Re: Now what? (was: Jakarta Overview)

2002-03-23 Thread Andrew C. Oliver 

On Sat, 2002-03-23 at 21:25, Jakarta General Newsgroup wrote:
> Subject: Re: Now what? (was: Jakarta Overview)
> From: Jon Carnes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>  ===
> Andrew C. Oliver wrote:
> 
> >
> >> > > 'News' as a measure of activity on a project is effectively useless.
> >> > > Commits/month would be a lot better.
> > True.
> > 
> > 
> > 
> >> I agree, but you need a purpose for a release. Releasing just so it
> >> happens often is pointless. There should be a consistent amount of
> >> change/bug fixing/docs etc for a release to be made.
> >> 
> > 
> > Agreed.  But thats not a release.  Thats called lying to yourself/others
> > that you have a release when you really just have a build.
> > 
> > -Andy
> 
> I believe that you have to have a release periodically (even if the changes 
> are not dramatic). These things are cyclical.  If you want to keep the 
> focus of your community, you have to generate releases.  Agreed that they 
> should not be pointless, but I can't imagine a truely pointless release.  
> We always have *some* progress. 
> 

I tend to differentiate between "builds" and "releases"

> 
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Re: Now what? (was: Jakarta Overview)

2002-03-23 Thread @Basebeans.com 

Subject: Re: Now what? (was: Jakarta Overview)
From: Jon Carnes <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
 ===
Andrew C. Oliver wrote:

>
>> > > 'News' as a measure of activity on a project is effectively useless.
>> > > Commits/month would be a lot better.
> True.
> 
> 
> 
>> I agree, but you need a purpose for a release. Releasing just so it
>> happens often is pointless. There should be a consistent amount of
>> change/bug fixing/docs etc for a release to be made.
>> 
> 
> Agreed.  But thats not a release.  Thats called lying to yourself/others
> that you have a release when you really just have a build.
> 
> -Andy

I believe that you have to have a release periodically (even if the changes 
are not dramatic). These things are cyclical.  If you want to keep the 
focus of your community, you have to generate releases.  Agreed that they 
should not be pointless, but I can't imagine a truely pointless release.  
We always have *some* progress. 


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Re: Now what? (was: Jakarta Overview)

2002-03-23 Thread Andrew C. Oliver 

On Sat, 2002-03-23 at 17:38, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> "Andrew C. Oliver" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote on 24/03/2002 12:39:09 AM:
> 
> > > 'News' as a measure of activity on a project is effectively useless. 
> > > Commits/month would be a lot better.
> > > 
> > 
> > Hummm...I'll put that comment in the pile of "the most important
> > activity in software development is programming" pile of things I
> > disagree with.
> 
> Fine, but since commits aren't just programming, they're also docs, 
> proposals etc, i feel it's a far more valid measure of activity than 
> writing a news article.
> 

True.



> I agree, but you need a purpose for a release. Releasing just so it 
> happens often is pointless. There should be a consistent amount of 
> change/bug fixing/docs etc for a release to be made.
> 

Agreed.  But thats not a release.  Thats called lying to yourself/others
that you have a release when you really just have a build.

-Andy

> --
> dIon Gillard, Multitask Consulting
> Work:  http://www.multitask.com.au
> Developers: http://www.multitask.com.au/developers
-- 
http://www.superlinksoftware.com
http://jakarta.apache.org/poi - port of Excel/Word/OLE 2 Compound
Document 
format to java
http://developer.java.sun.com/developer/bugParade/bugs/4487555.html 
- fix java generics!
The avalanche has already started. It is too late for the pebbles to
vote.
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Re: Now what? (was: Jakarta Overview)

2002-03-23 Thread dion 

"Andrew C. Oliver" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote on 24/03/2002 12:39:09 AM:

> > 'News' as a measure of activity on a project is effectively useless. 
> > Commits/month would be a lot better.
> > 
> 
> Hummm...I'll put that comment in the pile of "the most important
> activity in software development is programming" pile of things I
> disagree with.

Fine, but since commits aren't just programming, they're also docs, 
proposals etc, i feel it's a far more valid measure of activity than 
writing a news article.

> > Given most jakarta projects have a nightly build, releases by 
themselves 
> > aren't as much of a milestone as people would think from the 
commercial 
> > point of view. Take Struts for example. I happily built production 
systems 
> > off pre-1.0 code for many months. There were no new betas, just 
updated 
> > nightly builds. The code was actively being developed, but why waste 
time 
> > on a release if there's no particular purpose?
> > 
> 
> Whoa...dude.. The release is the point when all the edges are smoothed
> and things are tied off.  Release often.  There is a difference between
> a build and a release.  Its the point when an effort is made to make
> sure the documentation matches up and everything is *ready*.  It a
> tracking point in the software lifecycle.  If you never stop the bus
> then when can you paint it?
I agree, but you need a purpose for a release. Releasing just so it 
happens often is pointless. There should be a consistent amount of 
change/bug fixing/docs etc for a release to be made.

--
dIon Gillard, Multitask Consulting
Work:  http://www.multitask.com.au
Developers: http://www.multitask.com.au/developers

Re: Now what? (was: Jakarta Overview)

2002-03-23 Thread Ceki Gülcü 

At 14:47 22.03.2002 -0800, you wrote:

>- Audience and "Marketing":
>The document is directed towards people who may not be familiar
>with all the projects that exist under the Jakarta umbrella.
>Specifically, it is directed towards users, who hope to find
>something useful for their own projects. (Those users may turn
>into contributors over time!)
>I cannot understand why Leo and Ceki refer to the document (and,
>by implication, others like it) as "Marketing" - a term which
>carries in this context clearly condescending connotations.
>I don't think documentation is marketing - and what I tried to
>provide is simply documentation, not different in principle
>than Javadoc, only at a higher level.

I realize that you spent considerable amount of time editing
the document. I appreciate the effort. I assure you that there is
no condescension on my part, at least not intentional.

The introduction in your email came through as "here is the
solution to all Jakarta's problems." I have a hard time accepting
that as being the truth.

>It is also simply not true, as Ceki believes, that "everybody
>knows Jakarta": from the inside it may be hard to conceive how
>large and confusing the entire Jakarta project can appear to
>the outsider.

The Jakarta brand is very well known. What is less known are the
individual Jakarta subprojects, in particular their relation with each
other.  I doubt the overview document will solve that conundrum.

As I said in my previous comments, I do not have a problem with the
contents of the document per se but the sprit in which it was
presented. IMO, it would have been preferable to work with each
individual subproject rather than start a new body of work but that was
not my decision to make.

Are you willing to continue maintaining it? Make sure that it is
comprehensive, consistent and up to date? What will happen when you
grow tired of it?

Nothing is preventing you from continuing to work on the
overview.  If you persist, my -1 will be withdrawn or overridden. What
is certain is that the overview is yet another brick on of the edifice
of Jakarta.


>Philipp K. Janert, Ph.D.  [EMAIL PROTECTED]

--
Ceki

My link of the month: http://java.sun.com/aboutJava/standardization/


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Re: Now what? (was: Jakarta Overview)

2002-03-23 Thread Andrew C. Oliver 

On Sat, 2002-03-23 at 03:42, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> Philipp K. Janert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote on 23/03/2002 09:47:31 AM:
> 
> > 
> [snip]
> > I don't think documentation is marketing - and what I tried to
> > provide is simply documentation, not different in principle
> > than Javadoc, only at a higher level. 
> 
> Except it also contained words such as immature, which border on the 
> emotional.
> 

I don't think he meant any harm.

> [snip]
> > - Users vs Developers
> > I sense a certain ambivalence towards making Jakarta projects 
> > easier to use - Ted, for instance, points out that more users lead 
> 
> I'll take personal exception to that comment. My first patches to a 
> Jakarta project included documentation, and it's one of the main things 
> I've done on Latka at this point. I think we'd all like the projects to be 
> easier to use and understand, but I'll wager not everyone is comfortable 
> that they can do it themselves.
> 

I get the same feeling often.  Granted I think its probably part that
most developers don't feel comfortable with their writing skills.

> [snip]
> [snip]
> > That's great! The "News" section has also disappeared - I consider
> > that a bit sad: I think some measure for the activity of the
> > project would be helpful, but there may be better ways to determine
> > it. I would have thought that the date of the most recent release 
> > would not be considered a "subjective judgement".
> 
> 'News' as a measure of activity on a project is effectively useless. 
> Commits/month would be a lot better.
> 

Hummm...I'll put that comment in the pile of "the most important
activity in software development is programming" pile of things I
disagree with.

> Given most jakarta projects have a nightly build, releases by themselves 
> aren't as much of a milestone as people would think from the commercial 
> point of view. Take Struts for example. I happily built production systems 
> off pre-1.0 code for many months. There were no new betas, just updated 
> nightly builds. The code was actively being developed, but why waste time 
> on a release if there's no particular purpose?
> 

Whoa...dude.. The release is the point when all the edges are smoothed
and things are tied off.  Release often.  There is a difference between
a build and a release.  Its the point when an effort is made to make
sure the documentation matches up and everything is *ready*.  It a
tracking point in the software lifecycle.  If you never stop the bus
then when can you paint it?

> > 
> > The question is: Now what? 
> > 
> > Should we:
> > - collect suggestions to improve the initial draft so that the 
> >   majority here considers it a good thing to have and develop it
> >   further along those line?
> > - leave it as is?
> > - drop it altogether?
> > - replace it with something altogether different?
> 
> Well, it's already being improved by being changed in CVS, and could 
> easily be replaced with something altogether different over time. I'd much 
> rather see the commons stuff removed and a pointer in place to the 
> existing page, and some form of 'activity' in place of what was news.
> --
> dIon Gillard, Multitask Consulting
> Work:  http://www.multitask.com.au
> Developers: http://www.multitask.com.au/developers
-- 
http://www.superlinksoftware.com
http://jakarta.apache.org/poi - port of Excel/Word/OLE 2 Compound
Document 
format to java
http://developer.java.sun.com/developer/bugParade/bugs/4487555.html 
- fix java generics!
The avalanche has already started. It is too late for the pebbles to
vote.
-Ambassador Kosh


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Re: Now what? (was: Jakarta Overview)

2002-03-23 Thread Andrew C. Oliver 

On Fri, 2002-03-22 at 17:47, Philipp K. Janert wrote:
> 
> Dear Friends!
> 
> First off, many thanks to Ted for posting my Draft Jakarta 
> Overview, thus allowing everyone to review it, and many thanks 
> to all who provided feedback on it, for or against.
> 
> I would like to comment on some of the issues raised.
> 
> - Purpose and Redundancy:
> To clarify the intended purpose of the document, it may help
> to explain how it came about: When I started to hang around 
> the Jakarta website, my first desire was to get a good, high-level
> overview, so that I would then know where to dig deeper into those
> projects which are relevant to me. I followed every link on 
> the main page to each individual project's homepage, and then on 
> to the sub-projects where appropriate, compiling exactly the
> information in the submitted document. Took me several days. 
> Assuming that others will have the same experience (and Chris'
> and Endre's emails seem to indicate they do), I decided to make it 
> available.Just having all the information in one place can help a 
> lot! (The overview on the Jakarta homepage, although great, does 
> not contain either subprojects, or status information.)
> 

Agreed, except I don't think your subjective comments are necessarily
appropriate for a top level page.  Its unlikely that in "several days"
you have been able to objectively judge the status of all the projects. 
Such information is the responsibility of those project committers.

> - Audience and "Marketing":
> The document is directed towards people who may not be familiar
> with all the projects that exist under the Jakarta umbrella. 
> Specifically, it is directed towards users, who hope to find
> something useful for their own projects. (Those users may turn
> into contributors over time!)
> I cannot understand why Leo and Ceki refer to the document (and,
> by implication, others like it) as "Marketing" - a term which 
> carries in this context clearly condescending connotations.
> I don't think documentation is marketing - and what I tried to
> provide is simply documentation, not different in principle
> than Javadoc, only at a higher level. 
> It is also simply not true, as Ceki believes, that "everybody 
> knows Jakarta": from the inside it may be hard to conceive how
> large and confusing the entire Jakarta project can appear to 
> the outsider.
> 

Agreed.  I think the "marketing" came out of someone else's comments as
the discussion went on.

> - Users vs Developers
> I sense a certain ambivalence towards making Jakarta projects 
> easier to use - Ted, for instance, points out that more users lead 
> to more support questions (and mailing list discussions, such as 
> this one). But isn't this stance slightly contradictory?
> If you don't want users, why publish your products? (By the way,
> I, as a user, am grateful that you do make them public - and that's 
> why I am trying to support this project where I believe it needs 
> it!) Just for balance, Endre puts usability first - I guess, it's
> a balancing act. 
> 

In general, Jakarta committers vastly underestimate the importance of a
wide audience.  I like what Eric Raymond has to say on the subject in
the Cathedral and the bazzar.  Your users are your testers.  Producing
quality software requires a massive real world validation.  (At least
for something like POI, I could never hope to amass the data that users
have provided).  And as you mention are your pool of new recruits.  For
all of the time they swear they don't want users...if you watch you'll
see them constantly campaign people USE their pet projects.  So this is
IMHO a paper-tiger party line.

> - "Hello, World" and Javadoc:
> Danny suspects that I "have a downer on Javadocs". That is not 
> quite correct. I think Javadocs are great - as a reference. I
> think they are terrible for just finding out what a project is 
> all about. Overview, Tutorial, Reference: three very different 
> things!
> I would like to repeat my conviction that for first-time users 
> (and all of us are at that stage at some point in our lives!) 
> worked examples would be immensely helpful in understanding the 
> scope and purpose of each project. It would be great if this could 
> come either out of the projects themselves, or from the larger
> user community. It is great to see Andrew encourage contribution
> of documentation to individual projects. 
> 

I totally agree.  I have a downer on Javadocs.  Javadocs are the bare
minimum that should be provided.  They are NOT documentation they are
published comments.  API docs are less then sufficient, they are the
pungent glue that real documentation should be pasted upon.  Any project
that says the Javadoc is its documentation, I consider "not ready for
prime-time".  That being said, I take an action approach to this.  As I
have time I contribute documentation to projects that I see that don't
meet my documentation requirements for use.  

> - Personal Assessment and Maintenanc

RE: Now what? (was: Jakarta Overview)

2002-03-23 Thread Leo Simons 

> - Audience and "Marketing":
> Specifically, it is directed towards users, who hope to find
> something useful for their own projects. (Those users may turn
> into contributors over time!)

It takes too much effort to support a user base for a project
that changes rapidly (ie any 'alpha' status code). Hence these
parts are not advertised very well. It should stay that way.

> I cannot understand why Leo and Ceki refer to the document (and,
> by implication, others like it) as "Marketing" - a term which 
> carries in this context clearly condescending connotations.

as dion said. When a project you are working on very hard for
a long time is listed as "immature" or something like that, it
is very hard to find the right wording for a response.

> - Users vs Developers

again, I personally distinguish between alpha, beta and final
releases. You only offer "support" (answers to mailing list
questions) for released products.

> - Personal Assessment and Maintenance:
> In terms of maintenance: Once everything is set up, this should
> not take too much effort (just updates of revision numbers and
> release dates, really). I think I also hinted (cough) that I
> might be willing to help with that (to the degree that I have
> available resources, of course) provided that maintaining such
> an overview document at all is solidly supported by the community.

as we say: documentation is always welcome!

> Now what? 
> =
> 
> The "News" section has also disappeared - I consider
> that a bit sad: I think some measure for the activity of the
> project would be helpful, but there may be better ways to determine
> it. I would have thought that the date of the most recent release 
> would not be considered a "subjective judgement".

it's simply not a good indicator. FA, almost nothing happens
over at Avalon Framework, but it gets more releases than the
way more busy other Avalon parts because it is, well, released.

> Should we:
> - collect suggestions to improve the initial draft so that the 
>   majority here considers it a good thing to have and develop it
>   further along those line?
> - leave it as is?
> - drop it altogether?
> - replace it with something altogether different?

it should, -- after consent by others here -- be merged with the
current overview on the front page. That's imho, of course.

greetz,

- Leo Simons

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Re: Now what? (was: Jakarta Overview)

2002-03-23 Thread dion 

Philipp K. Janert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote on 23/03/2002 09:47:31 AM:

> 
[snip]
> I don't think documentation is marketing - and what I tried to
> provide is simply documentation, not different in principle
> than Javadoc, only at a higher level. 

Except it also contained words such as immature, which border on the 
emotional.

[snip]
> - Users vs Developers
> I sense a certain ambivalence towards making Jakarta projects 
> easier to use - Ted, for instance, points out that more users lead 

I'll take personal exception to that comment. My first patches to a 
Jakarta project included documentation, and it's one of the main things 
I've done on Latka at this point. I think we'd all like the projects to be 
easier to use and understand, but I'll wager not everyone is comfortable 
that they can do it themselves.

[snip]
[snip]
> That's great! The "News" section has also disappeared - I consider
> that a bit sad: I think some measure for the activity of the
> project would be helpful, but there may be better ways to determine
> it. I would have thought that the date of the most recent release 
> would not be considered a "subjective judgement".

'News' as a measure of activity on a project is effectively useless. 
Commits/month would be a lot better.

Given most jakarta projects have a nightly build, releases by themselves 
aren't as much of a milestone as people would think from the commercial 
point of view. Take Struts for example. I happily built production systems 
off pre-1.0 code for many months. There were no new betas, just updated 
nightly builds. The code was actively being developed, but why waste time 
on a release if there's no particular purpose?

> 
> The question is: Now what? 
> 
> Should we:
> - collect suggestions to improve the initial draft so that the 
>   majority here considers it a good thing to have and develop it
>   further along those line?
> - leave it as is?
> - drop it altogether?
> - replace it with something altogether different?

Well, it's already being improved by being changed in CVS, and could 
easily be replaced with something altogether different over time. I'd much 
rather see the commons stuff removed and a pointer in place to the 
existing page, and some form of 'activity' in place of what was news.
--
dIon Gillard, Multitask Consulting
Work:  http://www.multitask.com.au
Developers: http://www.multitask.com.au/developers

Now what? (was: Jakarta Overview)

2002-03-22 Thread Philipp K . Janert 


Dear Friends!

First off, many thanks to Ted for posting my Draft Jakarta 
Overview, thus allowing everyone to review it, and many thanks 
to all who provided feedback on it, for or against.

I would like to comment on some of the issues raised.

- Purpose and Redundancy:
To clarify the intended purpose of the document, it may help
to explain how it came about: When I started to hang around 
the Jakarta website, my first desire was to get a good, high-level
overview, so that I would then know where to dig deeper into those
projects which are relevant to me. I followed every link on 
the main page to each individual project's homepage, and then on 
to the sub-projects where appropriate, compiling exactly the
information in the submitted document. Took me several days. 
Assuming that others will have the same experience (and Chris'
and Endre's emails seem to indicate they do), I decided to make it 
available.Just having all the information in one place can help a 
lot! (The overview on the Jakarta homepage, although great, does 
not contain either subprojects, or status information.)

- Audience and "Marketing":
The document is directed towards people who may not be familiar
with all the projects that exist under the Jakarta umbrella. 
Specifically, it is directed towards users, who hope to find
something useful for their own projects. (Those users may turn
into contributors over time!)
I cannot understand why Leo and Ceki refer to the document (and,
by implication, others like it) as "Marketing" - a term which 
carries in this context clearly condescending connotations.
I don't think documentation is marketing - and what I tried to
provide is simply documentation, not different in principle
than Javadoc, only at a higher level. 
It is also simply not true, as Ceki believes, that "everybody 
knows Jakarta": from the inside it may be hard to conceive how
large and confusing the entire Jakarta project can appear to 
the outsider.

- Users vs Developers
I sense a certain ambivalence towards making Jakarta projects 
easier to use - Ted, for instance, points out that more users lead 
to more support questions (and mailing list discussions, such as 
this one). But isn't this stance slightly contradictory?
If you don't want users, why publish your products? (By the way,
I, as a user, am grateful that you do make them public - and that's 
why I am trying to support this project where I believe it needs 
it!) Just for balance, Endre puts usability first - I guess, it's
a balancing act. 

- "Hello, World" and Javadoc:
Danny suspects that I "have a downer on Javadocs". That is not 
quite correct. I think Javadocs are great - as a reference. I
think they are terrible for just finding out what a project is 
all about. Overview, Tutorial, Reference: three very different 
things!
I would like to repeat my conviction that for first-time users 
(and all of us are at that stage at some point in our lives!) 
worked examples would be immensely helpful in understanding the 
scope and purpose of each project. It would be great if this could 
come either out of the projects themselves, or from the larger
user community. It is great to see Andrew encourage contribution
of documentation to individual projects. 

- Personal Assessment and Maintenance:
Several people pointed out that the document contains subjective 
assessments. This may be true, and may have been unfortunate. 
I think a much better approach would be if the status ratings,
for instance, came out of the projects themselves, along the
lines of: 'alpha', 'beta', 'stable', or somesuch (and I would
like to thank Andrew for suggesting that anybody unhappy 
patches it - and which is already happening!).
In terms of maintenance: Once everything is set up, this should
not take too much effort (just updates of revision numbers and
release dates, really). I think I also hinted (cough) that I
might be willing to help with that (to the degree that I have
available resources, of course) provided that maintaining such
an overview document at all is solidly supported by the community.

- Commons Components:
I am sorry, I have overlooked the Commons Components page, which
provides the equivalent of what I tried to do (for the Commons
project) - my mistake. I apologize. And thanks to Rodney for pointing 
it out.


Now what? 
=

It seems to me that overall a high-level Jakarta overview is
being considered useful, or at least "mostly harmless" by most.
The main contentious issues seems to be the perceived subjective
assessments, which are already being patched out: by people
closer to the projects and therefore more knowledgeable than me.
That's great! The "News" section has also disappeared - I consider
that a bit sad: I think some measure for the activity of the
project would be helpful, but there may be better ways to determine
it. I would have thought that the date of the most recent release 
would not be considered a "subjective judgement".

The question is: Now what? 

S