Forum OpenACS Development: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: OACS 6 and beyond

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39: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: OACS 6 and beyond (response to 37)
Posted by Simon at TCB on 07/30/06 01:13 AM
You seem to have posted several in quick succession and I can't keep up ;)

I think my comment appears a little out of context. It is made in light of my opinion that doing the oracle bit was never supposed to be 'optional'.

But, I do understand the practical point you raise.

However, the 'pain' you describe is about a days work. Thats on fedora on an IBM laptop, and I am in no way an oracle expert. How often does this have to be done? Once a year maybe? You only need to get the thing starting to be able to prove some basic SQL code. Its not as if you have to spend a lot of time in maintenance or tuning.

Is that really such a barrier to entry?

It can't be financial either because Oracle is free for development purposes.

If that amount of work is really a barrier to willing contributors then I think you are right. It must surely have to be dropped.

And yes I agree. What we have will continue to work.. it'll just be a case of setting up a smaller, separate community to maintain it I guess.

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41: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: OACS 6 and beyond (response to 39)
Posted by Tracy Adams on 07/30/06 01:28 AM
It's not trivial to maintain both environments and make sure the work you do for one works for the other. I've done it when I was at Sloan, and it did add a good deal more the the development time and it's frustrating....

I'd vote for a process where it was easy to contribute with one, but also that we are organized enough that others can use the other.

We do want OpenACS to be used by a wide audience... and to a large extent each of us only has so many hours in the day and so much energy. It's fun to be part of the community and in an interchange where we help each other out.. and some time people just have to get the bills payed. To some extent, this takes a little more effort from participants.. and that level of extra effort should be reasonable.

I don't believe anyone is suggesting that we'd do anything with OpenACS so that there was a large obstacle to using Oracle. Or that someone else couldn't jump onto the team and volunteer to do that work.

It's just that the current arrangement (meaning Don doing the vast majority when he doesn't need it at all) isn't working.

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43: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: OACS 6 and beyond (response to 41)
Posted by Simon at TCB on 07/30/06 01:47 AM
Hi Tracy,

'..and to a large extent each of us only has so many hours in the day and so much energy'

And herein lies my dilemma also. And always has. We're a small consultancy, not a software house. If I had time to spare there are many other things I have to put higher up the list. Whilst we make use of OpenACS from time to time (and would like to do so more) it isn't the core of what,as XP consultants, we do. :(

So, yes, I accept that I can rant all I like, but, I can't contribute in the way I'd like, so I can't expect anything...

I just want to see this fully debated (and vigorously) before the decision can't be undone.

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49: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: OACS 6 and beyond (response to 39)
Posted by Don Baccus on 07/30/06 04:37 AM
Oracle support is not optional.

We support Oracle for oacs core 5.2.3. We will support Oracle for oacs core 5.3. When people break Oracle, we've told them to fucking stop it.

WE ARE TALKING ABOUT A METADECISION TO DECIDE A POINT IN TIME WHEN WE DROP ORACLE SUPPORT.

A fucking YEAR from now and you insult me and the rest of us who make this project work with just about everything short of having a whore for mother and a Brit for a father.

Nice way to try to convince the community to continue Oracle support.

And, I repeat: fork and The Oracle effort will implode. You really think all these people posting up, screaming, will suddenly step forward and maintain, test, and release new features?

HA HA HA! British humour rocks.

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55: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: OACS 6 and beyond (response to 49)
Posted by Simon at TCB on 07/30/06 10:56 AM
'Oracle support is not optional'.. well, at least we seem to agree on something.

Why you wish to take this so personally I don't know. You are not the one ingoring oracle, and I'm sure thats true of others. But *somebody* must be for there to be an issue and for you to be doing the majority of the work.

My frustration was directed at submitters who have not supported oracle sufficiently and who seem to be suggesting that is was someone elses responsibility all along.

Oh and just in case no one picked up on it I meant the core, just the core. I have in no way suggested at ANY point that this applies to application packages. Just the CORE. I did not think this was unreasonable.

But, if you estimate 50% effort for that (and I confess I did not realise the figure was so high) then I can accept that it is simply not practical.

I accept, you are right and I am wrong. I should have stayed out of it, and therefore I hope everyone will have the good sense to dis-regard my inappropriate comments.

Thank you all for you efforts in the past, and my best wishes for the future.

Simon

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58: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: OACS 6 and beyond (response to 55)
Posted by Don Baccus on 07/30/06 06:38 PM
"'Oracle support is not optional'.. well, at least we seem to agree on something."

When we talk about a metadecision to decide when we will decide that this will no longer be true, just what do you think this means?

People in this thread are reacting as though we propose to drop Oracle support NOW rather than talking about talking about possibly dropping it a YEAR FROM NOW.

Sheesh.

Now ... you really think that forking a project to support Oracle yourselves would be easier than supporting Oracle within the existing structure of the community?

That's a joke. It would be harder, not easier. Since no one is willing to do it today, why would they be willing to do it tomorrow?

Nick's absolutely right in this.

The 50% estimate is for reasonably stable code where little new development is done. Testing takes as much time for Oracle as it does for PG, you can't take shortcuts and assume that something that works under PG will also work under Oracle. Surely none of you are that naive.