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Em 28-06-2009 23:32, Igor Stasenko escreveu:
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cite="mid:4a5f5f320906281932l11e3d295we1963efc894ea9f9@mail.gmail.com"
type="cite">(...)<br>
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<pre wrap="">This discussion resembles other inside Fedora community: what should be
in/out of a distro and how to maintain it. There are three proposals:
Squeak, Pharo, Cuis. I'll tell you what I don't like in Pharo/Cuis
proposals: they resemble me Brazilian way of solving things: you have
something that's just not working as you wish. Instead of correcting the
circumstances that lead to the problem, people start a new project saying:
"now everything will be all right". Later the so called solution is
suffering from the same problems and people launches a newer project to fix
what went wrong with the predecessors.
</pre>
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<pre wrap=""><!---->
This is what is called development: learn on mistakes and move forward.
An opposite to this is stalling: do nothing, eveyone is happy. End of story.
</pre>
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No, it's just spinning around. Why? Just take a look at the statements
of Pharo and Cuis. They clearly point out what people think is wrong
with Squeak.org but doesn't have a single word about how to avoid the
situations to repeat in future.<br>
<br>
First, I am not reactionary. I think that if something is not working,
them it is necessary to move ahead. I've seem Pharo and I particularly
enjoy their proposal. But when you see the project roadmap... there's
much to be done. What are the concrete, tangible schedules? What are
the resources to achieve them? Will the same people involved in
Squeak.org be contributing to Pharo? If they're splitting teams where
they'll find people to care about real world issues like support &
maintenance?<br>
<br>
Second, much of the manifestations of the spin-off projects show non
satisfaction with current Squeak.org leadership. But leadership was
voted... Besides, we at LA know where "benevolent dictatures" lead to...<br>
<br>
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<pre wrap=""></pre>
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<pre wrap="">And there are 3 projects running in
parallel. Redundancy of effort, high costs (even in terms of dedication of
people struggling to keep pace in what is happening around) and futile
disputes are the only results.
</pre>
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<pre wrap=""><!---->
How many companies in the world producing a cars in parallel?
Should they merge under a single banner & start producing a single,
good for everyone car?
Or should they stop producing a cars at all, because all of them would
break someday, or get obsolete?
Imagine, how many money & man hours could be saved! :)
</pre>
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In fact, there are really a number of manufactures producing vehicles
in parallel. But whenever their business loose meaning they merge or
even close (unless some government crazily injects billions of bucks in
their broken businesses).<br>
<br>
The key question is: "the meaning of the business". What is the size of
the market? What are the available resources? What are the future
scenarios? Where people want to be in the next five years?<br>
<br>
Squeak and derivatives scenario: how many people/organizations are
using it? What is the "potential market" for Squeak? What are the
available resources? What are the chances of filling the market space
and how to do that?<br>
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cite="mid:4a5f5f320906281932l11e3d295we1963efc894ea9f9@mail.gmail.com"
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<pre wrap="">
</pre>
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<pre wrap="">I think there's nothing fundamentally wrong with squeak. The question is how
to organize things. How to classify things as "core", "contributed" and "3rd
party". How to keep things up to date. How to obsolete things.
It may be boring, but I think that many things could be formalized.
First there are the leadership meetings on Wednesdays. The agenda of the
meetings as well as their minutes could be placed at the
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="http://www.squeak.org/Foundation">www.squeak.org/Foundation</a>. There should be a place where people could
suggest topics to be included in the agenda. I know that much has been done
via e-mail lists but for people (like me) who have to deal with large
amounts of email these lists may be unpractical. Besides, keeping things
public is a good way for letting people decide if they want or don't want to
use squeak.
</pre>
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<pre wrap=""><!---->You are free to post agenda items at any time. Either in blog comments
area, or here on the list.
We are in need for your proposals, and declaring this constantly.
</pre>
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Well... I think I've presented some administrative proposals in my
e-mails. The next paragraphs have at least 3 proposals: responsibility
delegation regarding maintenance, establishment of mechanisms for
evaluating suitability of packages to be included in official distros
and seek for $$$ support. As they appear they're out of order because I
think that 1rst thing for a leadership is to ensure enough resources
(so, $ and gathering people comes first), delegation follows.<br>
<br>
As I don't believe in dictatorship, at first I present ideas. If the
ideas are not welcome, no meaning in proceeding to implementation
suggestions.<br>
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<pre wrap="">
</pre>
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<pre wrap="">As this discussion (about future of Squeak & Pharo) made clear, it is urgent
to define what is in and what is out of Squeak. Since there's a real concern
about back compatibility and as things are getting big and sometimes
non-maintained, I would suggest that documenting things is essential.
In my opinion, it would be interesting to create a mechanism for
responsibility delegation regarding to maintenance. Regarding to
distributions it would be interesting to create a mechanism for evaluating
the suitability of packages to be included (like looking that the packages
don't have dependencies outside the distribution and things that can lead to
a situation where it is impossible to assure their maintenance). I don't
think that a situation where a single person is responsible for a critical
part of a distribution is acceptable: whenever such situation is identified
the leadership should seek for additional people.
In my opinion, it would be good if some sort of financial/corporate support
could be granted. It would allow to have people involved in "non exciting"
tasks. Again: corporate support doesn't translate in any kind of servitude
and it can help to grow the universe of Squeak users. Besides, good
marketing is essential: if you get good media it is more likely you'll be
granted more and better projects... more people will pay attention to you.
Just a last thing about croquet. It was meant to rock but didn't... I tell:
(1) poor documentation (how in hell I use it???) (2) lack of marketing
(yeah... even inside university good marketing is essential). Many people
just didn't figured out what it was meant to (3) performance issues
(intensive use of GL, etc).
</pre>
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<pre wrap=""><!---->
You know, all of this is good: Pointing at mistakes, drawing a new direction.
But for a success, there is one little thing is missing: where are
those people who stop talking and start doing something?
I can tell you, but i think you know it yourself.
</pre>
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Yes. I know it. That's why I'm spending time in order to discuss things
and present suggestions. Perhaps suggestions are not clear enough.<br>
<br>
IMHO, I think that Squeak.org should be seeking for objectives
(medium/long term), support and popularization. I give you an example:
about 26 years ago people at UvA (Amsterdam, NL) decided to invest in
the study of knowledge modeling and related research. Their leadership
at that time (Prof. Dr. Wielinga, Prof. Dr. Breuker and Prof. Dr.
Schreiber) elaborated an action plan (formalized in a set of projects)
and got support within EU (ESPRIT projects, a good number of them) and
companies (IBM among them). The ESPRIT support lasted for more than 15
years (I currently don't know the state of things) and many really
interesting things came to life. SWI-Prolog is one of them.<br>
<br>
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No offense.
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<pre wrap="">Good night all,
CdAB
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<pre wrap=""><!---->
</pre>
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No offense taken.<br>
<br>
CdAB<br>
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<pre wrap="">
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