On Mon, 2015-11-02 at 18:18 +0000, Matthew Toseland wrote: > On 02/11/15 13:02, Bob Ham wrote:
> > It seems that nobody here believes that in five years' time Freenet > > developers will be publishing an RFC. Instead, people seem to be > > focussed on updating the website, worrying about user interface niggles > > and fretting over whether users can install new versions of Fred easily > > enough. > Documentation is good. > > But multiple implementations just don't make sense until the protocol is > somewhere close to "final". Even then they're problematic. I disagree; having more than one implementation inevitably highlights problems in both the protocol and each implementation, for the better of all. > Why do you think TCP still relies on packet loss to signal congestion, > rather than ECN? Because there are thousands of buggy TCP firewalls > which drop packets with the ECN bit set, or worse, home routers which > crash completely when they see it! You would seriously argue that there should be one single implementation of TCP? If there is a problem in the Freenet protocol, would you rather another implementation highlighted it sooner or later? > We gain considerably from being able to change > stuff without worrying too much about legacy incompatibilities You said you're gaining something. This implies some set of values which determine this to be a "gain" rather than a "loss". What are those values? What is the goal you're working towards that has made it clear this is valued as a gain and not a loss? > Making a difference is not a matter of standardisation. Standardisation is not the same thing as publishing a protocol. Regardless, standardisation considerably increases the likelihood that a protocol will make an impact. > Which had the greater impact, POSIX or Linux? You're giving an example of standardisation of Unix-like systems whereas the issue at hand is the standardisation of protocols. A much better question would be: which had the greater impact, IP or IPX? > > What is the priority of the project, is it to ensure that as many > > Windows users as possible have a little Freenet icon in their status > > tray? Or is it to play a role in creating a world where nobody really > > uses Windows because they recognise how massive a threat it is to their > > privacy and security? At the moment the priority seems to be the former > > and there seems to be no idea about how to approach the latter (a > > "strategy"). > What is it that you propose we do? Freeze the protocol so other people > can implement it, even if it means we can never make a change to it > again? What do you mean by "freeze" the protocol? > What good would multiple barely compatible implementations do if > no more people use the network? Why would multiple implementations necessarily be barely compatible? > The key point is to solve the numerous fundamental problems which still > exist in Freenet What are these problems? Are they described anywhere? Is there a plan on how to solve them? > to get more users, and especially to get more > developers. What are the goals you're trying to achieve, which make getting more users and more developers valued as a gain? > None of that is helped by premature standardisation. > Standardisation should happen after we've solved all the important > problems, declared 1.0 or better 2.0, and have published rigorous proofs > that everything always works. It is not premature to document the existing protocol. Documenting the protocol is not standardisation. Documents can be versioned. It's highly likely that a lot, if not most of the protocol will be unchanged between now and 1.0. At the same time, publishing a protocol document will attract developers, something you see as a gain. It will also serve to clarify the existing problems and may even aid in finding solutions. Similarly, it will illuminate undiscovered problems in the current protocol. It will also move the project forward and it will move it forward to a place where publishing a 1.0 protocol is a realistic possibility rather than a pipe dream. > Which will probably never happen. That sounds like simply a defeatist attitude. Which, of course, will ensure that it does indeed never happen. Unless you believe there are specific reasons why Freenet can't work? And if that's the case then why would you bother communicating about the project at all? > Of *course* we should document the protocol. We should document > everything, to make life easier for new developers. *Facepalm* > But it's not a panacea. A panacea for which problems? What problems does the project have? What is the strategy for solving them? _______________________________________________ Devl mailing list Devl@freenetproject.org https://emu.freenetproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/devl
