The future of SM...

goran.krampe at bluefish.se goran.krampe at bluefish.se
Thu Jul 29 13:30:04 UTC 2004


Hi Stephan and all!

Stephan Rudlof <sr at evolgo.de> wrote:
> Hi Göran,
> 
> first I want to thank you for your constructive and encouraging reply!

Well, "I try my very best". :) (a quote from a hilarious sketch that is
shown on TV in Sweden every new years eve)
 
[SNIP]
> >>But if you have started to make your own thing, why should I continue?
> > 
> > 
> > Well, I have been "making my own thing" since 2002 in this area -
> > although I haven't written specific code until now. :)
> 
> I have just meant the dependency mechanism, but I think you know that.

Yes, and I actually meant that too. :)

I think my plan originates from OOPSLA2002, and many things I have done
in SM since then has had it in mind. But it is only recently of course
that I have reached the point where coding is useful. For example, there
was no point in coding for dependencies earlier when we didn't have
releases. And I still hesitate slightly to go for it without first
having modifiable local maps, which would make it much easier to
integrate the posting of configurations from users into the Squeak
tools.

> >>To compete with a part of software from you, where you decide to use
> >>yours or mine? I know, which I would use in such a situation...
> > 
> > 
> > This is of course an unfortunate scenario. Let us instead see if our
> > ideas can be merged and if we can collaborate - as I have wanted all
> > along. I would definitely *NOT* stomp all over the very first person
> > stepping up wanting to collaborate with me on this.
> 
> This sounds good and is encouraging for me!

It should. :)
 
> > My coding so far has not been a "decided course" - but as I said - I
> > needed to get some code written to clear my own head and to be able to
> > experiment.
> 
> I understand.
> But there are other valuable approaches, too. E.g. at my job I've made
> just concepts for about a year and nevertheless the domain so far hasn't
> been precisely described, since it is *very* complex. There are other
> reasons for this long time, too (it is a rotten project). But now there
> is the time to start with software development there: before it hadn't
> made any sense!
> 
> Since the domain of a package versioning system is not so simple and
> there are in addition many social aspects to taken into account, I've
> first written down my thoughts in a conceptual manner, and look for
> feedback now.

Which is a good approach.

> In your head your view of the domain is much clearer, of course, since
> you have written SM...

Well, I am not sure. :)

> >>Don't understand me wrong: I can understand that you've just started
> >>without making yourself dependent from others.
> > 
> > 
> > The reason for starting was just because I got tired of thinking with a
> > pen and pencil.
> 
> I understand. But since you have posted your efforts kind of a result ..
> 
> <from another mail>
> > And I can at this time, for anyone still reading, mention that I
> > yesterday executed two unit tests green that made the very first partial
> > dependency analysis. New class called SMDependencyEngine.
> > 
> > So dependencies are finally hitting the code!  :)  But since it is
> > currently such a hotly debated area I can't promise anything regarding
> > how/when/what will go into the public SM.
> 
> .. I've been thinking as I did:

Well, reasonable. But as I said - we will not take anything into
"deployment" until we are in some form of agreement I think. Of course,
everyone can't be happy - for example, Lex and I seem to be quite far
from each other regarding this (my perception is that he wants
dependencies per package and I *really* want them per releases, etc) -
so we will just have to see where it leads.

> >>Possibly I've misinterpreted your call for help in this area.
> 
> > No, you didn't. Let me prove that by replying to your DEPS article.
> 
> OK. I've seen, that you already have replied to it (please be patient
> with me, don't currently know when I have time to reply to the reply ;-) ).
> 
> > And
> > I hope you can take my criticism - because there will be a bit of that,
> 
> Constructive criticism is good!

Yes, but hard to write and hard to read without people getting a little
bit hurt. :)

> Four eyes are seeing more than two, so just in complex domains it is
> good to have more people looking onto the concepts. Especially in
> domains where the others have to live with a result much *visible* to them!
> 
> I think that getting the graph traversing stuff running well is not
> simple, but compared with having to solve these other issues it seems to
> me to be a small problem. I also think that you will be faced with some
> of the principal problems I've mentioned in the paper, independently
> from the chosen *technical* solution.

Well, yes and no. The graph traversal in itself is of course not *that*
hard (but not trivial eiher) - but there are so many other parameters in
this problem so it turns quite complex. For example, I have now code
that seems to be able to find all possible non-conflicting sets of
releases that needs to be installed as prerequisites for a given set of
releases. Ok, but:

- How can/should we choose from the calculated scenarios? They need to
be rated somehow.

- What if there is no scenario found? Then the "tweaking" begins -
perhaps try 1.01 instead of 1.0 of package X? But there may be multiple
such tweaks for multiple of the scenarios. How do we find the most
suitable tweaks to offer the user?

etc etc. Of course, everything is "doable". But there are *many* degrees
of freedom here that needs to be considered.
 
> So please take my criticism of *your* concepts - I'm expecting there
> will be some - as fight for the best practical solution: I'll always try
> to make *arguments* in whatever direction.
> I'm also aware of that there always will be some trade off: but for good
> decisions the variants should be as clear as possible.

Sure.

> > and then we can borrow/build from there? :).
> 
> This sounds promising.

I hope you are still positive after reading my DEPS-reply. :)
 
> > And then we can start sharing using Monticello when we have boiled this
> > down to a first shot. 
> 
> > You can reply to me in private or on the list - and or join #squeak on
> > irc.freenode.org where I am.
> 
> I've never used irc so far, but this could be a reason for starting with
> it...

I hadn't used it earlier either - but I have grown to like it a lot. It
is nice to be able to exchange thoughts a bit more swiftly and it
strenghtens the "community feeling" in Squeak. I almost daily talk with
Craig, Jecel, Brian, Ken, Avi, Bryce, Ragnar, Cees, Marcus, Doug etc on
that channel. And I still don't understand why so few show up!
 
> Greetings
> Stephan

regards, Göran



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