Re: Re: What I think we should focus on now

R. David Murray wrote:
> Joachim Werner <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
>>I completely agree with your comments. Mainly the part about fragmenting 
>>the community ... -- I'd just like to focus on actually getting things 
>>done rather than only discussing the problems. If the core developers 
>>around Jim get communicated that forward compatibility tools are what 
>>we'd like to see, they can focus on that.
>>
>>I understand the mission of this list as to define what migration tools 
>>(and concepts) we need, so that the developers can work on them.
> 
> 
> I'm afraid it's not that simple.  What gets coded is what the
> developers, core or otherwise, are interested in developing.  To
> some extent this is informed by "need" as articulated in a plan for
> a complete product, but a "wish list" by itself is not going to be
> enough.  There's always more to do than there are people/time to
> do it.
> 
> Migration tools and back porting are not yet on anybody's radar
> screen...no, they are definately on the radar screen, they are just
> off there in the distance.  The itches that need scratched right
> now are completing out what is needed to get real applications (that
> certain core developers are actually working on, ex: SteveA) running
> inside Zope3.  Once we have a Zope3 product or two for which someone
> then says, "gee, I want to run this on my existing wiz-bang Zope2
> site", *then* backward compatability will get worked on by core
> developers, IMO.  Nearer term, a Zope2 developer can decide they
> want to write some new product they need in a forward compatabile
> way.  If they then approach the Z3 developers with specific questions
> and problems, again the compatability pieces will get worked on.
> 
> A real, *concrete* problem is what is needed to get this process
> kick started, not a discussion of what tools we *think* we might want.

Your note focusses on motivational issues.  I guess that a lot of people
think that the lack of detail on transition is due to a lack of motivation.

For me, the Zope Pope and the head of the Zope 3 development effort,
this is not the case. I am extremely motivated and committed
to provide a smooth transition. The reason that we are not working on the
technical details now is that the time is not right yet.

It would be foolish to work on the technical aspects of migration until
the think we are migrating to is really well defined.  We are getting close,
but it's really too soon.  It will make sense to focus on migration after
the first beta, when the new platform will be a bit more hardened than it is
now.

Jim


-- 
Jim Fulton           mailto:[email protected]       Python Powered!
CTO                  (888) 344-4332            http://www.python.org
Zope Corporation     http://www.zope.com       http://www.zope.org