Good point. I for one am rather 'amused' in the difference of style *and* momentum in between both general@ lists and projects, and indeed there exists some partisanship that divides both. Duh. Oh well, part of the fun over here is exactly participating in this electronic biosphere while observing 'group dynamics'.
Apparently, the XML style of doing things is a bit more conservative with regards to the creation of new subprojects, whereas Jakarta has a history of scratching itches fairly often, and subsubprojects being graduated to full-blown subprojects as a result of that. And both groups feel pretty proud of their realisations, which is natural, of course. Hence the heated discussions when overlap (and competition) comes into existence. * On a global level: Over the past few weeks, there was an avalanche of new project proposals on the Jakarta list, clearly some people start to believe ASF blessing of a project is a safehaven for community-poor projects. To the outside world, it isn't clear what the criteria are for new project proposals (and indead only Jakarta explicitely lists those at http://jakarta.apache.org/site/newproject.html, a pity this hasn't done (to my knowledge) for the XML site as well, I keep on referring people to the Jakarta site). I believe rules for subproject and subsubproject creation should be clearly stated on an ASF-wide level. Global policies or email contacts that can give authorative answers to these issues are hard to discover for newbies (even though I'm following a lot of email lists for the past 2 or 3 years, I still consider myself to be a novice in this regard). To an outsider, both PMC's operate quite silently (I understand and appreciate them keeping a low profile and having a supportive instead of enforcing role), perhaps some joint statements on this matter could clarify this. IMO, one of the issues to be tackled is the creation of subsubprojects without some broader consensus (IMO!). Apart from that, some people, myself included, articulated the need for having a cross Apache list to discuss issues on commercial activities (like support and consulting) based on Apache projects, and after some private communications the common feeling was that we didn't really knew where to go with our ideas. So I am all +1 to discuss the need and eventually the setup of some cross-project communication platform, not just because of Java topics not being addressed as Santiago indicated, but because we are on the brink of deteriorating partisanship between both communities. We all depend on a spirit of rapid consensus and getting on with the work. If we create a forum where we can ventilate crossproject issues and also discuss/prepare project integration, the lists where the real work is carried out are freed from these email avalanches which sometimes leave a bad taste in one's mouth. * The Centipede/Maven/Gump 'case': I'm happy to see that the discussion is finally converging into a positive and hopefully productive atmosphere. The only remaining impression is that all of these projects have been build with a need for coherence in mind, whether that is coherence for building projects, managing dependencies or having a coherent website (The XML group has opted to create a subproject Forrest for the latter). Apart from the choosen solution, I believe presenting a coherent image of both the Jakarta and XML communities and projects is of vital importance for the uptake of our lovingly crafted goodies. We see a plethora of initiatives in this direction nowadays but as the recent heated discussion just has shown, it would have been better if both communities were aware of each other a bit sooner. As an aside from all this emotional stuff, on Forrest: our short term goal is to provide a facility to build and maintain a coherent xml.apache.org site. We're not in the business of dependency checking (Gump is), project/build frameworks (Maven and Centipede are) or XML web publishing (Cocoon is). By coincidence (and since we didn't know Maven existed, see my previous statements), we have choosen Centipede to bootstrap our project, and Cocoon as the publishing engine. I know Maven does similar stuff on a project-level (correct me if I'm wrong), but Forrest intends to go xml.apache.org-wide and is clearly website-focused. But as I said, this is just an aside for people wondering what all these strange new projects are about ;-) Just my 2 eurocent, </Steven> > -----Original Message----- > From: Santiago Gala [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] > Sent: woensdag 1 mei 2002 20:06 > To: Jakarta General List > Subject: cross-project communications > > > Berin Loritsch wrote: > > > Andrew C. Oliver wrote: > > > >>> > >>> Translation: > >>> > >>> Jakarta = jakarta.apache.org > >>> XML = xml.apache.org > >>> > >>> And the reason on XML.apache.org there is no discussion is: > >>> everyone seems to be on board with Forrest--which is > using Centipede. > >>> > >>> > >> > >> Yeah so why can't these work together? I still just don't > get it. > >> "Gee we don't like that lets do our own thing or integrate with > >> anything but this or that". It just baffles the crap out > of me. If I > >> had the choice. I'd use NEITHER. I choose Centaven WITH GUMP. > > > > > > > > Fine. The history is that Forrest was in motion before I even knew > > there was such a thing as Maven. I know the folks involved with > > Forrest, and they are top notch people. The whole purpose > of Forrest > > is to work with GUMP. (Notice the synergy: Forrest Gump). > > > > Forrest was started and talked about publicly on the general@xml > > list before it was even started. That is something that somewhat > > perturbs me about the Turbine projects. SOmething with Maven's > > scope and ability should have been talked about publicly instead of > > sneaking up on us. When we get the message "convert all your > > projects...", that would definitely catch alot of people off guard. > > > > > I am interested is most of Jakarta-land, and in most of > xml-land (the > *instanceof* java part). > > I'm wondering if cross-communication lists would be needed. > Since there > are plenty of communities in Apache, the general lists are > too general > for me most of the time. > > Since the java.apache.org project was frozen a lot of time > ago, we could > reuse the name to create a [EMAIL PROTECTED] list, or > some similar > cross-project structure to ease java development communications. > > The main points I see are: > > - xml is becoming fairly used everywhere, so that most of us > are related > to it somehow (specially as power-users or plain-users of the > java-related tools) > - a significant part of Jakarta is devoted to project infrastructure > (build, test, document, ...) > - infrastructure thingies springin in xml are being sent > outside instead > of being developed there. > > Java server is a big box to organize things, and XML is > potentially even > bigger, so I think some organizational thinking should be (is > already?) > going on. Also, one year and a half without an ApacheCon > synchronization > points does not help much. > > I'm not entering here to pick up flames, just looking for > constructive > solutions. > > Regards, > Santiago > > > > -- > To unsubscribe, e-mail: > <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > For additional commands, e-mail: > <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For additional commands, e-mail: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
