Refactoring of forms, validation and model synchronization

[rgrp]

This is a meta-ticket to hold all of the work on refactoring forms, validation and model-synchronization in CKAN.

ckan-dev thread: ​http://lists.okfn.org/pipermail/ckan-dev/2011-January/000180.html

The Issue

From #926:

The current formalchemy setup conflates view, controller and model code in a way that makes it hard to debug and customise.

From ​http://lists.okfn.org/pipermail/ckan-dev/2011-January/000181.html:

... FormAlchemy, in retrospect, was probably a mistake as it merges too much model/validation/form generation into one thing.

At least 3 functions involved [in this area]:

1. Generating (or just filling) a form template with 'form data' (and errors)
2. Converting model data to form data (also happens for APIs in fact) -- let's call this 'dict-ization'
3. Converting form data to model data (and validating) (inverse of previous step)

Related Tickets

• #926 - Pick a simpler form framework
• [not ticketed yet] 'dictization' - serialization / deserialization of package (and other domain objects) to standard intermediate format such as json-convertable python dict
  • cf existing dumper and importer code
  • This will fix #662
• [not ticketed yet] - validation layer (should work on serialized objects?)
• #662 - Can't put entity that is returned by posting to package register (Defect)
• #972 - Merge 'extras' into main package dict rather than having separate key
• #1035 - Form impressions are given IDs

[dread]

So you also need:

4. Converting form data to dict
5. Converting dict to model

i.e. the dict is not the same as the serialized form data or model data.