Fwd: Re: [Calendula-devel] re: GNUe analysis - might be helpful

[James Thompson]

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I accidentally forgot to CC the list on this message this AM.

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Content-Description: James Thompson <jamest@gnuenterprise.org>: Re: [Calendula-devel] re: GNUe analysis - might be helpfu

From: James Thompson <jamest@gnuenterprise.org>
To: Darryl Caldwell <darrylc@fudosys.com>
Subject: Re: [Calendula-devel] re: GNUe analysis - might be helpful
Date: Thu, 18 Mar 2004 11:19:04 -0600
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> I've been giving GNUe a hard time over on the gnue list these last few
> days. Thanks for coming to my house.

Ooooo, sorry about the mud on the carpet.

> I spent 2 weeks with 0.4.2 last year. You have come a long, long way
> since then. In my mind it is still questionable whether GNUe is right
> for Calendula. I really don't have time to experiment and hope it works
> out. I need to scratch my own itch and I need evidence of stability. You

I understand the itch thing.  However on the stability front I'd like to point 
out that gnue is in use in real world, money making situations.  Specific 
parts of gnue are tested daily and people are paying for gnue based solutions 
that work.   If you are thinking of creating a solution written completely 
from scratch then it is quite possible the initial code would be less stable 
than what another project (GNUe or something else) would provide.

> I don't want to rely on IRC for your support anymore than I want to rely
> on RedHat/SuSE/Mandrake for phone support. Email leaves a better audit
> trail, and a better basis for FAQs later on.

We are going to try and be more responsive to email support as the traffic the 
last few days have show people are interested.

> If you want wider adoption, I suggest that one or all of the core GNUe
> developers stop writing apps for use in production (as you note below)
> and make documentation a priority.

It's so easy to say this.  Its so much harder in real life.  Most if not all 
the developers are working on gnue features based upon needs.  Those needs 
usually relate to either deadlines and work or money from a client.  I know 
in my case a client doesn't care if X is fully documented, they only want X 
working, yesterday.  That being said, i did reread our documentation (i 
typically don't have to :)  and see it is hideously outdated and incomplete.  
I have shifted more of my time towards proper documenation and will be 
posting a least the start of something to our list later today.

> tell me. Less outreach, more support, please. Write some short guides,
> howtos, updated API docs, etc. You wrote a great email yesterday
> describing 4 quick steps to testing Designer. That was wonderful. Now

In progress.  If fact, late last year we started adding epydoc comments to all 
our applications to cover the API front.  They are far from complete but you 
can see the starting samples at

http://www.gnuenterprise.org/~jamest/apis/

Again its partially a communications issue on our part.  The developers know 
this is in progress but it hasn't been well communicated to the list.

>
> Thank you, thank you taking the time to join this list and for all of
> your support on your gnue list. 

No problem.  The list activity at gnue has been a bit of a wake up call for 
me.  When GNUe was founded it was never my intention for things to become as 
closed as they have.  I plan to take the steps needed to show we're not a 
dead project as many believe

>You can find out more about Calendula at http://fudosys.com/Calendula.html.

Like I have time to read web sites.  I've got docs to write!

j/k I'll check it out this weekend =)

Take Care,
James

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