> just to throw in my 2 cents: i really like Dwight's extension of Dan's
> idea.
> i think this would allow Squeak Central to "get out of the way" in certain
> cases.
> 
I still don't see how. Unless we open the update stream for everyone there
is still quite some effort required to get new stuff in the system. If we'd
open the update stream then the person(s) posting to it have to be very
careful about the implications of their postings. As an example:

> i am thinking specifically about exceptions here. this should be a no
> brainer. everybody wants it. people want it bad enough that they are
> rolling
> their own. we need to pick one and run with it.
> 
Exception handling done in the right way is not at all trivial. I have
reviewed some of the proposed mechanisms and found quite some pitfalls in
the code I've seen. Changing some serious system code to something that
might eventually crash your system is nothing I'd be willing to do for a
public release. And, since I don't have the time to fix or clean up the
existing stuff the only thing I can do (and have done) is sending messages
to those folks working on it.

As it turns out, there just came in a new implementation and as a matter of
fact I like it a *lot* - it is clean, understandable and very well written.
It is by far the best implementation I have seen and having a choice before
we decide what to include is a big advantage (when there is no real time
pressure of course). If we choose the right one, every developer (and most
people out there on the list are developers) will have a good time with it
(the same is of course true for any UI or other stuff). So what is the
problem with the approach?! Is it that people start feeling like 'those
people at Squeak Central don't like me nor my code' when their stuff isn't
included?! But we sure have reasons for acting as we do; there is a lot of
stuff out there and besides the fact that it is hard to keep track of
current versions (which should be announced on the list; I have sometimes
found that things had developed far beyond my knowledge without notifying
people on the list) we cannot always discuss every little point in detail.

> even if none of them are
> perfect, i think the interest and willingness to contribute is there to
> make
> it perfect. so if Squeak Central were to commit to exceptions in v3.0,
> throw
> someone's implementation into an image, mark it v3.0-CURRENT i know i for
> one would be thrilled and would certainly want to contribute to bringing
> it
> to 3.0-RELEASE.
> 
I'm not sure if I understand the above. Do you mean we were then *forced* to
clean up this stuff? I wouldn't like this idea very much - if the stuff is
not on my priority list it would distract me from the work I want/have to
do. Unfortunately you are right (even if you didn't intend to say so ;-) -
it would in fact force us to clean up all the stuff that's been submitted if
we ever wanted to get out of an experimental state. Maybe that is part of
the problem we're discussing here: There is a lot of stuff going on on the
outside but it is not always in a state that makes inclusion in the system
useful or is even ready for it (I have seen quite a bunch of changes that
had very bad side effects). And while trying out new ideas and sending
around change sets for people to play with surely is a good idea, the notion
of 'start something and leave the dirty part to Squeak Central' is not
exactly my understanding of working together.

Perhaps we should think about a 'vote of inclusion' - meaning that if there
are a number of people on the list who want to have a serious extension of
the system (I'm not talking about bug fixes but an exception framework sure
counts as a serious extension) they get together with (one or more) members
of Squeak Central and discuss what needs to get ready for prime time. Then,
we would a) know that there is serious interest in this extension and b)
could point out what we don't like to a group of people who are willing to
fix them.

  Andreas
--
+===== Andreas Raab ========= (andreasr at wdi.disney.com) ==+
| Walt Disney Imagineering        Phone: +1 818 544 5016  I
I Glendale, CA                    Fax:   +1 818 544 4544  I
+======< http://isgwww.cs.uni-magdeburg.de/~raab >========+