Great text!
My one question about "simplify the Eclipse programming model" is: how
much of our efforts are we actually putting into it at the moment? One
point about e4 being community funded is that the priorities are
whatever the contributors make them. I'd love to see more effort being
put into "simplify the programming model", but with the "loosely
coupled" setup of contributors we have today (compared to a strong
project lead following a strictly planned agenda), I see a risk of this
goal being put off again and again while we're all working on things
that we see more pressing at the moment. From my company's perspective,
I also need to admit that we see our effort in Resources more pressing
(note: I don't say "more important") than investing in the programming
model. And I assume it's similar for others.
That being said, I see much more work around "styling the UI" at the
moment (which is not mentioned) than around "simplifying the programming
model". So, is it fair to name this as a "principle aim" of e4? (I'd
hope so). And are the "web-based runtime technologies" really a level
above the other efforts such as CSS/Styling, Modeled Workbench or
Resources?
I've tried putting these thoughts into an alternative proposal for the
text, but couldn't come up with one (looks like John's was just too good
:-) so I'm just sending these thoughts for now.
Cheers,
--
Martin Oberhuber, Senior Member of Technical Staff, Wind River
Target Management Project Lead, DSDP PMC Member
http://www.eclipse.org/dsdp/tm
________________________________
From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of John Arthorne
Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 4:26 PM
To: E4 Project developer mailing list
Subject: Re: [e4-dev] e4 Survey
How does this sound:
e4 is the community effort for building the next generation of
the Eclipse Platform. The project has three principle aims: to simplify
the Eclipse programming model, to enable the platform for use on
emerging web-based runtime technologies, and to broaden participation in
development of the platform. Simplifying the programming model will
reduce development and maintenance costs and enable a larger developer
community to leverage the platform in their own Eclipse-based
applications. Enabling the platform on new runtime technologies will
ensure the platform remains a compelling and viable application
framework in a rapidly changing web technology landscape. This will
allow e4-based applications to leverage powerful new web technologies,
while remaining insulated from specific technology choices that may
quickly become obsolete. Finally, broadening participation in
development of the platform itself reduces the risks associated with
building on a platform largely funded from a single source. Having a
large and diverse group of commercial backers, will ensure the platform
remains vibrant and viable over the long term. An investment in e4 will
reduce overall development costs, enable leveraging of new runtime
technologies without being locked into short term technology choices in
an age of rapid obsolescence, and provide a stable long term application
platform.
Now I need to go and get clean again...
John
Kevin McGuire/Ottawa/i...@ibmca
Sent by: [email protected]
01/13/2009 09:04 AM
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Hey Jeff,
I understand and agree with it's importance. I'm willing to
help on this, but as I said, we need someone with a business marketing
side, who knows this audience, to help. Think of it as matching grants.
I also would like to see broader participation in these kinds of efforts
as its tending to fall to a small number of people who are spread thin.
One problem we have (see, I said "problem" and not "challenge"
or "opportunity" :> ) is that an inherent goal of e4 is to be open.
Thus the definition is determined by what the participants want to do,
and is subject to change as they change their focus, more get involved,
etc. It's hard therefore to explain what it does for a consumer of it
and has I think made our "messaging" kind of wishy washy. If we had
laid out a definitive road map it would've made it easier to focus
people but it would've been at the cost of community building.
We have some pieces of technology which I believe we could do a
better job at explaining their value (modelled UI being a good example).
But IHMO, an important message must continue to be that others can get
involved and have the ability to change the direction. At this point I
personally believe this continued growth of the committer base is more
important than any of the technology.
Regards,
Kevin
Jeff McAffer <[email protected]>
Sent by: [email protected]
01/12/2009 09:01 PM
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Thanks Kevin. IMHO this is a significantly important group to
the overall success so communicating effectively is important.
Clarification. One paragraph or so is the desired content
length. I don't think you can do much better for any audience with one
sentence. Think elevator pitch in a low-rise building :-)
As much as we would like to think that the value of e4 is
inherent in "its the next Eclipse", most of the rest of the community
wants to know what does it do for them. This requires a move from the
techno-geek "cool" factor to identifying the business value delivered to
someone building on top of the platform. What pain points are
addressed?
Jeff
Kevin McGuire wrote:
I realize that my comment might've come across as being
uncooperative, so just to clarify:
We're clearly failing at communicating to that audience. We're
technical people and write, with some success, to other technical
people. For my part, I never write something for business people to
consume. I don't know how to communicate to that audience [1], and
though I'd like to do better, me trying again without guidance is
unlikely to produce a better result.
Someone with business/marketing knowledge who *does* know how to
communicate to that audience could help guide. I was guessing that by
the time they explain what we need to communicate, they're likely to
have just written the one sentence. :)
Seems like a lot of discussion when all that was asked for was a
single sentence but I'm concerned by the larger issue of communication
and I'd like to see a more coordinated, coherent, and, well,
professional approach, so lets start now. If I had an "e4 Inc" company,
I'd expect the marketing department to be quite involved in such an
endeavour (and I'm guessing it wouldn't be staffed by developers). So
how do we get the next best thing?
Regards,
Kevin
[1] As proof of this, when I spell checked this email I
discovered I misspelled "marketing".
Kevin McGuire/Ottawa/i...@ibmca
Sent by: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>
01/12/2009 04:20 PM
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Maybe those putting together the survey could provide guidance
on how the information can be tuned to that target audience (say, by
taking the proposal and reworking it as an example :> ).
Kevin
Jeff McAffer <[email protected]> <mailto:[email protected]>
Sent by: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>
01/12/2009 03:54 PM
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All I can say is that the people putting together the survey
feel that the information in its current form is not readily consumable
by their target audience. Providing tuned information for this audience
will improve the quality of the feedback we receive.
Jeff
Oberhuber, Martin wrote:
Why not have them "pull" any background technical information
rather than trying to "push" something that's bound to be incomplete
when it should just be one sentence. So what about this:
e4 is the community effort for building the next generation of
the Eclipse Platform. For any details, see the e4 project proposal
<http://www.eclipse.org/proposals/e4/> [1].
[1] http://www.eclipse.org/proposals/e4/
<http://www.eclipse.org/proposals/e4/>
Of course we should eventually prepare something on the web or
the wiki that's more current but still as informative as the project
proposal. But for now, I still find the proposal most appropriate for
persons seeking a higher-level understanding of e4.
Cheers,
--
Martin Oberhuber, Senior Member of Technical Staff, Wind River
Target Management Project Lead, DSDP PMC Member
http://www.eclipse.org/dsdp/tm <http://www.eclipse.org/dsdp/tm>
________________________________
From: [email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]> [mailto:[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]> ] On Behalf Of Jeff McAffer
Sent: Sunday, January 11, 2009 8:18 PM
To: E4 Project developer mailing list
Subject: [e4-dev] e4 Survey
At a recent board meeting we had a discussion about e4 and what
it means to the Eclipse membership. The results were quite mixed with
widely differing opinions and thoughts. One thing that did come out was
the idea of polling the membership for some feedback. Mike Taylor, an
elected Solution Provider director on the board volunteered to poll the
Solution Providers on this topic and has set about creating a survey.
As part of this there should be a description of e4. I'll quote Mike on
this.
"I had seen the e4 description on the wiki page, but didn't find
it satisfying for the purposes of this survey. This survey will go to
the contact (often a "business" person) who is the designated EMO
contact point for a particular Solution Provider company. Its primary
intent is to get a high-level feeling for what people know and think
about e4 right now. Its not really designed to be a technical or feature
survey."
It would be great if as a community we can provide a brief (one
paragraph) description of e4. Something a bit deeper than "the next
generation of Eclipse" but a bit shallower than what's on the wiki.
This is a really good opportunity to raise awareness of e4 and
simultaneously get valuable feedback and input.
Jeff
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