Hi, > I have a feeling that Avalon, and specifically Merlin is focusing too much on > the enterprise. I know that the enterprise features are necessary for some
Berin could you list the feature you consider 'Enterprise' features. I just want to get an understanding of what you think is complicating things and just how they are complicating it. > folks, but others simply do not need it. It never really had simplicity, and > to be honest I can't tell what it does and does not do. I know of a couple of > people who are concerned (and will remain nameless until they choose not to be). I think Merlin is as simple as any other IoC container of its class like Phoenix. The two are very similar from the user's perspective. There are some nice extras that Merlin has to offer but I just ignore those for my vanilla IoC needs. I think all these neat features may make the code complex but I don't think it affects the user's sense of complexity. However these features may make it harder for Avalon developers to track the progress of Merlin. I have found the internals of Merlin to be difficult and have often backed off giving the ball to Steve. But I think Merlin honors the Avalon contract and follows it and users know what to expect. Merlin is easy for me the user but not so easy for me with the developer cap on. <snip/> > rebuild or new work. I don't blame them. I feel the need for simplicity is > being drowned out by the need for features. There needs to be balance I think. We need to listen to the users too. > > Another thing that scares me is the rate of mutation for Merlin. You may know > what it does this week, but come back to it a couple weeks later and everything > is different. There are hundreds of commit messages that go by all the time, > and it is difficult for me to try to keep up with what is really going on. I've felt like this before. > The questions I have are this (for those who have not seen this earlier): > > 1) Am I alone in my concerns? No I understand where you're comming from but want to point out again the distinction between the user and the developer of Merlin. Users see a simple world if that's all they want and can ignore most features. However adding new features makes the code change and Steve is very quick with things so I find myself siting back on the bench watching him drive. > 2) If not, how should we start refactoring Merlin to make it what we all need? > * please note that development should be able to continue while refactoring > occurs. We need to start taking peices one at a time. Perhaps we need to define what the core is first and what the requirements of the kernel are. Then build around it adding features on top. > > 3) What about the guy with simple needs? What are we going to do for him? I'm doing alright :-) - I have both simple and complex needs. > > 4) What about extensibility? We need this if we are to survive. Right now I > get the feeling that Merlin is an all or nothing approach. Not a pick and > choose the feature set approach. I like the idea of pluggable features. Alex --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
