Set logging levels before other plugins load

[FichteFoll]

In order to set the logging levels (based on preferences), this package should load as early as possible, which requires it to have a higher lexicographic precedence over other packages. Package Control introduces the 0_package_control_loader package for this reason.

This precedence is relevant for both initial loading and plugin_loaded callbacks.

[scholer]

Hi @FichteFoll excellent the suggestion! Do you have any experience with how to use the 0_package_control_loader for this purpose? Is it just a matter of updating the README to instruct other package maintainers that if they want to use this sublime_logging_control package to configure logging, then they must add this package to their dependencies file? Or is there anything we can do to sublime_logging_control to ensure it is loaded as early as possible? (I took a quick read at https://packagecontrol.io/docs/dependencies, but that only describe the "priority through dependencies" approach).
Thanks

[FichteFoll]

I believe you should be either renaming your package so that it gets loaded before other packages (e.g. start with a 0 or AAA, as PackageDev did previously), which is a bit ugly, or create a .sublime-package file dynamically with the plugins you need, which is rather complex because there are edge cases to consider (especially uninstalling the package).

[scholer]

Hi @FichteFoll, just to revive this issue: Would the best way to do this still be to just rename the package? If so, should I just change the entry in the package control channel, changing the value of the package's "name" attribute?

If I simply update the package_control_channel files, moving the Logging Control entry from l.json to 0-9.json and changing the "name" value, would that leave existing users "hanging" on the old version? In that case, is there any way to transition users to use the new name? I can see there is a "previous_names" entry, but I assume it is only informational. Is there a way to mark a package as "renamed"?

I looked through 0-9.json and a.json in the package control channel repository and I did not find any other packages that were renamed to promote early loading of the package.

[FichteFoll]

Firstly, there is no other way to be loaded faster besides being a package with low lexicographical precedence and a .sublime-package archive.

Secondly, I would need to take a look at the code in order to understand whether this is actually feasable, since the sublime API is only available after plugin_loaded and depending on whether or not you use the API for storing and loading logging configuration would affect the available options.

There is also the option to generate the code that is supposed to be run by ST upon initialization, either each time configuration is changed or just on installation. The only downside is that this generated package needs to be removed upon deinstallation (or upon disabling the package rather), unlike when the package itself was renamed.

Finally, renaming packages with Package Control is trivial and most packages do not rely on load order. AAAPackageDev did a long time ago but doesn't anymore; zz File Icons still does (which is why it begins with two z) and the 0_package_control_loader package obviously still does. Other than that, I don't know of any.