although similar, a very different issue. Inside out objects solve the problem of classes vying for slots to put their instance data in and do it in such a way that retrieving instance data is still efficient (e.g. rather than multiple hash lookups) and strict checking becomes useful again. Your acquaintance's article looks like it is just a short note on one strategy for namespace partitioning within a Session object.

I've looked at some of the other articles on his site. In many cases, he seems to find profundity in a little semantic slight-of-hand... For instance, his assertion that there are no web objects and http requests should be thought of as functions. Well, I think that depends on the web application... Oh! But he goes on to suggest developers should think in terms of "request handlers" rather than "web applications." Ok... whatever. Sometimes you have to group together a few hundred request handlers and call them an application. It's mighty convenient when they act on the same data and even share code.

In other cases, his statements seem to be more academic than experienced. Like when he says, "GET requests should not have side effects while POSTs may." Well, yes and no. That's really a convention and it is often not followed. It makes sense in the context of getting the most out of caching... You've got to keep in mind though that almost every hit counter in the history of the web breaks this guideline.

I don't know what to say about his POST requests must always result in redirects idea...

Or his Put all interactive content into images with headers for immediate expiration idea...

I couldn't help but notice that he rolled his own templating system. Have you reviewed the code? (And you've accused me of writing in a C-ish style! ;-)

I don't doubt that this guy is bright and has some good ideas about programming in general and writing web applications specifically but I don't find a lot to be impressed by on that site. Frankly, when someone writes a "Thingamajiggie Considered Harmful" paper, I expect it to have some real meat. This one didn't.

-sauoq
"My two cents aren't worth a dime.";