Re: [PDO] Re: [PHP-DEV] PDO 2: Request for Comments

On 25.01.2008, at 02:59, Wez Furlong wrote:

> We are serious about moving forwards on an improved PDO 2, and about  
> making the process for contributing to it easier for everyone; PDO 2  
> need not be dependent on a CLA, so calling out to boycott improving  
> PDO on the basis that there *might* be a CLA is a little bit extreme.

I think you could have done a better job making it clear that the CLA  
is an option, not a requirement.

> Obviously, Andi and myself believe that a CLA will be beneficial,  
> which is why we've structured our initial mail in this way.  The  
> question is, what will the CLA cost us, and if that cost is too high  
> for the community, what other options do we have to take advantage  
> of the offer of help from the vendors?

I agree we should see this as an opportunity. Getting new people on  
board is always a good thing (tm). I have read through the CLA and the  
critical issues I personally had with the Apache ( as well as ZF and  
eZ) CLAs have been reworded in a way I think is much closer to  
something I would sign. That being said, it still going to be a  
problem for many of us who work for larger organizations, that do have  
a patent portfolio (Yahoo, Amazon etc.). Also the simple fact that  
people need to sign something before they get startet has a  
significant burden (especially since there are items in there like #7,  
which put a perpetual burden on the contributor).

My understanding of what Wez and Andi are looking for is to create a  
situation, where all of the vendors have an interest to make sure that  
their PDO driver is at least as shiny as the others guys driver.  
However they do agree to play be the rules of compatibility (defined  
by the specs and the test suite). As such they expect the vendors to  
take leadership, but not exclusively, on their respective drivers. The  
core would then be mostly a community thing, though they also do seem  
to expect vendors to provide core improvements fairly regular. So to  
summarize, they are hoping to significantly increase the number of  
developers working on PDO.

Now I see some problems here. One could say that due to lack of  
competition MySQL AB was able to afford this, but its not like MySQL  
AB did not have different phases in their support for the various  
mysql API's.  Companies shift priorities around just as other OSS  
developers do. So I do not value the commitment from a company higher  
than that of any individual. Actually people motivated to work in  
their spare time (or after hours on top of their allocated  
"benchtime") have always seemed the most trustworthy. What do I mean  
with trustworthy? Mainly that they care, care about the code they are  
working on, the community that they are part of, recognition for good  
work by their peers etc (most of you have seen Rasmus testosteron  
talk). Someone that just gets allocated is just not the same.

In that sense I think we have seen two types of ways big cooperations  
have interacted with us. The more negative example is IBM. Few of  
their guys have made an effort to be part of the community. Actually I  
only consider Dan (not with IBM anymore) and Caroline to have really  
tried and succeeded (thats just my personal POV here .. not sure if  
any of you have managed to get a different vibe). Of course I see  
their commits, but most attempts at personal engagement have been  
mostly futile. Anyways, the work on improving the tests and writing  
the initial PDO docs have been very appreciated. No CLA's needed to be  
signed for those. The PDO ODBC/IBM drivers did require CLA's and it  
has already been a major annoyance back then and the concerns form the  
community were flat out ignored by Wez. And I think the only reason  
why we ended up with this CLA'ed off section in PECL was that back  
then people were too in shock to react to the unilateral steps that  
Wez took. So to summarize, new tests good, documenting PDO good,  
splitting the community bad.

On the other hand we have Oracle. They focused on having a visible and  
available point of contact in the community. They hired community  
developers (through Zend/OmniTI?) to work on their drivers. They  
contribute with tests and even some tiny bits of code here and there.  
Not much bad to say here, very good approach.

>
Now the question to me is what is better:
1) go with a CLA, risk a split in the PHP community, get a few more  
developers that know their API's really well but are just clocking in  
their time and be mostly reliant on the whim of company budgets
2) no CLA, no split in the community, no additional developers, but  
maybe new documentors/test writers as well as access to the brains who  
know the respective database drivers well

Somehow 2) seems much more appealing to me. And from the very  
resilient way that Andi/Wez defend the CLA approach without giving me  
the vibe they ever gave intensifying the non CLA based interaction  
with already have with Oracle/IBM while bringing in Microsoft a good  
look.

regards,
Lukas