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Sun 20 Sep 2009 |
News From the Production Leadership Team
Written by Mark Dexter
Hi everyone. This is the first of what we hope will be regular blogs to let you know what the Production Leadership Team is working on. In case you missed it, we're the people who coordinate the development, documentation, communications, bug squashing, and translation efforts for Joomla.
Currently, we are hard at work getting version 1.6 ready. To that end, we are meeting weekly to sort out tasks and keep things moving. You can read the notes from these meetings on the Google Group called Joomla! Production Working Group Leadership.
We have also begun work on a development budget for next year. We've created a thread on the Google Group where we will brainstorming ideas for the best ways to use our limited funds to further the Joomla development process. If you are interested, you can follow the discussion there.
We are also meeting regularly with the Version 1.6 Release Team. The largest task to complete before we can release 1.6 is the ACL asset management system. If you have been following the CMS Development Google Group, you know that people have been working very hard on the design for this. This process of brainstorming the design showed the Joomla community in action. The discussion was lively but cordial and many good ideas were contributed by a number of people. In the end, we were able to reach a clear consensus around a great design.
Hannes has posted a detailed description of the final design and some code here: http://groups.google.com/group/joomla-dev-cms/browse_thread/thread/883baaffe12f023.
Oh, and one last thing. Look for an official announcement about the upcoming version 1.6 alpha2 release soon.
2009-09-20 21:08:55
I know there is some resistance to Joomla development going commerical, as it is an open source project, but I don't think it is an all or nothing situation. The JED already charges for advertising space, Joomla days/ developer conferences need more funding, and if core team members do get paid, it could be reserved to those who have already put a couple of years effort in, so money is not the reason developers put their hand up for getting involved in Joomla CMS development.
For the average Commercial extension developer, $30 a month is probably 1-5% of their income, it seems a more than reasonable charge for the exposure the JED gives.
2009-09-21 06:53:10
Just fair enough!
2009-09-21 07:30:07
2009-09-21 10:36:19
2009-09-21 14:32:43
I am puzzling over the meeting minutes found in the work-group leadership list (http://groups.google.com/group/joomla-wg-production/browse_thread/thread/1c6654452107d5ff). Reading this post I am uncertain how to interpret the current state of development, all I read is that there is discussion on almost any level on how to finish 1.6 and there is not clear plan to actually reach the end goals for this minor release.
Given the promise for an Beta 6 weeks after the alpha, I am also surprised to read there will be a second alpha. From the quality point of view I understand it, let's face it the released alpha was not really an alpha at all, but for the sake of managing expectations it is a real disappointment to read this.
Things like a new infrastructure, moving to a new development structure sound great, and even releasing the Joomla application framework sound awesome but the community is waiting for the release of 1.6. Currently there is no information on the schedule and there is no alignment towards the announced goals in January? I am quite confident I am not alone, but after reading the meeting minutes from 12 September I really doubt if the release team and production work group even know how they would finish 1.6, reading those of September 5th make me really want to cry about what is going on...in the mean while I also will move away from this once so great platform, to much promises, to little progression and just one disappointment too much to handle.
2009-09-21 15:05:25
2009-09-21 19:33:23
Jeff- As Mark Dexter mentions above, we are preparing for a second Alpha release before we go to Beta (which will probably be a pretty quick turnaround). There are a myriad of reasons for the delay, not the least of which is the level of community involvement. There's a high level of information and opinions being shared and a low level of coding being done by the community. If the level of community contributions in the form of code were as high as the opinions being shared, we'd be much closer to beta by now.
That being said, we want Joomla 1.6 to be a solid release. We've overshot ourselves a bit by adding a bunch of things people really want, but weren't really planned for this release. And we're taking the time to get the important things just right (like ACL).
I really hate the phrase "it'll be ready when it's ready," but that's essentially it. Believe me, nobody wants it more "out the door" than the Leadership Team. But it's not good if it's released and we have tons of unhappy people. So please hang in there.
2009-09-21 20:38:23
At this point, these commercial developers (whom I hold a great deal of respect for) are making money and getting free advertising.
If I have a product I'm selling, it makes sense that I pay to advertise it, I think.
2009-09-22 09:05:38
Just like to thank all the committed developers and everyone else who are working hard to get Joomla 1.6 out.
Good idea to charge a small nominal amount for JED commercial developers so that Joomla can benefit.
2009-09-22 09:59:09
Now it seems this did not give the core team any advantage as its working on the acl over 6 months now?
Or was this just some commercial message to promote jxtended...
2009-09-22 18:32:54
While I would certainly be in favor of Joomla! finding a way to get some money from commercial extension developers, but I don't think that simply charging a fee to list commercial extensions in the JED is necessarily the fairest way to do it.
There are lots of ways that creative businesses could still get free advertising in the JED by working around this idea. Here are some examples:
1. They list extensions as non-commercial, but when you get to their website to download them they list the same extensions with more features which aren't free.
2. They list extensions as non-commercial, but when you get to their website to download them they charge for documentation.
3. They list extensions as non-commercial, but when you get to their website to download them they charge for consulting or customization work.
Those are just 3 examples. I am sure there are many others out there which make this a much more complicated matter than simply declaring that Joomla! will start charging a fee to list commercial extensions in the JED.
Note I am NOT saying the above 3 examples represent bad or unethical business practices. I am simply saying that there are lots of ways a business can still get free advertising in the JED even if they only list non-commercial extensions there.
I think a lot of careful thought and discussion should take place before any decisions are made regarding this idea.
2009-09-22 21:18:19
I meant resistance to going commercial in regards to Joomla CMS development. The development is largley done by a community of volunteers, where the focus is on open souce development. I don't think anyone would want to see this change to a bunch of deveopers who are in it for the money, and are squabbling about getting paid for their effort. This is why I suggested only experienced volunteers are paid.
@Paul Orwig
I dont have any facts on these. I do know 1% is a close figure for my income as a commercial developer. I also think it is a reasonable assumption that most other commercial developers earn something in the vicinty of 20% to 500% of my income. I also think it is plain common sense that if most commercial developers are charging $30-$50 for an extension, and there is reasonable activity in their support forum, they are not making $100 a month.
In regards to your ways around, if a developer wants to distribute an extension commercially, with no free basic version, and no "free extension paid support/docs" model, there is no way they will change their prefered business model, to save $30 a month.
Sure I can't prove this, but if every point on here needs to be proved with solid evidence, rather than reasonable doubt, I don't think anything will get done.
I think its good to have critical thinking about ideas on here, but I also think you can be to skeptical, and nothing gets done if this high level of skepticism is applied.
2009-09-23 01:00:42
Thanks for acknowledging that the assumptions underlying your original idea are not based on facts. I don't agree that your assumptions are based in common sense, and in fact I have very strong "reasonable doubt" about the validity of the math you used to support your original idea.
In your original post you claimed that by charging $30 per month to list commercial extensions in the JED, that Joomla! could bring in $15,000 per month. You also said that $30 per month probably represents 1-5% of the average commercial developer's income.
So for your math to be correct, there would need to be 500 commercial Joomla! extensions listed on the JED which would each need to be generating an average of $3,000-$15,000 per month income (and income is very different than revenue).
So yes Matt, I do have a very strong "reasonable doubt" that there are anywhere close to 500 commercial Joomla! extensions which are bringing in that much income every month.
Also, it is a fact that some of the most popular Joomla! extensions are listed as non-commercial in the JED, but their developers follow one of the 3 examples I gave which would still leave them uncharged by your idea.
I agree with you that critical thinking about ideas here is good. As I said before, I think that the general idea of finding a way for Joomla! to get money from commercial developers is a good one. However, I don't think your specific idea will bring in anywhere near as much money as you have claimed it will.
If an idea gets implemented based on realistic expectations, then that's great. If an idea gets implemented based on unrealistic expectations, that may be not so great. Unless of course it's the person who comes up with the idea who also volunteers to implement it.
2009-09-23 03:07:17
$30 = 1% of $3000
$30 = 5% of $600
Means I estimate the average commercial developers profit is between $600 and $3000 an month, not $3000-$15000 as you said.
I will use the terms monthly profit, and monthly sales from now on, as income can be an ambigious word.
I can't find a forum post by the JED team I read that said how many commercial extensions there are, but I can remember it being around 500. Given that there are 3500 extensions, and around 1 in 6 are commerical 500 sounds about right.
If deveopers give their code away for free, but charge for a pro version, or support, or docs, then maybe it is best to consider them as non-commercial. (given that the extension listed on the JED is free). It seems like a sliding scale anyway, when does a developer become "non-commercial", what if the extension is free, but support and pro version is paid, what if just support is charged, what if there is free support and "premium support"...
Either way I think there are close to 500 extensions that you have to pay to get, therefore they can be considered commerical. Arguing about whether the other ones are commercial doesn't seem productive, as there is a lot of grey area.
2009-09-23 05:13:16
Suggest to Matt and others to follow Mark's advice and be part of the brainstorm team on Google Group. Specific ways to raise $ puts the cart before the horse. I appreciate that you're working on the plan first; then, based on the desired plan, you and others who want to help with fundraising efforts can hammer out how to fund it.
2009-09-23 06:21:36
If you look at the code base of Joomla 1.6 you will find that a great number of JXtended technologies have made it into the trunk as part of that "investment" into the core. The ACL system that is being worked on is still a derivative of the system that was donated by JXtended. Several other technologies that are being used in various areas are either donated or derived from donated code from JXtended such as the new forms package and the extended models in the 1.6 framework.
Just because something is donated doesn't mean that it is taken and used exactly as it was implemented. There is a community of developers behind Joomla and very little is just taken as it is without review and modification.
2009-09-23 08:15:10
2009-09-23 10:15:31
You talk about community involvement? But in the same meeting minutes of September 5th it is clear the production workgroup (or whatever you may call it) have no clue how to get the community involved or even what it means.
Tell me, what initiatives are there to get more people involved in the actual development? Patches have been provided, but almost none have been accepted, what about the great summer of code results? A lot of people really want to help out, but instead of opening interaction and get people really involved, all we hear is that no one is willing to help.
I moved to the Drupal community and oh boy what a difference. At least I am taken serious when I say I want to help out...to follow Dries his latest blog post (http://buytaert.net/drupal-is-a-young-adult), I think Joomla is just a little child that is spoiled and does not want to listen how to grow up.
Stop blaming the community for not helping out, it is the lack of openness and the lack of clear consistent leadership that makes people not feel welcome to help out, it is not the other way around.
2009-09-23 15:27:53
Please excuse me while I wipe this egg off my face. First I criticize your math, and then you correctly point out a major math mistake in my post. I hate it when that happens!
I am sorry for my mistake. Now that you have shown me where my math was wrong, your estimates look a lot more reasonable.
2009-09-24 10:59:38
Twice a year email every developer that has commercial extensions(s) asking for a $100 Paypal payment for 6 months of advertising on the JED. At the same time rip the email list to a spreadsheet.
When developers pay, they put a reference that identifies them.
Someone matches these references to the spreadsheet, and ticks them off as paid.
Seems like a small amount of housework, and may lead to $100,000 (500 commercial developers x $200 annually) a year to go to Joomla days, developer conferences etc.
I understand getting volunteers to contribute to the code/ docs/ support/ admin is the most important thing to move Joomla forward, but funding is still important as well, and this would seem like a big help.
2009-09-24 15:05:04
You are right. Joomla! is struggling with engaging the broader community in development. And in documentation. And, with financial support. And, with helping answer questions in the forums. And, even on the inside of the project where most people don't see, there are frequently problems with cooperation, little battles here and there, lots of drama.
We sometimes suck.
You are also wrong. The Joomla! project knows it's struggling in this way, which you have obviously read in the Production Leadership Team's notes. So, shaming the project for openly recognizing this challenge is unfortunately a common way frustrated people respond, but, it's not helpful. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPk11AugG4c
We sometimes suck with community engagement, but we do get it. Have you ever been magically shamed into a skillset? Me neither. I have sometimes been encouraged to try again, though, and the support of a caring friend makes a world of difference for me.
Community engagement is a SHARED problem, it's not a "we versus they" problem. Our community engagement will improve when we all get that.
With respect.
Amy
2009-09-24 16:01:18
"You talk about community involvement? But in the same meeting minutes of September 5th it is clear the production workgroup (or whatever you may call it) have no clue how to get the community involved or even what it means."
We all talk about community involvement. The issue is that there's no magic bullet to engaging the developer community. What does "community" mean to you? To answer your questions one by one...
"Tell me, what initiatives are there to get more people involved in the actual development?"
Initiatives? Google Summer of Code is an opportunity to get more people involved in development. We're also planning some pretty big changes to the developer site and trying to make that more of a playground for developers. There are other initiatives underway, but this is a regular topic of discussion at meetings (and outside of meetings) and an area where Joomla (and many open source projects) needs to do better.
"Patches have been provided, but almost none have been accepted, what about the great summer of code results?"
Like all contributions, GSoC results are evaluated on an individual basis. Whether they're "great" or not isn't the only criteria. Does it fit in the goal of the next release? Is it what the community wants in the core? Is it appropriate? Is it well-written? These are just some of the many questions asked to determine if GSoC projects and community-contributed patches/ideas are committed.
"A lot of people really want to help out, but instead of opening interaction and get people really involved, all we hear is that no one is willing to help."
In my previous message, I was stating a fact. If you've been following the development list (but you're probably not because you've "moved to Drupal"), you would have seen there's a ton of activity around a few specific things and the hundred or so other things that need to be done receive no attention whatsoever. I've posted a few times there asking for help from the community on very specific "mini-projects" that needed to be done for the release. I got no response at all. Many want to share their opinions on how things should be done, but few actually do the work. That's all OK because that's the way it works—a small number of people contribute compared to the vast number of people that use it. This is certainly not unique to Joomla. But show me a list of people capable and willing to do stuff and I'll give them so much work, they'll beg me to stop.
"I moved to the Drupal community and oh boy what a difference."
If you're so unhappy and that's really the case, why are you hanging around here?
"At least I am taken serious when I say I want to help out."
I don't know who you told that you wanted to help out and what you specifically wanted to help out on, but that's a pretty big sweeping generalization, don't you think? For example, if you offered to help out on something that's not within the scope of the feature set for the next release, that wouldn't be very productive, would it? So unless you're specific, it's hard to make claim like that believable.
"Stop blaming the community for not helping out…"
I didn't blame the community and, to the best of my knowledge, nobody has.
"...it is the lack of openness and the lack of clear consistent leadership that makes people not feel welcome to help out, it is not the other way around."
Is it that same lack of openness that allowed you to read the meeting notes on the list and voice your opinion on it? I won't claim the newly-created Leadership Team is perfect, but I also don't know of circumstances where one of us has gone out of our way to make someone not feel welcome or help out. There have been some shifts in leadership and some changes (hopefully for the better) in the project. But these things take time.
Thank you for your comments. I sincerely hope you're happy in your new digs.
2009-09-24 17:55:22
I know Peter would like to help http://twitter.com/NoNumber_nl with development and is *very* talented. Also, let's find a way to involve Julio Farias http://groups.google.com/group/joomla-dev-cms/browse_thread/thread/ea494a7bdd2da241 . So, there's two names of capable and willing developers for starters. If you give them an assignment, I am certain they will do it.
I'm sorry, but I don't know where these "mini projects" are listed. If I did, I would share that information with people who many times come to me asking how to get involved. Let's not forget, there is a wealth of information here (and now at Google Groups) and sometimes, people don't know where to look. It might make sense to have a place where mini-projects could be posted? Even here on Community would be good. If you still need help, consider doing that and we can try to get you help.
Jeff - I'm sorry things didn't work out for you. If you would like to get involved in the project, let's find something for you to work on. If you'd rather not at this time, then I encourage you to try again, later. Hopefully, then, your experience will be more positive.
It's frustrating and hard to hear what someone is *trying to say.* It's good to see interest in community. I prefer a little spark to apathy, that's for certain. So, let's take that as a sign of something positive and think.
Amy
2009-09-24 18:33:38
Various Working Group members could post descriptions of help needed on various projects, list needed skill sets, etc., and also include a link so those who are interested in helping out can follow up about it.
Today, there is a "Join In" link on the Community Site which has good information, but it's very general. I think having some "Help Wanted" postings that are very specific and current might be a good way to both make it easier for Working Groups to get the word out where they need the most help, and also be an easier way for people who want to help to find out where they can contribute.
2009-09-24 20:23:49
2009-09-25 22:58:30
"You are right. Joomla! is struggling with engaging the broader community in development. And in documentation. And, with financial support."
"We sometimes suck with community engagement, but we do get it."
On the very same page you posted this, I have been suggesting a way to improve the financial support, and it has been more or less ignored by anyone highly involved in Joomla.
If you/others thinks it's not workable or desirable, why not communicate why you think that is so? The no reply doesn't exactly lend support to the idea that "you do get it".
2009-09-26 23:31:24
2009-09-28 01:54:14
Initially, I was enthusiastic about giving something back to Joomla as I've gotten and continue to get a lot out of it. I believe I came in with a positive attitude and some good ideas, but was only reproached for my efforts. I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels this way.
It actually makes me a bit sad :less, because your efforts may very well not end up getting used. Because of bad coordination, for example, I once poured over 40 hours into a manual which was encouraged by some team members, but ultimately dissed by Chris. I must say, this was a personally very discouraging experience which I tried to explain at this time, but was basically ignored.
So I believe the solution has to come from the core team. They need to create a special forum for working groups and be very active with them. There should be polls and votes for everyone to participate. Perhaps have a scoring system, where the more you contribute, the more your vote counts, although a good ear should always be open to anyone who makes an intelligent suggestion.
I don’t want to diss you guys, I think you’re good people doing a great job in many ways. I just hope (some of you) improve your social skills a bit and maybe smell the coffee about democracy. Much luck and I’m sure I’ll be watching from the woodwork for when I might feel comfortable to help out again.
j.g.
2009-09-29 17:56:33
http://forum.joomla.org/viewtopic.php?f=304&t=444648&p=1869773#p1869773
2009-09-29 23:27:13
2009-09-30 00:58:01
It appears my comment above has been censored. It makes little scene the way it is now. Why on earth would you censor it? I have only good intentions. Can you please correct it? Here is the original:
Not wanting to add fuel to the fire, but I have to agree with Matt's point about lack of willingness on the part of Joomla's decision makers to constructively discuss ideas in a meaningful way. I have tried several times in the past to make suggestions and have either been ignored, or even much to my surprise, received by an angry response.
Initially, I was enthusiastic about giving something back to Joomla as I've gotten and continue to get a lot out of it. I believe I came in with a positive attitude and some good ideas, but was only reproached for my efforts. I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels this way.
It actually makes me a bit sad :issed by Chris. I must say, this was a personally very discouraging experience which I tried to explain at this time, but was basically ignored.
So I believe the solution has to come from the core team. They need to create a special forum for working groups and be very active with them. There should be polls and votes for everyone to participate. Perhaps have a scoring system, where the more you contribute, the more your vote counts, although a good ear should always be open to anyone who makes an intelligent suggestion.
I don’t want to diss you guys, I think you’re good people doing a great job in many ways. I just hope (some of you) improve your social skills a bit and maybe smell the coffee about democracy. Much luck and I’m sure I’ll be watching from the woodwork for when I might feel comfortable to help out again.
j.g.
2009-09-30 01:16:36
It seems that regular community polling about Joomla's roadmap is such a no-brainer. I can't think of a better way to encourage participation and goodwill then giving the community a voice.
2009-09-30 14:26:02
Just wanted to add my voice to those praising the Joomla team! What terrific work you are doing.
Personally, I have started donating to Joomla. I would also support commercial extension creators paying some kind of annual "subscription." No matter what it brings in, it seems fair.
Please keep up updated on 1.6 progress!
2009-09-30 17:29:27
Thank you Amy for answering the questions you can.
Best...
2009-10-01 04:51:14
"It actually makes me a bit sad :issed by Chris." Huh? Chris didn't make me that sad!
I'm curious to know if I've been censored, or if you have a problem with your comments script?
2009-10-01 05:14:08
Your comment is still there! No one censored it. It's been a couple of years and you've raised this point a number of times. No one has ever censored your comment. Say your piece, it's cool!
Now, you are still not understanding what happened, though. No one rejected your work. You were asked, like everyone else to use the Wiki if you wanted to contribute documentation. Several people offered to transfer your PDF to the Wiki for you. In the end, you opted out because the rules were not acceptable.
That's your choice. No one blamed you. But the fact of the matter is, as a community, we use a Wiki. Don't take it personal, it's just what we do. And, it's pretty standard operating procedure -- the vast majority of projects do the same. The underlying reason is empowering community collaboration. Everyone is expected to contribute in this manner. Does that help?
Regarding the double editor: Ron Severdia, who is Joomla!'s User interface guy, indicated there will only be one editor at release. We're still Alpha. Lots of stuff in there is not how it will be released. So, there is no reason to take the community's pulse on that - it's not changing.
Credit where credit's due: Every single feature coming in 1.6 came from the "white paper forums" where the developers invited community to bring forward their ideas about what they wanted in the new release. You shared a number of ideas, yourself, and had great comments on the ideas from others. Everyone's ideas were considered and the list of items the developers are working on for 1.6 came solely from those posts. That's about as inclusive and engaging as you get.
Hope that helps clarify those points. Take care!
2009-10-01 06:38:22
First of all... my posts were changed. I'm saying that as matter of fact, because they were. At least 2 paragraphs were truncated and cobbled together. I'm sure I didn't make a mistake when pasting, especially the 2nd time.
After seeing the second comment, it's so garbled that I'm beginning to think maybe it's an actual gremlin! If you KNOW for a fact that my posts weren't censored, than the comment system here has a problem. Just letting you know that. It certainly appeared like censoring, but I realize with computers have glitches too.
As for ancient history and my "manual" experience, I don't think you or anyone else (at least of who responded to me which has only been you and Chris) has ever got that the problem was one of bad coordination (i.e. all my wasted time)... not just about wiki or no wiki! I'm not sure why my point about this still hasn't seemed to have been understood.
I'm totally over it and certainly not interested in drama. I don't feel spited by Joomla. I don't even care whether you or anyone else understands (or even wants to try!) to understand this old event and how it relates to me PERSONALLY, at this point. The reason and the only reason I brought it up again (for the the 3rd time) is because I believe it's a relevant example of what I think is not working with the current system. What doesn't work (and is the gist of which got edited out of my comments) is that better coordination could lead to more participation. More Democracy. i.e. not me as an individual getting their wish met about wiki or not... but perhaps taking a poll to see if there was support for a user manual project and then who will help (hopefully IN ADDITION to the wiki). Bet if you tried these things, and advertised them prominently, you'd get a lot of good results!
Sorry if I had to send about 4 comments to make my small point!
p.s. to the folks who like to paint Joomla with only fragrant rose petals. Do so at your own risk! Certainly do give credit where credit is due (and I of course believe a lot is due), but improvement only comes when you recognize the need for it and work towards it.
2009-10-01 17:35:05
The point is, I spent a lot of time "Specifically" making the document into a nicely formatted PDF docment. It was a cohesive unit, not a huge disorganized mess, that I thought people would appreciate (many do to this day). Honestly, most of its contents couldn't have just gone into the wiki as-is and still made sense. Besides, I was told by several people who I thought had authority that it would be ok as a manual before I did a lot of work.
I don't even know why I feel the need to explain this at this point, but I could tell you obviously seem to not have the right information (even though I posted it in the forum way back when). Maybe it might help somehow... the next time around... who knows.
2009-10-01 21:15:20
Point 1: I don't moderate comments so, I cannot speak to what might be happening. I'm not seeing changes and I am checking this page on a regular basis.
Having said that, let's make certain you are comfortable posting here. So, write your comments. Save a copy. Send a copy to me and someone else you love and trust
Point 2: Let's resolve this document issue here and forever more. Figure out what that means to you and let me know, via email. Here's the boundaries: your proposal cannot involve changes to the forums, how Joomla! makes decisions, additional polls or stop signs, and I'm not going to chew Chris out since I like him, having enjoyed a few drinks him and owing him a debt of gratitude for finding my car in SF when I forgot to take my parking tag and of course didn't remember which garage I used!
So, back to the beginning. The Joomla! community uses a Wiki and a specific license (it's documented on the Wiki.) We want people to share their work *for crying out loud!*
Point 3: OK. I can see that I have not understood your point and that *is* frustrating. I'm guessing Chris, being introverted and (this is a joke) male *really* didn't understand your point. For me, that is frustrating. It feels like disrespect. So, on behalf of myself, for certain, and on behalf of anyone else who didn't stop long enough to hear you (and they want to claim this apology as their own) we are sorry. I *do* know what that is like and it is hard to move on. You want people to know they are doing it so it doesn't happen to others. If you care about the project (and it certainly appears that you do), then you feel duty bound to get the message across because responding to people in that manner is not good for the project. 2 years later -> Message received.
Point 4: Let's move on. Acceptable?
AmyStephen AT gmail DOT com - look forward to your note.
2009-10-02 00:46:44
Points 2, 3 and 4: As I said, in the beginning I just intended to give MY opinion about just one point... which from the point of view of trying to be helpful, was to suggest changes to things in the ways you just claimed to be immutable. Polls, democracy, changes to the forum, etc. And just why do you think these boundaries are a good thing which bar these kinds of suggestions?? Is your word on this the consensus of Joomla's philosophy of what is allowed from "community participation". If so, I certainly will respect it, but don't see how I can ever participate... because I've never been much good in any kind of caged environment! At least for people like me, these so-called boundaries are the real "barriers of participation" (I think I recall a blog post called that...).
This is all relevant (I least I think so) to the subject matter at hand. I think these types of questions about what Joomla is and wants to become, and might interest anyone.
But as for the personal aspect, I thank you for your words. Truly, it's no longer a big deal for me and I'm not proposing chewing any one out, nor expecting an explanation from you. I just wanted to set the record straight after you said that you thought the pdf didn't get published because I wouldn't make the changes Chris asked for... cause that wasn't true. In any case, I'll send you a quick hello note and we can set the record straight of any lasting angst... which I'm happy to do.
Watch out in the city! Once my car wasn't where I remembered parking it (an area where everything looked the same), and I wondered around for a bit. In the end, $400+ dollars later it turned out that it was towed for being about one inch in someone's driveway.
2009-10-02 04:28:34
I am one of the Webmasters for the Community site. Pretty much every day I log in to the back end of this site and among other things I review and approve comments posted to the blogs. I have reviewed multiple comments from you in this blog post, and in every case when I have seen one of your posts up for moderation I have approved it without making any changes. As a rule I will approve all posts without making any changes unless they (1) aren't written in english, (2) are spam, or (3) if they contain what I consider to be offensive language.
Sometimes when I log in to the back end of this site I notice that blog comments have been approved by others since the last time I logged in. There are many others who also have the level of back end access to this site which is required to approve, edit, or censor blog comments. This site uses JXtended's Comments component for managing blog comments. This component does not have a way to go back and track who has edited, approved, or deleted any particular blog comment.
2009-10-02 07:04:12
So from what you're saying, it's probable that there was a glitch somewhere. I do know for certain that my post was changed though. I think it must have been on your end... but of course I'm open to the possibility that there could have somehow been a hiccup with my setup. However, I was very careful to check everything over before hitting send, especially after the first time that I noticed my text was changed.
At any rate, I'm sorry if I come across as blaming or paranoid. It's not typically in my nature to feel this way, but I don't feel like going on about the details any longer of why I got to the point of having these concerns here. In any case, thank you for the time you took for your explanation.
Besides the issue of glitchy posting, I think at this point I've discovered that the types of ideas I have are not interesting, seeing that I've brought them up a couple of times and no one is discussing! So I'm over it.
2009-10-06 14:18:27
How about getting a "donation" from some large organizations in return for the collaboration with their software as an option? I don't have any good ideas off the top of my head, but there should be.
2009-10-15 19:38:11
PEOPLE. What I mean by "People" is that there are personalities the just don't function together. The problem is not having people who can manage people and keep the talented focused on their talents and not the personalities of others.
I love Joomla, and would DEARLY love to help with 1.6, however I wouldn't know where MY talents can be used, since I'm only good at breaking things
Anyway My $.02 worth on the TWO main topics of this thread:
1) I like the idea of a commercial listing fee, the concept is intriguing. Details may need to be worked out, but I think using the commercial extension fees as "rewards" to coders who donate towards Joomla is very justifiable.
2) There are two forms for "manuals", one dead tree (PDF), one webstyle (eg wiki). One is not better than the other, and both have advantages. And I know for a fact that sometimes it isn't possible to replicate one in the other. So the question I have is why can't both exist? I've seen good and bad versions of both types, so saying one is better than another is just someone's opinion.
In both cases the problems we are seeing expressed here is the typical egocentric "my way is best, your's sucks". Now while these sentiments may not have been expressed as such, they are clearly written between the lines.
Let me tell you, egos will kill a project or cause it to fork quicker than just about anything else. I've been in this business for so long that I've seen egos destroy all that is good and holy.
I'm not pointing fingers at anyone in particular or even in anyone's general direction. The point I'm trying to make here is that there is ROOM for diversity of opinion in places, it is actually healthy.
Anyway, I hope this is viewed as constructive.
2009-10-16 00:30:56
2009-11-04 00:49:51
However, removing the need to communicate with the core team in order to get something done, would even better be better.
The best example for the success of this policy, is the Joomla extension system itself. Instead of external developers queuing to contribute patches to Joomla, and trying to convince the core Joomla team to accept them, they can just publish their work as extensions.
But then again, the hooks must be there, in order to modify and extend Joomla's core behaviour. So, external developers still have a need to communicate where exactly they need additional hooks. Communication is needed here, and therefore, is bound to fail exactly here.
The fact that you need to declare beforehand to the core Joomla team, where exactly you need additional hooks, is one of the most glaring weaknesses in the Php language.
It is not possible to simply overwrite, replace, or extend a Php class method, because there is no way to change the a class or object prototype in Php. Javascript can do it out of the box.
Therefore, the need to communicate about these things, is an issue caused by the Php core team and not by the Joomla core team.
The issue can therefore not be solved in a fundamental way by just having better communication between the core joomla team and the joomla community. It requires convincing the core Php team to lift this limitation in Php.
But then again, here we are running into another issue. The core Php team has never been known for great language design. They are also not known for their great vision as to how to improve the Php language. They tend to add cargo-cultist, copycat features that look totally out of context and are often simply ridiculous (namespaces, interfaces, method overloading, et cetera), while ignoring the better ideas (explicit class and object prototypes).
It is really the Php language core team that will manage to drag our Joomla investments down the drain.