Re: [Catalyst] RFC: The paradox of choice in web development
Maybe perl6 will provide that common denominator without sacrificing the low-level goodies. I've followed the perl6 development some, and the approach is a little different. Unlike now, there's not going to be a 'blessed' set of source code that is a particular perl version. Instead, perl versions are described by a test suite. If it passes the test suite, it's perl 6. Whether it's written in C, Haskell, Lisp, or whatever. It's a different way of looking at things, and far be it from me to predict if it will work. That's what's up with the various perl 6 projects right now, like Rakudo and Pugs. They're sharing the 'spec' test suite and jointly developing the definition of what is Perl 6, but implementing at a different rate. Rakudo continues to make progress (that's the one I'm betting on crossing the finish line), with more big things working than not, but like any massive software project, it takes a while to knock off the last 20% of a project. Here's the birds-eye view: http://www.perlfoundation.org/perl6/index.cgi?rakudo_feature_status You can probably write useful projects in Rakudo Perl 6 today, but of course it'd be crazy to use it for professional development at this point. -- Kirby ___ List: Catalyst@lists.scsys.co.uk Listinfo: http://lists.scsys.co.uk/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/catalyst Searchable archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/catalyst@lists.scsys.co.uk/ Dev site: http://dev.catalyst.perl.org/
Re: [Catalyst] RFC: The paradox of choice in web development
On Feb 17, 2009, at 11:21 AM, Jonathan Rockway wrote: The community will benefit from more bloggers and success stories Actually, the community will probably benefit most from writing code. Talking about talking about something doesn't actually buy you much. New modules that make programming easier are definitely more appealing all around. Well, yes and no. Not everyone has the same skillset. Some people you want spending time working on the code and please don't use your special brand of 'help' on new people. Other people have excellent communication skills, and may not necessarily be at the level of coder you want making best-practices tools for others (but Catalyst helps them write their own stuff that still works, even if they've still got a few lumps to take as a coder.) It's also important to keep in mind that 99% of people that read social news sites (like Programming Reddit) are idiots that only read things they agree with. Wasting your time trying to educate these folks is just going to make you very, very bitter. There's a lot of truth to this. There's a reason that programming language discussions in the wild Internet are so personal - because they are. I've invested a lot of time becoming a perl expert, not a java expert, and so I do care that most of the semi-technical people out there incorrectly think that java is a better language - it means less job postings, so less likelihood I'll be able to end up with something where I like the work and salary. But since these things are so personal and high stakes, they're deeply unpleasant to participate in and not winnable. Never post in the comments of a programming language discussion on Slashdot - it's just unpleasant. On the other hand, there are less hostile forums, and they do matter. Not that long ago, I was starting up a major web project and needed to pick a platform to start with. I chose Catalyst for several reasons. This active mailing list is a big one, the existence of your book was another. Being able to work through the example in a few days gave me a lot of confidence that I could work with the framework. Seeing Catalyst mentioned in talks at the Open Source conference, seeing it mentioned in blog posts, it helps the person choosing to think, This is the project that's actively improving and I won't regret sticking with in six months. As opposed to, for instance, Solstice - the mailing list is almost dead, there's very little that turns up on a web search for help, no basic 'make a sample app in a day!' document, no buzz. It's obviously much more important that Catalyst works well, is extensible, and has good support, but that sort of thing is very hard to actually see when you're buzzing by options if people aren't talking about them. I think Catalyst's primary market right now is experienced perl developers that have built frameworks from scratch and don't want to do it again, and it's emitting decent pollen to attract those. It doesn't do much for the new developer looking for an easy way to make a dynamic web site - Ruby on Rails is winning that. And maybe everyone is happier that way? I guess, my point is don't utterly give up on the idea of benefits for talking about things. Avoid the trolly parts of the Internet, target places where perl is already the cultural norm, but it does matter that we've attracted a lot of bright minds to this project, and they're telling people about it. -- Kirby ___ List: Catalyst@lists.scsys.co.uk Listinfo: http://lists.scsys.co.uk/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/catalyst Searchable archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/catalyst@lists.scsys.co.uk/ Dev site: http://dev.catalyst.perl.org/
[Catalyst] PDF creation in Catalyst?
If you go to catalystframework.org, it says on the main page: And in case you want PNG or PDF output, you'll need just a few lines... Can someone give me those few lines? :-) Somewhat less snippishly, I've been trying to figure out the state of PDF generation from Catalyst. I don't need to do anything super fancy - mostly get a report so it can print on paper that's perforated into thirds, without worrying about browsers, telling users how to turn off browser print header/footer lines, and the like. I've seen several options: PDF::Template, based on HTML::Template. The reasons I'm not thrilled about this are: terrible lack of documentation, the original maintainers giving up on the project and calling it a mess, versions being rolled back - the google footprint of this project shows a lot of internal chaos. And I'm using Template Toolkit as my HTML generation template, so I'm not thrilled to mix in a different format. PDF::ReportWriter. This looks like it's maintained, under active development, and has excellent documentation. Anyone heard of this? It's not mentioned in the usual places like perlmonks. And the design really forces you to learn more about PDF than I ideally want to. Use something external. I found an old thread from this mailing list from 2006, where people mentioned htmldoc. However, with this approach I'm not sure I'll get the small level of control I want (to verify that page breaks are in the right place, really.) It does let me keep using TT, which I like. (Other people mentioned Latex, which I don't really want to learn in the time I have available. The thread is: http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/catalyst/users/8028, actually.) I'm a bit surprised that there's no Catalyst::View::Something::PDF by now, which makes me worry that it's hard. Most days I'd be happy to look into this, but I'm under the scheduling gun right now in a fairly panic-inducing way, so quick and dirty is unusually appealing. I don't need to create PDF files for distribution, just something printable with more layout control than HTML is willing to give me. Maybe PDF is a rabbit hole, and someone else has a bright idea? Thanks for any advice, Kirby Krueger, University of Washington ___ List: Catalyst@lists.scsys.co.uk Listinfo: http://lists.scsys.co.uk/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/catalyst Searchable archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/catalyst@lists.scsys.co.uk/ Dev site: http://dev.catalyst.perl.org/
[Catalyst] Catalyst and Shibboleth authentication
Greetings, I'm writing a new web application, and have decided to jump into Catalyst (because I am smart.) One thing that Catalyst seems to do well is have a good mechanism for plugging in standard approaches to things. Here at the University of Washington, we use a project called 'Shibboleth' for authentication: http://shibboleth.internet2.edu/ Has anyone worked with this in conjunction with Catalyst yet? I didn't see anything in Authentication::Credential::* yet, and it seems like that would be where it would go. If not, I suppose I'll have to write it, and this seems like an obvious candidate to give back. (One plus of working for a University, they really don't mind the whole Open Source thing!) Any tips beyond 'read a few other Authentication::Credential modules and stick to the same standards' would be appreciated. (But I'm still hoping someone else already has done it and just didn't think anyone else would care.) Thanks in advance, Kirby ___ List: Catalyst@lists.scsys.co.uk Listinfo: http://lists.scsys.co.uk/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/catalyst Searchable archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/catalyst@lists.scsys.co.uk/ Dev site: http://dev.catalyst.perl.org/
