> Bike Sheds > ---------- > > At first, people -1'd the use of Anakia to generate the Jakarta website. But > then when I took the effort to make it simple and easy to use and took away > the bike shed argument, people adopted it and used it all over the world.
I really _don't care_ whether it is XSLT, or DVSL, a GUMP project descriptor or a maven descriptor. I don't care which project hosts what. I want all my bikes to fit into the same shed. I think there's quite a few more people out there that feel the same. Use case -------- 1) fire up computer 2) run grab-a-coffee-during-complete-update.sh - cvs update of everything - build of everything - test of everything - compilation of errors sent via e-mail to me - overview of changes sent via e-mail to me 3) read e-mail "everything" should include docs, dependency graphs, javadocs, javasrc, website, pdfs, etc in an ideal situation. I also need pluggable look and feel (I don't want my company website looking like the Jakarta one), extensibility, pluggability and manageability. * easiest way of satisfying use case Combining that complete myriad of tools other people wrote would enable me to do this. I could rip out the components I need from different bike sheds and build the power plant I need over the weekend. There'd be Yet Another Bike Shed, and everyone would do it, and there'd be no more collaboration. * best way of satisfying use case Discuss with smarter people that wrote those tools how to handle this, agree on course of action, combine different bike sheds into reusable power plant. Use case 2 ---------- The avalon project badly needs a better website. It needs a better look and feel. * no satisfaction There's a jakarta project(1) that handles this, but I do not like the look it provides. I created a MVC presentation layer file(2) in the project's custom presentation layer language(3) to provide a custom look. I found it too difficult to create a patch for this project that enabled this look while preserving the one currently in use by this project. * satisfaction Avalon currently uses cocoon (sort of an eat-your-own-dogfood case), and other developers would like this to stay that way. There is a tool(4) that does the same thing as the jakarta project, created by people from xml.apache. The tool does allow me to plug in this look, and it uses cocoon. I complain about how difficult it is to plug in the look, as docs are lacking. The tool author(5) promises better docs, and in the meantime, promises to provide the look I envisioned with his tool. So, what's the bad part? The jakarta project is being pushed by some people(6) at jakarta to be the next de facto standard for generating all of jakarta's web site documentation. I like to follow standards, de facto or not, if at all possible. * optimal satisfaction The two competing projects merge to the extend where they satisfy the use case together. Avalon can keep eating its own dogfood, as that food becomes part of the to-be-de-facto standard. As there are no more competing projects, this de facto standard becomes more 'standard'. (1) Maven (2) at http://cvs.apache.org/viewcvs/jakarta-avalon/src/proposal/site/anakia/xdocs/stylesheets/site.vsl?rev=1.3&content-type=text/vnd.viewcvs-markup (3) DVSL (4) Centipede (5) Nicola Ken (6) Jon Summary ------- I have personal, commercial and jakarta project use cases for a tool that combines features from all the different build tools that exist. Many of those tool authors have those use cases as well and are open to this combination and would like to cooperate to make this work. Problem ------- The optimal satisfaction of the mentioned use cases is, as far as I can tell, only hindered by an unwillingless of some of the tool authors to cooperate. Where, in all this, am I building any kind of shed? Where am I not thinking free? Who is missing which point? > People > ------ > > Needless to say, the attitudes here are becoming more and more familiar. > Andrew reminds me of the early days of dealing with Peter Donald (credit to > Peter for eventually coming to his senses...I think joining the PMC helped). > Steven reminds me of Paulo. Deja vu! I am not on any PMC, I have never hired anyone in my life, I have no degree, I have no imposing career, no company. I don't have a car. I don't even have a driving license. I have, in terms of code, contributed only in a very modest way to the jakarta community, and I have not been around very long either. Does any of that matter, at all? If it does to you, well, I don't really think you're thinking free, or open, at all. cheers, - Leo -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For additional commands, e-mail: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
