So what will we do? (was [Zope] What causes the community to stall so often?)

[Derek Simkowiak]

	This has been a very interesting thread, with many good points.  
Thanks to all who have posted.

	There were a couple of points I thought were complete rubbish.  
Like the idea that Zope is "more complex" than PHP, and thus can't be as
well-documented.  I'm sorry, but "functions" are no more easy to document
than "object hierarchies".  (OOP theory would state quite the opposite, in
fact.)

	Compare Zope and MySQL.  Both have the same business model, both
are popular OSS products, and both have similar target
markets/communities.  Yet the MySQL documentation (both the User Manual
and the developer's docs) are far more extensive than Zope's.  PHP, GTK+,
Qt, Apache, the Linux Operating System, SGI's OpenGL, SDL, the Python
programming language, and the Perl programming language all have
documentation that far surpasses that of Zope.  Even smaller one-man
projects like PyUI, or Pango, do a better job than Zope.org.

	It would be great if we understood why.

	Could it be that Zope community is just 'different'?  Maybe, but I
doubt it, because the Zope community overlaps with the PHP, MySQL, and
Apache communities quite heavily.  With the exception of the Linux
Documentation Project (which has an almost unlimited scope, everything
from Linux Quake install to RAID), docs are not written by the community.

	Having watched and participated in a few OSS projects, I've
observed that almost all OSS documents are written by the people doing the
coding.  The PHP functions were documented by the guys who wrote those PHP
functions.  Note that a name on most of the Python docs is "Guido Van
Russum" (who ironically enough works for Zope Corp).  Most of the Apache
docs were written by the core Apache developers.  All of the Pango docs
were written by Owen Taylor.

	Could it be Zope Corp's lack of prioritization?  Maybe Zope Corp.
management believes that "if you're busy writing docs, you're not busy
developing", and so has set a mandate.  Or more likely, Zope Corp just has
a developer-centric company culture, and we all know how much developers
like to write docs (right, Andreas? :).

	My personal opinion is that Zope Corp needs to realize that the
community is faltering due to lack of docs, and re-prioritize.  No,
writing docs won't bring in cash directly.  No, developers are not happy
retrofitting docs for production-level code.  But as somebody who stuck my
neck out for Zope, and is now realizing how hard it is to find up-to-date
info, I think this is a fair thing to ask of Zope Corp.

	Sitting on my desk right now are _The Zope Book_, _Zope Web
Application Development and Content Management_, and _Zope web application
construction kit_.  They are mostly very good stuff, and given the present
situation on Zope.org, I recommend them to anyone interested in Zope.

	Unfortunately, books can't keep up with issues (like Office XP and
WebDAV), and the HowTos (or even mini-HowTos) just aren't getting written.



Thank You,
Derek Simkowiak