[Zope3-dev] Re: Rid the term 'product'

[Philipp von Weitershausen]

Roger ineichen wrote:
> I tried this to say before, for me is more important to show
> how you can develope in Zope3 and explain the new concepts.
> That's a reason for to use a (in Zope2) unused word like components.
> Such a new word has the posibility to map, a new concept,
> in the brains, of Zope2 users.

You are absolutely right. We need to make sure people grasp these new 
ideas. Terminology undoubtedly plays an important part if you want to 
achieve that. And yes, the term 'component' is well defined right now, 
much better than 'application', 'extension', or even 'package'. But like 
I've tried to make clear in an earlier response, 'component' misses the 
meaning of it all.

> The word products in Zope2 was for me not such a problem.
> Somebody can say the new name for products is xy, but
> what was really hard, is to try out everey product and to
> find out by itself what's really works.
> 
> For me is much important to separate the good supported
> products form the ... one. And find a concept we can 
> manage this.
> 
> What's about a kind of "commenting" or "ranking" of good
> Zope3 products, components, packages, bundles, distributions 
> or whatevery you whana call this files.
> 
> We need new concepts for to present Zope3 and not only 
> better names. This does not mean that I'm against this 
> names. I think all of you are right with the meaning of 
> them. But just new concepts can make the life easier and 
> not the new names.

We already have the new concepts; it's (better) names we're looking for 
now. A 'product' in Zope3 is nothing like a 'product' in Zope2, that's 
why I want to stop calling it that way. This is all the discussion I 
personally would like to have right now.

Writing good products, distinguishing good from bad products, etc. is 
something that is partially already addressed or will be addressed 
naturally as Zope3 comes along.

> In my beginning with working with Zope I was enthusiastic
> to see concepts like Sprint's or words like ZClasses.
> This was the *Z*-way to do things and that wasn't bad.

Note that, while being innovative, Zope3 does not want to impose a 
special *Z*-way anymore. We don't want to call our packages something 
else than the python people do and have our own class types that have 
weird and confusing inheritance rules, just because we think it's 
necessary. The lesson we learned in Zope 2 and applied in Zope 3 is 
"back to the roots of Python" and "back to the place where people 
understand our terminology".

If there ever was a *Z*-way of doing things ("Z-shaped learning curve"), 
then it's hard to define what it is in Zope3. I guess the only thing you 
can put a sticker on is the Component Architecture, which *does* impose 
a development scheme. That's your innovation right there.

> So, I know, I came all the time with my stupid comments 
> on wrong topics, to long mails and in a really bad english, 
> but don't hate me because of this. I have just have a wrong 
> linked brain and see the things most the time different 
> then others. But sometimes together with normal thinking 
> peoples can grow great ideas. ;-)

Discussion is good and important, I just don't think your points are 
appropriate for *this* discussion. That doesn't mean they are not valid 
points! As I said above, I agree with some of them (with others I 
don't), but I don't think they fit in here.

All I want is to find a new word for 'products'. And I'm happy about 
copying a word here if people are familiar with that word. There is no 
sense in saying "Hey look, we're nothing like the other guys, because 
our terminology is completely different. That makes us special!". So, it 
won't hurt to call something a 'package', 'library', or 'extension' if 
everbody else is calling it that way. In fact, that's what I want.

Philipp