Re: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
On Saturday 14 January 2006 20:51, Jeff Shell wrote: > It is annoying to see the MessageIDFactory deprecation warnings. I > only have those and use those because I copied and pasted from > something else and ran with it. For people like me, someone needs to > write a "Basic Zope 3 Internationalization For Ignorant Americans". My > customers don't need it, but if I don't provide it in some places, > Zope 3 yells at me and then I feel sad... So knowing when you need > them, when you need the i18n_domain in ZCML, would be nice. But this > has never stopped me from charging ahead with Zope 3. Just to comfort you a little bit, this was very heavily discussed when we originally decided to add those warnings. On the one hand we do not want to force people that do not need I18n to deal with it, but on the other hand we need to give people that do care some feedback where their I18n is not fully covered. I agree a nice how-to for the uninitiated would be nice (and not too hard to do). Regards, Stephan -- Stephan Richter CBU Physics & Chemistry (B.S.) / Tufts Physics (Ph.D. student) Web2k - Web Software Design, Development and Training ___ Zope3-users mailing list Zope3-users@zope.org http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope3-users
Re: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
On Saturday 14 January 2006 20:51, Jeff Shell wrote: > I like Trac, or even the Plone (I assume) based tools Schoolbell is > using to publish information. "This is the 3.2 milestone. Here are the > proposals and issues that are tied to that milestone" You can do this > with Wikis, but it's all manual and the organization is seldom as nice > and natural. Compare these (and yes, I'm aware that trac has a wiki - > but it seems nice and secondary to some of the core information): > > http://trac.turbogears.org/turbogears/roadmap > http://dev.zope.org/Zope3/RoadMap > > But while that would be nice, I don't have the time or experience to > contribute to setting something like that up even if it were wanted by > others, and I'm not volunteering anyone else to do it. Just wishful > thinking. It's hard for me to find a decision tree of what went into > Zope 3.2 and why, or to try to lobby support for something to go in > Zope 3.3 and see proof somehow that it does by being able to follow an > issue, a roadmap, a plan, etc. I hear you! A couple of remarks. The SchoolTool project is blessed by having a project manager that is not a developer. Tom (Hoffman) manages all our proposals and keeps the Web site content up-to-date. Furthermore, SchoolTool development is currently paid for, so SchoolTool can promise features for a certain release. Zope 3, on the other hand, has a time-based release cycle and is developed by community members. Thus we cannot make any promise about what features will make it into the next release. We use proposals to only decide what could make it. Regards, Stephan -- Stephan Richter CBU Physics & Chemistry (B.S.) / Tufts Physics (Ph.D. student) Web2k - Web Software Design, Development and Training ___ Zope3-users mailing list Zope3-users@zope.org http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope3-users
Re: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
On Saturday 14 January 2006 20:51, Jeff Shell wrote: > Interfaces are generally well defined and in apidoc. There are some > that don't make it into apidoc, and that can be frustrating. I need to > make a better list of the ones I look for that I can't find so I can > submit it as a collector issue. But generally, it is all very well > defined. ZCML is well documented, which was a huge concern I had > during Zope 3's development process. Jeff, the interfaces you cannot find should be simply registered with the directive. The reason they do not appear is that they are not in the utility registry. This is a great way to contribute to Zope 3 without really diving into development. Regards, Stephan -- Stephan Richter CBU Physics & Chemistry (B.S.) / Tufts Physics (Ph.D. student) Web2k - Web Software Design, Development and Training ___ Zope3-users mailing list Zope3-users@zope.org http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope3-users
Re: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
I know that Stephan Richter has responded to many of these points. I'll add in some of my views as someone from the borderlands - I'm not a core developer, but I am someone who has used Zope since before it was Zope. Since before it was "before it was Zope". I worked on core Principia and Zope a long time ago, but have not been involved much with the core of Zope 3 besides following the conversations and chiming in (sometimes too much, sometimes asking unanswerable questions) on the mailing lists. After tinkering with Zope 3 for a while, late last summer I had to build a Zope 3 application for real, and do it real fast. On 1/14/06, David Johnson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > The documentation is not well defined, which makes deployment dangerous > because one may produce an application that does not conform to future > releases of Zope. Documentation is better defined than any previous release of Zope. Most of the documentation, as Stephen mentions, is at the API level and is used as doctests. I installed Zope 3.2 final on our development boxes the other day. Over 8000 tests ran succesfully, many of those coming from documentation. It's not only documentation, but documentation that works. Interfaces are generally well defined and in apidoc. There are some that don't make it into apidoc, and that can be frustrating. I need to make a better list of the ones I look for that I can't find so I can submit it as a collector issue. But generally, it is all very well defined. ZCML is well documented, which was a huge concern I had during Zope 3's development process. There are two published books. They are old, covering Zope 3.0, but I know www.worldcookery.com has updates for its book. Even though the books are a couple of releases old, many of the core concepts still apply. I'm trying to get back in the habit of consulting Stephan's book before asking a question of the mailing list. On the downside, there isn't much documentation showing how to pull a lot of this together. But how you pull it together is up to you. A twenty minute wiki how-to isn't going to provide you with good tips about how to write an e-commerce solution. An e-commerce how-to isn't going to help you write a knowledge base. There could be more documentation in this area, but writing it is hard when you've got full time jobs doing other things. Keeping it updated is even harder. This is affecting TurboGears, Django, and more - they have some good "get started quick!" tutorials. They've had issues keeping them up to date recently. The Wiki is terrible. But I hate wikis and if I believed in God I believe my god would consider Wikis an abomination unto him. It's good that there's a place for information to go that's reasonably central. But which of the various "related objects" proposals is current? So I never go in there. I get frustrated very quickly, and this is with a lot of work done by others to try to keep it organized. I like Trac, or even the Plone (I assume) based tools Schoolbell is using to publish information. "This is the 3.2 milestone. Here are the proposals and issues that are tied to that milestone" You can do this with Wikis, but it's all manual and the organization is seldom as nice and natural. Compare these (and yes, I'm aware that trac has a wiki - but it seems nice and secondary to some of the core information): http://trac.turbogears.org/turbogears/roadmap http://dev.zope.org/Zope3/RoadMap But while that would be nice, I don't have the time or experience to contribute to setting something like that up even if it were wanted by others, and I'm not volunteering anyone else to do it. Just wishful thinking. It's hard for me to find a decision tree of what went into Zope 3.2 and why, or to try to lobby support for something to go in Zope 3.3 and see proof somehow that it does by being able to follow an issue, a roadmap, a plan, etc. (The bug tracker product Stephan wrote in Zope 3 was really cool with grouping. I miss it). Regarding configuration, Stephan provided nice responses. > I can only find one semi real-world Zope 3 example (the SIP application), > and it does not even run under Zope 3.2; while I've been able to wade > through and fix many errors, I continue to get more as the interfaces and > standards keep changing. Even the current i18n facility does not seem to > work properly, editing messages frequently gives errors and does not update > properly. Errors in general seem to give unexplainable results. I struggle with i18n, but I admit to being a stupid American that wishes he didn't have to deal with it at all. This has nothing to do with Zope 3's implementation - it's just not a habit that I have. Getting used to unicode, encodings, messages, etc, was hard. But again - a admit complete and utter ignorance here. On the other hand - the question that I saw listed most on the "submit a question" list for the Snakes and Rubies meeting in Chicago had to deal with "when are you going to internationalize
Re: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
On Sat, 2006-01-14 at 10:51 -0600, David Johnson wrote: > > I can only find one semi real-world Zope 3 example (the SIP > application), and it does not even run under Zope 3.2; while I’ve been > able to wade through and fix many errors, I continue to get more as > the interfaces and standards keep changing. Even the current i18n > facility does not seem to work properly, editing messages frequently > gives errors and does not update properly. Errors in general seem to > give unexplainable results. > > > Hi David, as well as Stephan's book there is also this book with demo z3 app: www.worldcookery.com Alen ___ Zope3-users mailing list Zope3-users@zope.org http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope3-users
Re: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
OK, David, I hear ya. You are saying that Zope 3 is not production ready, because of your frustrations in trying to get SQL-integration to work. However, assuming that you are right then a more correct statement is: Is Zope 3s SQL-integration production ready. And the answer to that may very well be "no". I have no idea (I avoid SQL if I can). But going from there to "Zope 3 is not production ready" involves the assumption that any Zope site needs to involve SQL, which is not true at all, since Zope includes ZODB, which is superiour for 95% of the cases. ;-) [Well, that's what I think anyway]. Most Zope 3 sites wouldn't have any kind of SQL involved anywhere. ___ Zope3-users mailing list Zope3-users@zope.org http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope3-users
RE: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
My apologies in advance if I causing frustration. > On Saturday 14 January 2006 11:51, David Johnson wrote: > > The documentation is not well defined, which makes deployment dangerous > > because one may produce an application that does not conform to future > > releases of Zope. > > I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. A lot of the > packages in > Zope 3 have text documentation files that define the API very well. > Furthermore, the interfaces document the API on a programming level. Tools > like API doc pull a lot of this information (and much more) together. > Other > than that, there are many beginner tutorials out there now and we have 2 > books. I have been unable to find any significant Zope 3 documentation on techniques for interface with SQL as was present in Zope 2. I have had other users respond privately with similar statements. Your book, while excellent, does not discuss the subject at all. I know Zope can handle these things, and I can setup a database adapter and create SQL scripts. However, what is the best way to integrate these into an application? I could make it work, I'm sure, but I fear doing so will make cause my application to break during a Zope upgrade or may not scale well. I have not been able to find any Zope 3 tutorials other than your Message Board application. Ditto web based user management. I installed a Zope 3 application and the Zope server would not start because the interface specifications had changed since it was released, only 2 years ago to point where it was broken. They may have coded things incorrectly, but people will do that and they will make mistakes. > First of all, if you break any configuration file, not just Zope's, an > application will not start. Note that someone should never mess with the > ZCML > files directly. Use overrides.zcml to make your customizations. I disagree. We run a variety of applications and the most complex configuration files we have are in Apache, Nagios, and Exim; which surprisingly are the least complex applications we run. All of them offer configuration file testers, which are extremely good about pinpointing specific errors. Not to mention that all are relatively widely used and docs are easy to find. The Zope 2 configuration for example is not as difficult. Java based applications are the only ones I know that have complex configurations. Our company deploys very complex financial based transactions systems we have only a handful of about 10 very small config files which just contain database connection strings. We installed your Message Board application for example (step13), and the server would not start. I was unclear why (I think it had to do with the smileys). I probably could have figured it out, but there were some configuration files that required change, such as adding a file to ../etc/package-includes - but I'm a pretty experienced user and engineer. It does require some configuration. > > As to the production system, if you change configuration on a life > production > system, you are plain stupid. Also, the system administrator should > *never* > mess with ZCML. ZCML is application developer domain, not system > administration. > Also, I don't understand why a crashed server would cause anyone to mess > with > ZCML on a production system. I sincerely have no clue how you came up with > this. People are just plain stupid. Unfortunately it's a reality. We have high end clients we have to pamper (you work for one we're trying to get to at the moment), and we have to accept blame for their breakages if we want them to keep paying us. ZCML files look like configuration files and so they get played with when people get frustrated confused or just want to check on things. We just installed the MySQL adapater, and it requires adjustments to etc/package-includes. If I asked my system admin to install the Message Board application, step13, he would get an error because the smileys are missing. I can almost guarantee he would play with the ".zcml" files as a natural first step to diagnose the problem. He is very bright. For example, just the other day we had a system administrator edit a configuration file, and through some VI keystrokes during exiting, he managed to replace the first half of the file with an asterisk, and he didn't notice. The application continued to run, and restart without problems(BTW) despite missing half it's config. We only picked it up through a monitoring tool we have and security tools we have. In a moment of crisis, one wants an application that has a high tolerance for errors and problems. In regards to system crashes, lots of strange things can happen, and files can get corrupted. It is not as simple as re-installing or restoring from backup, if you think all the files are intact. A corruption error can cause a subtle yet important change in another wise apparently normal looking file. Or some error someplace else could manifest it
Re: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
Stephan Richter wrote: On Saturday 14 January 2006 12:27, David Johnson wrote: It has been claimed that Zope 3 is ready for production. I would like to politely disagree, and maybe even suggest that the claim be remoked. I feel bad for people who want to use Zope 3, later finding out that they cannot do what they want, or putting up sites which are unstable, and giving the project a bad reputation. Overall, it's really just a standards thing. Okay, so that's you opinion. Several companies use Zoep 3 very successfully in production, so they clearly have a different opinion. I doubt that you can change the developers' minds about that. To be fair, "ready for producton" is not exactly crisp. People with sufficient knowledge are running it in production, and therefore it's fair to say it is ready. It is still a new and somewhat immature system. Jim -- Jim Fulton mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Python Powered! CTO (540) 361-1714http://www.python.org Zope Corporation http://www.zope.com http://www.zope.org ___ Zope3-users mailing list Zope3-users@zope.org http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope3-users
Re: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
Even though I think it is pointless, I am going to reply to some of the points you make. On Saturday 14 January 2006 11:51, David Johnson wrote: > The documentation is not well defined, which makes deployment dangerous > because one may produce an application that does not conform to future > releases of Zope. I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. A lot of the packages in Zope 3 have text documentation files that define the API very well. Furthermore, the interfaces document the API on a programming level. Tools like API doc pull a lot of this information (and much more) together. Other than that, there are many beginner tutorials out there now and we have 2 books. We commit to an API for 2 releases after it is deprecated. If you find that a new release breaks your code, then you can consider it a bug and report it. > Configuration is done through a series of configuration > files, which are easily broken and difficult to traverse. If the > configuration is damaged in someway through a mistake or other reason, the > server will not restart until it is fixed, which presents serious > challenges in a production environment - in the heat of the moment, wading > through errors is not trivial, especially for the non-Zope experienced > system admin who will be on call at 2:00 AM. The errors are difficult to > comprehend and do not easily point out where problems lie. Once problems > are found it is difficult to understand what they mean. First of all, if you break any configuration file, not just Zope's, an application will not start. Note that someone should never mess with the ZCML files directly. Use overrides.zcml to make your customizations. As to the production system, if you change configuration on a life production system, you are plain stupid. Also, the system administrator should *never* mess with ZCML. ZCML is application developer domain, not system administration. Also, I don't understand why a crashed server would cause anyone to mess with ZCML on a production system. I sincerely have no clue how you came up with this. > I can only find one semi real-world Zope 3 example (the SIP application), > and it does not even run under Zope 3.2; Aehm, not every application Zope 3 is used in is a public project. Here are other applications that have been deployed: - Zope Corp. Document Management System (closed) - Tiks, a CMS for Zope 3 [a fairly large Web site has been in production using Tiks] (open) - Another large document management application, which I do not know the name of - Launchpad and other Ubuntu-related software - SchoolTool/SchoolBell; I know that SchoolBell is used in several schools and universities around the world. These are some of the pure Zope 3 projects I know about; there are surely many that use Five. > while I've been able to wade > through and fix many errors, I continue to get more as the interfaces and > standards keep changing. If people do not report API breakage, then we cannot fix it. I tried very hard to provide good backward-compatibility, but it's not an easy task and problems are expected. > Even the current i18n facility does not seem to > work properly, editing messages frequently gives errors and does not update > properly. SchoolTool uses the i18n facilities heavily and we have never had update problems. Are you sure you know how GNU gettext works properly? > Errors in general seem to give unexplainable results. Could you give examples? > I do see many advantages to Zope 3 and I am willing to tolerate a lot > because of those advantages, but it seems like it not quite polished yet, > and there may be some architectural issues that are problematic for > real-world use. You have to be much more specific to provide constructive feedback. If you are unhappy with some part of the architecture, make a proposal or at least bring it up on zope3-dev. > Has anyone produced a significant application in Zope 3? Yes, see above. I am personally involved in SchoolTool and it is pretty big and stable. We have had no problems that are due to Zope 3 issues. > Has it been relatively bug-free? Yes. We do not get too many bug reports. Most of them are not even very serious. Note that Zope 3 is one of the first (if not the first) Open Source projects that uses test-driven development. All tests always have to pass before a check-in can be made. > Has it integrated with an RDBMS? Zope natively uses the ZODB, which most Zope 3 application developers prefer to use. It also depends what you mean by integration. Zope 3 supports connecting to RDBs using utilities and making queries that are integrated in the transaction mechanism. If you want higher-level integration, there is sqlos. Nuxeo is working on an even higher level API to interface RDBs with Zope 3. Regards, Stephan -- Stephan Richter CBU Physics & Chemistry (B.S.) / Tufts Physics (Ph.D. student) Web2k - Web Software Design, Development and Training
Re: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
On Saturday 14 January 2006 12:27, David Johnson wrote: > It has been claimed that Zope 3 is ready for production. I would like to > politely disagree, and maybe even suggest that the claim be remoked. I > feel bad for people who want to use Zope 3, later finding out that they > cannot do what they want, or putting up sites which are unstable, and > giving the project a bad reputation. Overall, it's really just a standards > thing. Okay, so that's you opinion. Several companies use Zoep 3 very successfully in production, so they clearly have a different opinion. I doubt that you can change the developers' minds about that. Regards, Stephan -- Stephan Richter CBU Physics & Chemistry (B.S.) / Tufts Physics (Ph.D. student) Web2k - Web Software Design, Development and Training ___ Zope3-users mailing list Zope3-users@zope.org http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope3-users
RE: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
The purpose is because I'm trying to be open-minded and perhaps I'm not understanding something about it. I am frequently in error, and I know better than to state my opinion as fact. It has been claimed that Zope 3 is ready for production. I would like to politely disagree, and maybe even suggest that the claim be remoked. I feel bad for people who want to use Zope 3, later finding out that they cannot do what they want, or putting up sites which are unstable, and giving the project a bad reputation. Overall, it's really just a standards thing. In regards to fixing things, I agree. My next step is to figure out how to contribute. -Original Message- From: Lennart Regebro [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 10:58 AM To: David Johnson Cc: zope3-users@zope.org Subject: Re: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really? On 1/14/06, David Johnson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I know I've asked this before, but I still have to question whether Zope 3 > is ready for a production environment. I don't understand the purpose of this post. If you don't think it's ready, then don't use it. If you think it's ready, then please go ahead. If you can come up with ways to improve what you think are weak points, then please do so. ___ Zope3-users mailing list Zope3-users@zope.org http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope3-users
Re: [Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
On 1/14/06, David Johnson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I know I've asked this before, but I still have to question whether Zope 3 > is ready for a production environment. I don't understand the purpose of this post. If you don't think it's ready, then don't use it. If you think it's ready, then please go ahead. If you can come up with ways to improve what you think are weak points, then please do so. ___ Zope3-users mailing list Zope3-users@zope.org http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope3-users
[Zope3-Users] Zope 3 Ready for Production? Really?
I know I’ve asked this before, but I still have to question whether Zope 3 is ready for a production environment. I REALLY do not wish to be difficult, and I love the concept of Zope 3. I think it may be the greatest thing since Linux. The documentation is not well defined, which makes deployment dangerous because one may produce an application that does not conform to future releases of Zope. Configuration is done through a series of configuration files, which are easily broken and difficult to traverse. If the configuration is damaged in someway through a mistake or other reason, the server will not restart until it is fixed, which presents serious challenges in a production environment – in the heat of the moment, wading through errors is not trivial, especially for the non-Zope experienced system admin who will be on call at 2:00 AM. The errors are difficult to comprehend and do not easily point out where problems lie. Once problems are found it is difficult to understand what they mean. I can only find one semi real-world Zope 3 example (the SIP application), and it does not even run under Zope 3.2; while I’ve been able to wade through and fix many errors, I continue to get more as the interfaces and standards keep changing. Even the current i18n facility does not seem to work properly, editing messages frequently gives errors and does not update properly. Errors in general seem to give unexplainable results. I do see many advantages to Zope 3 and I am willing to tolerate a lot because of those advantages, but it seems like it not quite polished yet, and there may be some architectural issues that are problematic for real-world use. Has anyone produced a significant application in Zope 3? Has it been relatively bug-free? Has it integrated with an RDBMS? -- David Johnson [EMAIL PROTECTED] 201 Main Street Suite 1320 Fort Worth, TX 76102 (877) 572-8324 x2200 ___ Zope3-users mailing list Zope3-users@zope.org http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope3-users
