Openfire makes extensive use of JiveGlobals, stored in the ofProperty database table, for changing the way it behaves. These properties are generally not well documented.

In order to aid documentation, it is proposed that a new mechanism is introduce for storing/accessing these properties. Each property defined would have a description, as well as a default value when not configured.

This will allow an update to the existing admin user interface to show all properties, configured or not, with an appropriate description, thus keeping the description of these properties within the code base rather than tied to a hard-to-edit forum post.

Note 1; the new mechanism should be fully backward compatible with the current JiveGlobals API.

Note 2; it is not proposed that all properties will be migrated in a "big bang". Instead, some core properties will be initially migrated, with others being updated as and when code changes are made in the area.