RE: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Christian Stoller]

> > > When do you upgrade to a new release of php e.g. 5.3 -> 5.4
> > >   - As soon as released
> > >   - wait for the x.1 release
> > >   - Once our OpCode cache supports it
> > >   - When previous version hits EOL
> > >   - When a new feature warrants the upgrade
> > >   - When my Framework (Zend/Symfony/cake) or Software (Wordpress, Gallery,
> > > etc) requires it
> > 
> > You should add:
> > When my distro/hosting company upgrades.
>
> Also 'When my Framework supports it', as opposed to requires it.
> --
> Niel Archer

And: "When my favourite stable Linux Distribution (Debian, Ubuntu, etc.) 
supports it."


Christian Stoller

Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Leigh]

On 5 March 2013 15:13, Paul Reinheimer  wrote:

> How many servers do you deploy code to
>

Does this need a dev/test/prod split? I think this question should
specifically address production servers only.

(I'm not sure how this answer steers PHP as a language, but it might be
> useful for trends over time?)
> What server do you use in production:
>  - Apache
>  - IIS
>  - nginx
>

There's quite a few alternatives not on this list, and I think it does
influence development a little.

Servers like nginx, litespeed, cherokee and hiawatha (to name a few) are
almost certainly using FPM, and certainly not using the apache module.

Maybe a better question would be which SAPI is used in production?

Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Niel Archer]

> 
> > When do you upgrade to a new release of php e.g. 5.3 -> 5.4
> >   - As soon as released
> >   - wait for the x.1 release
> >   - Once our OpCode cache supports it
> >   - When previous version hits EOL
> >   - When a new feature warrants the upgrade
> >   - When my Framework (Zend/Symfony/cake) or Software (Wordpress, Gallery,
> > etc) requires it
> 
> You should add:
> When my distro/hosting company upgrades.

Also 'When my Framework supports it', as opposed to requires it.
--
Niel Archer
niel.archer (at) blueyonder.co.uk


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Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Kris Craig]

On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 7:45 PM, David Muir  wrote:

>
>  When do you upgrade to a new release of php e.g. 5.3 -> 5.4
>>   - As soon as released
>>   - wait for the x.1 release
>>   - Once our OpCode cache supports it
>>   - When previous version hits EOL
>>   - When a new feature warrants the upgrade
>>   - When my Framework (Zend/Symfony/cake) or Software (Wordpress, Gallery,
>> etc) requires it
>>
>
> You should add:
> When my distro/hosting company upgrades.
>
>
> Cheers,
> David
>
>
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> To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
>
>
It's also important that we figure out how we will go about getting an
accurate sampling.  Questions about Drupal usage might yield deceptively
low results if the polls are being promoted more heavily in Wordpress
communities, for example.

These are the questions I think we have to answer:


   1. Are these surveys invitation-only, open to the public, or both?  My
   vote would be for the latter option; i.e. certain targetted surveys may be
   invitation-only while others would be open to all.
   2. Aside from the obvious posting on the PHP website, how can we go
   about promoting survey participation in such a way that ensures (or at
   least tries to ensure) equal or semi-equal participation across a diverse
   multitude of user communities and demographics?
   3. What sorts of demographics do we want to identify among a given
   survey's sampling?  For example, do we want to add questions to determine
   what percentage of respondents have a newbie/intermediate/expert
   understanding of PHP, which respondents use certain apps and operating
   systems, etc?


There are also some other broader questions we'll need to answer, such as
what procedures we use to decide when to do surveys and what those surveys
should contain, how/when to publish the results of completed surveys, etc.

I'm sure I'm just scratching the surface here, but before we delve too
deeply into what questions should be asked in the first survey, I think
there are some basic questions we ourselves need to answer first.  =)

--Kris

Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[David Muir]

When do you upgrade to a new release of php e.g. 5.3 -> 5.4
  - As soon as released
  - wait for the x.1 release
  - Once our OpCode cache supports it
  - When previous version hits EOL
  - When a new feature warrants the upgrade
  - When my Framework (Zend/Symfony/cake) or Software (Wordpress, Gallery,
etc) requires it


You should add:
When my distro/hosting company upgrades.


Cheers,
David

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Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Paul Reinheimer]

Hi Everyone,

So I threw this idea out there, then I sat down and tried to come up with
questions I'd want answered. There's a bunch, those questions are easy.
Then I tried to focus my questions, I wanted questions that could possibly
affect or guide the development of PHP as a language. That got much harder.
Recognizing that much of how PHP advances is "scratch the itch" makes it
harder still.

Here I've got a few questions, as well as my thinking behind them:

(I think this question is useful to group responses, we might see radically
different responses from people deploying to a few servers versus hundreds)
How many servers do you deploy code to
1
2-5
5-20
20-100
100+

(I'm not sure how this should steer PHP, except possibly trying to devote
more resources to package maintainers if they're a large chunk of our user
base)
How do you install PHP on your production machines
 - Package (RPM, DEV)
 - Install from source
 - Executable from php.net (windows)

(I'm not sure how this answer steers PHP as a language, but it might be
useful for trends over time?)
What server do you use in production:
 - Apache
 - IIS
 - nginx

(How quickly are these new features being picked up in the language as a
whole)
Which of the following are you using today:
 - Namespaces
 - Closures
 - [other stuff]

(Where are people, also useful for grouping results)
What version of PHP are you using in Production
--

(what motivates people to upgrade?)
When do you upgrade to a new release of php e.g. 5.3 -> 5.4
 - As soon as released
 - wait for the x.1 release
 - Once our OpCode cache supports it
 - When previous version hits EOL
 - When a new feature warrants the upgrade
 - When my Framework (Zend/Symfony/cake) or Software (Wordpress, Gallery,
etc) requires it


(This, I think, is the biggest question in the survey)
Please rank the following in order of importance to you:
 - New language features
 - Language Speed
 - Language stability
 - Backwards compatibility between releases

(I think this is useful in terms of rating priorities. If everyone uses a
big framework, then we should temper their opinions against those of the
framework authors/maintainers)
Do you use any of the following frameworks (check all that apply)
 - Zend Framework
 - Symphony
 - Cake
 - Code Igniter
 - ...

(Can we convince people with C to help out in the language? Send just PHP
developers to work on tests? Documentation?)
What other languages do you know:
 - C
 - C++
 - Perl
 - Python
 - Ruby


I think you can see that I was challenged by a lot of the questions to
answer how it might affect the future of PHP. Some other questions to pull
apart classes of responses might be helpful (are you a: hosting provider,
development agency, deploying your own corporate code, etc.) but I'm really
having trouble coming up with good questions that I think could affect
things. Without those I'm not sure how useful the survey is to people on
this list.



paul




On Wed, Feb 27, 2013 at 5:38 AM, Lester Caine  wrote:

> Pierre Joye wrote:
>
>> hi,
>>
>> On Wed, Feb 27, 2013 at 9:53 AM, Lester Caine  wrote:
>>
>>  I was in a van with my son-in-law yesterday and we got around to
>>> discussing
>>> websites and the like. I run his sites, but HE uses Joomla, so although
>>> it's
>>> PHP he has no interest in the language as such as long as Joomla works.
>>> So
>>> this morning I though 'What ARE people using with PHP?" expecting to see
>>> a
>>> large chunk of the 90 odd % of websites actually using PHP to be using
>>> something to hide that, and got something of a surprise ...
>>> http://w3techs.com/**technologies/history_overview/**
>>> content_management/all
>>> makes interesting reading, and so while I was anticipating that a large
>>> chunk of users would be excluded from 'PHP' related questions, the
>>> reverse
>>> seems to be the truth?
>>>
>>
>> We have discussed that hundred of times in the past. However let me
>> try to compare with other mainstream products, in an understandable
>> way:
>>
>> a company A delivers materials to a cell manufacturer  > The
>> manufacturer sells ready to be used cells to end users. End users do
>> not care if the cell use a chip from Company A or B as long as it
>> works.
>>
>> the manufacturer reports needs&feedback to the company A, based on its
>> customers feedback and needs
>>
>> PHP is the company A, Joomla/Wordpress&co are the cell manufacturers.
>>
>
> But the point is that apart perhaps for Wordpress, the 'cell
> manufacturers' are possibly only a very small percentage of the PHP user
> base? The piece of information we are missing is the split of users between
> 'cell manufacturer' type users and those that are using PHP direct? What
> part of the 68% of people 'not using a cms system' are using some other
> 'cell manufacturer' and what part are just using PHP ... but even then,
> where a 'cell manufacturer' is no longer around, the end user needs help
> fro

Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Lester Caine]

Pierre Joye wrote:

hi,

On Wed, Feb 27, 2013 at 9:53 AM, Lester Caine  wrote:


I was in a van with my son-in-law yesterday and we got around to discussing
websites and the like. I run his sites, but HE uses Joomla, so although it's
PHP he has no interest in the language as such as long as Joomla works. So
this morning I though 'What ARE people using with PHP?" expecting to see a
large chunk of the 90 odd % of websites actually using PHP to be using
something to hide that, and got something of a surprise ...
http://w3techs.com/technologies/history_overview/content_management/all
makes interesting reading, and so while I was anticipating that a large
chunk of users would be excluded from 'PHP' related questions, the reverse
seems to be the truth?


We have discussed that hundred of times in the past. However let me
try to compare with other mainstream products, in an understandable
way:

a company A delivers materials to a cell manufacturer  > The
manufacturer sells ready to be used cells to end users. End users do
not care if the cell use a chip from Company A or B as long as it
works.

the manufacturer reports needs&feedback to the company A, based on its
customers feedback and needs

PHP is the company A, Joomla/Wordpress&co are the cell manufacturers.


But the point is that apart perhaps for Wordpress, the 'cell manufacturers' are 
possibly only a very small percentage of the PHP user base? The piece of 
information we are missing is the split of users between 'cell manufacturer' 
type users and those that are using PHP direct? What part of the 68% of people 
'not using a cms system' are using some other 'cell manufacturer' and what part 
are just using PHP ... but even then, where a 'cell manufacturer' is no longer 
around, the end user needs help from PHP to port their website ... which is were 
a number of my own customers are trapped.


--
Lester Caine - G8HFL
-
Contact - http://lsces.co.uk/wiki/?page=contact
L.S.Caine Electronic Services - http://lsces.co.uk
EnquirySolve - http://enquirysolve.com/
Model Engineers Digital Workshop - http://medw.co.uk
Rainbow Digital Media - http://rainbowdigitalmedia.co.uk

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Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Pierre Joye]

hi,

On Wed, Feb 27, 2013 at 9:53 AM, Lester Caine  wrote:

> I was in a van with my son-in-law yesterday and we got around to discussing
> websites and the like. I run his sites, but HE uses Joomla, so although it's
> PHP he has no interest in the language as such as long as Joomla works. So
> this morning I though 'What ARE people using with PHP?" expecting to see a
> large chunk of the 90 odd % of websites actually using PHP to be using
> something to hide that, and got something of a surprise ...
> http://w3techs.com/technologies/history_overview/content_management/all
> makes interesting reading, and so while I was anticipating that a large
> chunk of users would be excluded from 'PHP' related questions, the reverse
> seems to be the truth?


We have discussed that hundred of times in the past. However let me
try to compare with other mainstream products, in an understandable
way:

a company A delivers materials to a cell manufacturer  > The
manufacturer sells ready to be used cells to end users. End users do
not care if the cell use a chip from Company A or B as long as it
works.

the manufacturer reports needs&feedback to the company A, based on its
customers feedback and needs

PHP is the company A, Joomla/Wordpress&co are the cell manufacturers.


Cheers,
--
Pierre

@pierrejoye

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Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Lester Caine]

Paul Reinheimer wrote:

So my suggestion is simple, let's ask them: What they want, What they need,
how they installed PHP (source, rpm, deb, provided by hosting provider,
Zend Server), etc. Let's create a survey, and link to it prominently on
php.net. I considered just writing a survey myself, but even if everyone I
knew tweeted it I'd still lack the reach to hit those outside the
traditional community.


Little backtracking here ...

I was in a van with my son-in-law yesterday and we got around to discussing 
websites and the like. I run his sites, but HE uses Joomla, so although it's PHP 
he has no interest in the language as such as long as Joomla works. So this 
morning I though 'What ARE people using with PHP?" expecting to see a large 
chunk of the 90 odd % of websites actually using PHP to be using something to 
hide that, and got something of a surprise ...
http://w3techs.com/technologies/history_overview/content_management/all makes 
interesting reading, and so while I was anticipating that a large chunk of users 
would be excluded from 'PHP' related questions, the reverse seems to be the truth?


Perhaps this diversity is just a sign of the flexibility of PHP, but it does 
highlight the fact that simply getting the likes of Joomla and Drupal on board 
with current versions of PHP only addresses a small number of end users. 
Wordpress has an impressive takeup, and figures I was expecting to see for the 
other two given the hype, but what is highlighted is that the vast majority of 
users are perhaps using a much wider range of code that all needs to be tested 
and reworked for new versions of PHP. I suspect the information missing here is 
the number of smaller project CMS systems and other site generation tools 
against 'hard coded' PHP websites? But it does perhaps explain why ISP's are 
having problems moving clients forward where it is not simply a matter of using 
a later version of a third party tool?


--
Lester Caine - G8HFL
-
Contact - http://lsces.co.uk/wiki/?page=contact
L.S.Caine Electronic Services - http://lsces.co.uk
EnquirySolve - http://enquirysolve.com/
Model Engineers Digital Workshop - http://medw.co.uk
Rainbow Digital Media - http://rainbowdigitalmedia.co.uk

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Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Clint Priest]

On 2/20/2013 2:35 PM, Christopher Jones wrote:


Hi Paul,

My thesis is the other way round.  More people in the community need
to become PHP core developers.  This is historically how PHP
development has occurred, since nobody has idle time to adopt projects
they are not 100% behind.

Increasing user involvement is easier (and more often) said than done.
I'd prefer to see effort spent mentoring, rather than running surveys.

I've suggested this very thing in the past and even with a framework 
(albeit only in an email thread), I think a mentoring program of sorts 
would really benefit the core team.


It could even be kept in small groups where 1 mentor dedicates to answer 
and/or find the answer for a group of 1 to 2 people who are keen on 
learning to help with the core.


I would think that a separate mailing list for this type of mentorship 
would probably make sense, just to keep the chaffe off the internals 
list to a minimum.


It would take some (at least 1) of the current core developers to step 
up and commit to helping.  I ran into a lot of trouble learning what I 
know about the core and most of the tough question I had went unanswered 
for one reason or another, was quite infuriating at the time.



I do have a lot of reservations about a survey.  But if you do run
one, I'm sure I'll look at the results.



--
-Clint

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Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Florin Razvan Patan]

On Fri, Feb 22, 2013 at 8:40 PM, Florin Razvan Patan
 wrote:
> On Thu, Feb 21, 2013 at 9:24 PM, Christopher Jones
>  wrote:
>>
>>
>> On 02/21/2013 03:02 AM, Florian Anderiasch wrote:
>>>
>>> On 02/21/2013 08:14 AM, Pierre Joye wrote:
>>>
 I do not have a single doubt. Why? Surveys are one of many ways to get
 feedback. They have no contracting values but give us some numbers about
 one rfc or another. That may help us to focus on one feature instead of
 another if we see a large number of users looking forward to it.
>>>
>>>
>>> You'll never get perfect results, but I prefer results at all over none :)
>>>
>>> There have been a lot of those for other languages:
>>>
>>> -
>>>
>>> http://cemerick.com/2012/08/06/results-of-the-2012-state-of-clojure-survey/
>>> - http://survey.perlfoundation.org/
>>> - http://survey.hamptoncatlin.com/
>>>
>>
>> For the mail archives, there are also these (more focused) reports:
>>
>> http://static.zend.com/topics/zend-developer-pulse-survey-report-Q2-2012-0612-EN.pdf
>>
>> http://downloads.zend.com/guides/whitepapers/State_of_PHP_in_the_Enterprise_061212.pdf
>>
>>
>> Chris
>>
>> --
>> christopher.jo...@oracle.com  http://twitter.com/ghrd
>> Newly updated, free PHP & Oracle book:
>> http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/topics/php/underground-php-oracle-manual-098250.html
>>
>> --
>> PHP Internals - PHP Runtime Development Mailing List
>> To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
>>
>
> Hello,
>
>
> I see that people would rather agree with a RFC on
> polls on the website so I think we should rather get a
> RFC going and take it from there.
>
> I'll gladly make it if needed so just let me know.
>
> Also, maybe the conference organizers could help
> the PHP community by having surveys at the
> conference they are organizing and provide the
> feedback on their website.
>
> What do you think?
>
>
> Best regards.
> 
> Florin Patan
> https://github.com/dlsniper


Hello,


I've added the following RFC to allow discussion on it:
https://wiki.php.net/rfc/site_voting_poll

If there's a need for a patch before proceeding with the
next step of this let me know.



Best regards

Florin Patan
https://github.com/dlsniper

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Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Florin Razvan Patan]

On Thu, Feb 21, 2013 at 9:24 PM, Christopher Jones
 wrote:
>
>
> On 02/21/2013 03:02 AM, Florian Anderiasch wrote:
>>
>> On 02/21/2013 08:14 AM, Pierre Joye wrote:
>>
>>> I do not have a single doubt. Why? Surveys are one of many ways to get
>>> feedback. They have no contracting values but give us some numbers about
>>> one rfc or another. That may help us to focus on one feature instead of
>>> another if we see a large number of users looking forward to it.
>>
>>
>> You'll never get perfect results, but I prefer results at all over none :)
>>
>> There have been a lot of those for other languages:
>>
>> -
>>
>> http://cemerick.com/2012/08/06/results-of-the-2012-state-of-clojure-survey/
>> - http://survey.perlfoundation.org/
>> - http://survey.hamptoncatlin.com/
>>
>
> For the mail archives, there are also these (more focused) reports:
>
> http://static.zend.com/topics/zend-developer-pulse-survey-report-Q2-2012-0612-EN.pdf
>
> http://downloads.zend.com/guides/whitepapers/State_of_PHP_in_the_Enterprise_061212.pdf
>
>
> Chris
>
> --
> christopher.jo...@oracle.com  http://twitter.com/ghrd
> Newly updated, free PHP & Oracle book:
> http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/topics/php/underground-php-oracle-manual-098250.html
>
> --
> PHP Internals - PHP Runtime Development Mailing List
> To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
>

Hello,


I see that people would rather agree with a RFC on
polls on the website so I think we should rather get a
RFC going and take it from there.

I'll gladly make it if needed so just let me know.

Also, maybe the conference organizers could help
the PHP community by having surveys at the
conference they are organizing and provide the
feedback on their website.

What do you think?


Best regards.

Florin Patan
https://github.com/dlsniper

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Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Christopher Jones]

On 02/21/2013 03:02 AM, Florian Anderiasch wrote:

On 02/21/2013 08:14 AM, Pierre Joye wrote:


I do not have a single doubt. Why? Surveys are one of many ways to get
feedback. They have no contracting values but give us some numbers about
one rfc or another. That may help us to focus on one feature instead of
another if we see a large number of users looking forward to it.


You'll never get perfect results, but I prefer results at all over none :)

There have been a lot of those for other languages:

-
http://cemerick.com/2012/08/06/results-of-the-2012-state-of-clojure-survey/
- http://survey.perlfoundation.org/
- http://survey.hamptoncatlin.com/



For the mail archives, there are also these (more focused) reports:
 
http://static.zend.com/topics/zend-developer-pulse-survey-report-Q2-2012-0612-EN.pdf
 
http://downloads.zend.com/guides/whitepapers/State_of_PHP_in_the_Enterprise_061212.pdf

Chris

--
christopher.jo...@oracle.com  http://twitter.com/ghrd
Newly updated, free PHP & Oracle book:
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/topics/php/underground-php-oracle-manual-098250.html

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Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Florian Anderiasch]

On 02/21/2013 08:14 AM, Pierre Joye wrote:

> I do not have a single doubt. Why? Surveys are one of many ways to get
> feedback. They have no contracting values but give us some numbers about
> one rfc or another. That may help us to focus on one feature instead of
> another if we see a large number of users looking forward to it.

You'll never get perfect results, but I prefer results at all over none :)

There have been a lot of those for other languages:

-
http://cemerick.com/2012/08/06/results-of-the-2012-state-of-clojure-survey/
- http://survey.perlfoundation.org/
- http://survey.hamptoncatlin.com/

Looking forward to this, especially if we could get a few thousand
people to vote.

Greetings,
Florian

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Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Pierre Joye]

Hi Chris,
On Feb 20, 2013 9:36 PM, "Christopher Jones" 
wrote:

>
> My thesis is the other way round.  More people in the community need
> to become PHP core developers.  This is historically how PHP
> development has occurred, since nobody has idle time to adopt projects
> they are not 100% behind.

We have more new active contributors than ever before. Actually the top 5
contributors are here for less than a couple of years or even less than one.

> Increasing user involvement is easier (and more often) said than done.
> I'd prefer to see effort spent mentoring, rather than running surveys.

Having our user at large express their needs or opinion is about
contributing. It is actually the very first step to contribution.

> I do have a lot of reservations about a survey.  But if you do run
> one, I'm sure I'll look at the results.

I do not have a single doubt. Why? Surveys are one of many ways to get
feedback. They have no contracting values but give us some numbers about
one rfc or another. That may help us to focus on one feature instead of
another if we see a large number of users looking forward to it.

Cheers,

Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Kris Craig]

On Wed, Feb 20, 2013 at 12:35 PM, Christopher Jones <
christopher.jo...@oracle.com> wrote:

>
>
> On 02/20/2013 12:00 PM, Paul Reinheimer wrote:
>
>> Hi All,
>>
>> My apologies for the intrusion, I'll keep this brief.
>>
>> In many discussions over the past few months there has been talk about
>> what
>> the community at large needs. Pierre said just earlier today:
>>
>> "I would also say it us time for us to get back in sync with the
>> communities needs. I am not talking about the last days RFCs but in
>> general."
>>
>
> Hi Paul,
>
> My thesis is the other way round.  More people in the community need
> to become PHP core developers.  This is historically how PHP
> development has occurred, since nobody has idle time to adopt projects
> they are not 100% behind.
>
> Increasing user involvement is easier (and more often) said than done.
> I'd prefer to see effort spent mentoring, rather than running surveys.
>
> I do have a lot of reservations about a survey.  But if you do run
> one, I'm sure I'll look at the results.
>
> Chris
>
> --
> christopher.jo...@oracle.com  http://twitter.com/ghrd
> Newly updated, free PHP & Oracle book:
> http://www.oracle.com/**technetwork/topics/php/**
> underground-php-oracle-manual-**098250.html
>
>
> --
> PHP Internals - PHP Runtime Development Mailing List
> To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
>
>
I agree that we need more core devs (myself included), but I think it's
worth remembering that most PHP developers are not programmers who would be
comfortable working in ANSI C.  The point of a survey would be to guage
what PHP users want.  Whether or not we choose to act on that would be up
to the actual core devs, but at least we would have some helpful data on
what the average PHP developer would like to see.

We could probably mitigate your concern (and please correct me if I'm wrong
on this assumption) by making it clear in the RFC that these survey results
are completely non-binding and intended for informational purposes only.

Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Christopher Jones]

On 02/20/2013 12:00 PM, Paul Reinheimer wrote:

Hi All,

My apologies for the intrusion, I'll keep this brief.

In many discussions over the past few months there has been talk about what
the community at large needs. Pierre said just earlier today:

"I would also say it us time for us to get back in sync with the
communities needs. I am not talking about the last days RFCs but in
general."


Hi Paul,

My thesis is the other way round.  More people in the community need
to become PHP core developers.  This is historically how PHP
development has occurred, since nobody has idle time to adopt projects
they are not 100% behind.

Increasing user involvement is easier (and more often) said than done.
I'd prefer to see effort spent mentoring, rather than running surveys.

I do have a lot of reservations about a survey.  But if you do run
one, I'm sure I'll look at the results.

Chris

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Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Kris Craig]

On Wed, Feb 20, 2013 at 12:27 PM, Florin Razvan Patan  wrote:

> Hi Paul,
>
> On Wed, Feb 20, 2013 at 10:00 PM, Paul Reinheimer 
> wrote:
> > Hi All,
> >
> > My apologies for the intrusion, I'll keep this brief.
> >
> > In many discussions over the past few months there has been talk about
> what
> > the community at large needs. Pierre said just earlier today:
> >
> > "I would also say it us time for us to get back in sync with the
> > communities needs. I am not talking about the last days RFCs but in
> > general."
> >
> > The other point that comes up is the difficulty in reaching a large
> portion
> > of the community. They don't come to conferences, they don't sit on this
> > list, they don't go to user groups. They work with PHP for months or
> years,
> > but the rest of the "community" doesn't even know who they are. I believe
> > Rasmus has mentioned this on a few occasions.
> >
> > So my suggestion is simple, let's ask them: What they want, What they
> need,
> > how they installed PHP (source, rpm, deb, provided by hosting provider,
> > Zend Server), etc. Let's create a survey, and link to it prominently on
> > php.net. I considered just writing a survey myself, but even if
> everyone I
> > knew tweeted it I'd still lack the reach to hit those outside the
> > traditional community.
> >
> >
> > While this is clearly not a suggestion to change PHP, i'll write this up
> in
> > RFC format if there's interest. Should give people an opportunity to
> > discuss questions and such.
> >
> >
> > thanks for your time
> > paul
> >
> >
> > --
> > Paul Reinheimer
>
> Thank you for championing this. I've been promoting this kind of
> feedback for a while now.
>
> Just like the discussion I've had earlier on the IRC channel, I do
> believe that when proposals are made/are at a point where the
> internals don't agree with which solution is better and it should
> affect the community at large, it would be better to just ask the
> community and see what they want/agree on. The issue would
> be that in some cases one side would lose but the same thing
> happens when the debate is done here, on the mailing list, and
> a solution doesn't satisfy some people and ends up being the
> standard for the whole community.
>
> These votes shouldn't be seen as a must but should serve more
> as a guideline.
>
> As for the problems raised by Kris, I think that a simple system
> based on the e-mail address of the voter with some prior
> confirmation / pending approval, like for the mailing lists, should
> be enough to grant the right to vote or not. Even if some people
> were to have multiple accounts, I don't think they'd go to the
> trouble of spawning a very large number of e-mail addresses just
> to see their favorite option accepted.
>
> I'd be more that happy to provide any help possible for the RFC
> as well as the survey / surveys themselves.
>
>
>
> Best regards.
> 
> Florin Patan
> https://github.com/dlsniper
>
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> PHP Internals - PHP Runtime Development Mailing List
> To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
>
>
Agreed on all of your points, Florin.  Perhaps the three of us can make
this a collaborative effort if everyone's willing.

--Kris

Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Florin Razvan Patan]

Hi Paul,

On Wed, Feb 20, 2013 at 10:00 PM, Paul Reinheimer  wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> My apologies for the intrusion, I'll keep this brief.
>
> In many discussions over the past few months there has been talk about what
> the community at large needs. Pierre said just earlier today:
>
> "I would also say it us time for us to get back in sync with the
> communities needs. I am not talking about the last days RFCs but in
> general."
>
> The other point that comes up is the difficulty in reaching a large portion
> of the community. They don't come to conferences, they don't sit on this
> list, they don't go to user groups. They work with PHP for months or years,
> but the rest of the "community" doesn't even know who they are. I believe
> Rasmus has mentioned this on a few occasions.
>
> So my suggestion is simple, let's ask them: What they want, What they need,
> how they installed PHP (source, rpm, deb, provided by hosting provider,
> Zend Server), etc. Let's create a survey, and link to it prominently on
> php.net. I considered just writing a survey myself, but even if everyone I
> knew tweeted it I'd still lack the reach to hit those outside the
> traditional community.
>
>
> While this is clearly not a suggestion to change PHP, i'll write this up in
> RFC format if there's interest. Should give people an opportunity to
> discuss questions and such.
>
>
> thanks for your time
> paul
>
>
> --
> Paul Reinheimer

Thank you for championing this. I've been promoting this kind of
feedback for a while now.

Just like the discussion I've had earlier on the IRC channel, I do
believe that when proposals are made/are at a point where the
internals don't agree with which solution is better and it should
affect the community at large, it would be better to just ask the
community and see what they want/agree on. The issue would
be that in some cases one side would lose but the same thing
happens when the debate is done here, on the mailing list, and
a solution doesn't satisfy some people and ends up being the
standard for the whole community.

These votes shouldn't be seen as a must but should serve more
as a guideline.

As for the problems raised by Kris, I think that a simple system
based on the e-mail address of the voter with some prior
confirmation / pending approval, like for the mailing lists, should
be enough to grant the right to vote or not. Even if some people
were to have multiple accounts, I don't think they'd go to the
trouble of spawning a very large number of e-mail addresses just
to see their favorite option accepted.

I'd be more that happy to provide any help possible for the RFC
as well as the survey / surveys themselves.



Best regards.

Florin Patan
https://github.com/dlsniper

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Re: [PHP-DEV] PHP User Survey

[Kris Craig]

On Wed, Feb 20, 2013 at 12:00 PM, Paul Reinheimer wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> My apologies for the intrusion, I'll keep this brief.
>
> In many discussions over the past few months there has been talk about what
> the community at large needs. Pierre said just earlier today:
>
> "I would also say it us time for us to get back in sync with the
> communities needs. I am not talking about the last days RFCs but in
> general."
>
> The other point that comes up is the difficulty in reaching a large portion
> of the community. They don't come to conferences, they don't sit on this
> list, they don't go to user groups. They work with PHP for months or years,
> but the rest of the "community" doesn't even know who they are. I believe
> Rasmus has mentioned this on a few occasions.
>
> So my suggestion is simple, let's ask them: What they want, What they need,
> how they installed PHP (source, rpm, deb, provided by hosting provider,
> Zend Server), etc. Let's create a survey, and link to it prominently on
> php.net. I considered just writing a survey myself, but even if everyone I
> knew tweeted it I'd still lack the reach to hit those outside the
> traditional community.
>
>
> While this is clearly not a suggestion to change PHP, i'll write this up in
> RFC format if there's interest. Should give people an opportunity to
> discuss questions and such.
>
>
> thanks for your time
> paul
>
>
> --
> Paul Reinheimer
>

I like the idea, though I would be extremely concerned about making this
survey as scientific as possible so that we don't wind up with biased or
inaccurate results.  Common examples would be duplicate voting, leading or
subjective questions, and limited sampling.  If those hurdles could be
overcome, I'm all for it.  I'd be happy to assist with the RFC and the
voting app/questions if there's sufficient interest here.

--Kris