Wow, lots of news there. Thanks for the explanation Matt. I created a quick survey to help quantify and gauge how the community feels. Please fill it out.
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/J5JLMFT Daniel On Thu, Apr 5, 2012 at 4:06 PM, Matt Aimonetti <mattaimone...@gmail.com>wrote: > *Many of you have been wondering what is going on with the MacRuby > project given the lack of up-to-date releases and overall communication. > I feel we owe you some explanation. > > As a lot of you have noticed, our de-facto project leader Laurent > Sansonetti has been M.I.A since October 2011, his last post to this mailing > list being > > http://lists.macosforge.org/pipermail/macruby-devel/2011-October/008168.htmlannouncing > MacRuby 0.11 really soon. > His last commit was a change of license back in October: > https://github.com/MacRuby/MacRuby/commit/ac2a7a8e678d19e44d3c64a9508a8370d082dca2 > <https://github.com/MacRuby/MacRuby/commit/ac2a7a8e678d19e44d3c64a9508a8370d082dca2> > Laurent is fine. As described on his twitter http://twitter.com/lrz and > LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/in/sansonetti accounts, Laurent is no > longer with Apple and is clearly also no longer directly involved with the > MacRuby project on a day-to-day basis. > Laurent is currently busy with another project and and hopes to someday be > able to contribute to the MacRuby project again. > > While no one on this list can speak for Apple, and Apple as a company does > not tend to comment on its future plans or intentions, I think it's > reasonable to imagine that Apple would be more than happy to have the > MacRuby project decide for itself what its destiny is and how to achieve > it. If they did not want the community to be involved or drive such a > process, they would not have released MacRuby as open source or created the > project infrastructure to facilitate it. It is time for us to stop > looking to Apple to provide guidance, leadership and coding for the > project, in other words, and take on those challenges for ourselves! > MacRuby is already very powerful and comparatively stable as a > development platform, now it's time for us to take things to the next level. > > I personally think it will finally allow us to communicate and collaborate > on the actual process of development as it occurs, rather than the previous > practice of simply seeing code appear from some hidden, internal branch > which was driven almost exclusively by a single person > > Doing all of this in the open should lead to far more people being > interested in the project, not just as users but as developers and leaders. > No one rushes to fill a position that is occupied by someone else, but now > we have a vacuum to fill, and that can be a good thing in terms of > encouraging more people to step forward. > > Here is how I see things and I would love to hear more about what you guys > think. > MacRuby is a great project, but: > > - the target audience & projects aren't clear > - the target platform (OS X) isn't the one we all really want to > target (iOS) > - Cocoa's API is awesome but not user friendly/easy to grasp > > > What I'd like to suggest is the following: > > 1. Define clear goals for MacRuby that we can easily evaluate: > > - Focus primarily on making MacRuby the tool to use for quickly > prototyping OS X and iOS applications. > - Remove dependency on libauto so MacRuby can run post Mountain Lion > and on iOS. > > 2. Increase the number of contributors: > > - Define areas of contribution: > - implementation itself (mainly requires C, C++ knowledge) > - prototyping focus (templates, wrapper APIs, modules, tools: a > full ecosystem aimed at being more productive) > - documentation (getting started, guides, FAQs, wiki, demos, hacker > guides) > - support > > > - empower contributors: > - move the website to github for easier contribution > - better release process and roadmap > - better process to review pull requests & give commit rights > > 3. Improve communication: > > - start an active and official chat room (IRC, campfire like or > something else) > - open discussions about plans for the project and progress made > - better collaboration with other Ruby implementation teams (Rubinius, > JRuby, MagLev and of course Matz/C Ruby) > > > Let's not forget that MacRuby is and will remain a free Open Source > project and that means we need your help and support. > Without you, this project doesn't mean much so please voice your opinion > and if you decide to do so, become an active participant to MacRuby's > success. > > I would like to thank Apple for their historical support and Laurent for > starting this project and all his work so far. Without those contributions, > MacRuby would never have existed and the project will more than welcome any > future participation by either Apple or Laurent. > At the same time, I don't think the future of this project can or should > rest on the shoulders of a single corporate entity, or that of a single > individual. That does not encourage the kind of broad participation, or > the kind of overall longevity (in the form of future generations of > contributors) that Open Source projects really need to survive over the > long term. > Finally, I'd like to make clear that I see myself more in a role of a > facilitator than a technical leader on the order of what Laurent was. This > role has been left vacant for more than 6 months now and needs to be filled > by a group of people with greater technical skills than mine. Additional > contributors are therefore more than welcome to join the team, and their > support will be as much appreciated as it is needed. > > Finally, in addition to the already numerous great MacRuby contributors > and soon to become contributors, Evan Phoenix (Rubinius) agreed to act as > an advisor for the project. > > So, MacRuby community what do you think?* > * > * > *- Matt* > > _______________________________________________ > MacRuby-devel mailing list > MacRuby-devel@lists.macosforge.org > http://lists.macosforge.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/macruby-devel > >
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