[Zope-CMF] Re: concerns regarding plone

[David (Hamish) Harvey]

--On Monday, August 19, 2002 13:27:19 -0400 Jeff Kowalczyk <jtk@yahoo.com> 
wrote:

> Robert Rottermann wrote:
>> I have concerns regarding the way Plone evolves. Some two weeks ago
> runyaga
>> announced that a Plone 1.0 version will be released within hours after
>> CMF 1.3 hits the street.
>
> FWIW, I am grateful to have worthwhile API changes happen now, because

FWIW, likewise.

> we'd be stuck with the alternative for an entire 1.x series. Upgrading
> deployed portals later would be painful. A lot of template content and
> python content products will be built on Plone 1.0, and that's effort
> that multiplies with API shortcomings or misfeatures, so Plone should
> take as long as it needs to become fully baked. </$.02>

I see your 2 cents and raise you another 1 or so, to make it British and 2 
pence :-)

Exactly. I have a site running on a now venerable version of Plone. I'm 
deep in PhD thesis writing at the moment, so it's been put on hold for a 
while. It continues to run, but isn't getting much traffic - it's already 
proving its worth though just in letting me keep it up to date with 
content. When I get back to it, I'll start bringing it up to date with the 
latest Plone - which may or may not be 1.0 by that time. I won't update the 
production site unless or until Plone 1.0 is released. But the changes 
under discussion sound to me as if they are so worthwhile (I'm passively 
monitoring the list in amazement - way to go, guys) that I'd prefer them to 
be included in v1.

The counter argument I guess is that this could go on forever - freeping 
creaturitis. If you substitute "feature" for "bug" in the poem "the last 
bug", you get close (ok, it doesn't quite work):

http://www.tuatha.org/~mpk/weirdness/last-bug.html

The point is though that the changes being made are fundamental 
rationalisations and basic improvements in the way Plone works. 
Flexibility, extensibility, usability all look set to be drastically 
improved. And if Plone 1.0 was released without the basic mechanisms in 
place, then the developers would end up supporting a Plone 1.0 series for 
those who jumped on board early, and a later series with the changes for 
those who waited/updated. If a release was made without them, a raft more 
people would build sites with Plone who then weren't willing or able to 
move to 2.0 (say).

Compare calculators --- HP get it right first time, sell the same one for 
years, Casio put out a new one every week --- or <troll>programming 
languages --- java, perl, (dare I say it) python have periodic substantial 
changes, SmallTalk was right from the outset and has barely changed in 20 
years</troll>.

So, I say +1 - get it right, then release. See y'all again in November.

Cheers,
Hamish