Fwd: Some personal thoughts and questions about Pharo

> From: Stéphane Ducasse <[hidden email]>
> Date: February 28, 2009 2:07:42 PM CEST
> To: Matthew Fulmer <[hidden email]>
> Cc: Marcus Denker <[hidden email]>
> Subject: Re: Some personal thoughts and questions about Pharo
>
> Hi matthew
>
>
>> Hi. I stumbled across a rather interesting email while I was
>> researching to write up my campaign platform for the squeak
>> election. Stef wrote this email 4 years ago, and it challenged a
>> lot of what I thought about Pharo:
>>
>> http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/squeak-dev/2005-January/087532.html
>>
>> It prompted me to write this email, and lay out exactly what I
>> think about Pharo, both good, bad, and not understood.
>
> Ok I think that this is important to have a look at what we did and  
> wrote in the past
> to understand our attitude today. Lot of people judge without really  
> knowing.
>
> This is not the best email I sent. but it just gives a facett of the  
> problem
>
>>> From what I can tell, this email was written just before you
>> guys started the 3.9 team.
>
> I imagine.
>
>> Firstly, I see that you have really cared about bug response
>> latency for a long time. I'm really glad you care and do
>> something about it.
>
> Yes.
> We cared also about transparency and trust.
> The idea is that I already said that to the squeakfoundation and I  
> gave up
> long time ago.
> If we do not give a chance to knowlegdaebale people to get a look then
> we failed. Once janko which I trust sent a fix for network and I  
> thought that
> we should integrate it but bert had a look and said it was not good.  
> So this makes me thing
> a lot. So if an opensource movement we do not have communication  
> then nothing good
> can happen.
>
> For 3.10 I proposed to ralph to help but he declined. They thought  
> we had no process
> and when I explained him what we were doing he said that this is  
> what he planed to do.
> I think that people thiught that ralph was Jesus but he was not.
>
>> Second, you solved this problem back then by releasing 3.9,
>> and now you are solving it thru Pharo. Why did you choose to
>> fork this time?
>>
>> If I may be blunt, I've long suspected that there are exactly
>> two reasons why you forked:
>> 1. Edgar J. De. Cleene
>> 2. Andreas Raab
>
> You are not blunt
> Been called a randomrefactorer is blunt. I do not want to tell more on
> that but we are a solid group of people all getting the same feeling  
> nd this is not
> because we are wash-brained. Just our experiences are following the  
> same line.
> Ask mike why andreas does not talk to him.
>
>> Thirdly, I've heard Stef mention a number of times that "Marcus
>> got burned", and therefore doesn't read squeak-dev, or no longer
>> runs for board, or several things most squeak people do.
>> However, this is by far the earliest mention of said burning
>> I've ever seen. I had assumed the burning was people (Edgar and
>> Andreas) complaining about Traits, but this was long before
>> that.
>
> marcus was burnt to the point of been sick of smalltalk.
> The problem is that marucs dreamt with us at bern about beauty and
> a better world and that people like andreas were most of the time
> negative and playing for themselves. Look at Tweak Andreas forked it
> even people working in Sophie did not have access to his branch.
>
>
>> What is it that happened to Marcus? If you are still bitter
>> about something that happened over 4 years ago, perhaps it is
>> time to forgive and re-join the squeak community.
>
> No we are not bitter. The squeak community has no vision except  
> toying with the past.
> If I would be you I would not lose my time there. We harvested since  
> squeak
> 3.6 and we did our best but it failed and it will fail.
>
>> As 3.11 release team leader, and Squeak board nominee, I'm
>> really excited about what you guys are doing with Pharo. From my
>> perspective, one thing you have done is take up the reigns for
>> harvesting bugs, and left the release team free to consider a
>> long-standing issue in the community: who is responsible for
>> merging bug fixes from one distribution to another, and how can
>> we make their lives easier
>
> No we did the only thing that make us breath again and not
> jump into ruby or python or just hack in our little corner
> stuff in VW or other.
> Pharo is not an accident this is a survival reflex.
> You know when you want to fix sometihng that a guy shout at you  
> because you push
> a fix in his package.... Then after a while you stop this is why  
> there are some
> fonts problem in 39 because we stop to harvest anything related to  
> andreas.
>
>
>> Another valuable thing you have done is show the community that
>> one image does not fit all; the monolithic image does not work
>> for anybody. Squeakland showed it does not work for end-users
>> Croquet showed it does not work for researchers.
>
> No Croquet shows nothing. Ask lombardi because he gave a presentation
> last year at ESUG and we felt he was just alone lost.
> And we are researcher much more than they :). Look at our  
> publication records.
> Now we want a good Smalltalk and make evolve: first class slots,  
> packages....
> It will take time but we will do it.
>
>> And now Pharo
>> shows that it does not work for developers. I really think that
>> Pharo finishes painting that picture in the minds of the
>> community, and you have thus paved the way for the release team
>> and the squeak board to get away from the monolithic image, and
>> toward modularity. I really think the community is ready now,
>> and it's all thanks to you guys. I intend to exploit this
>> opportunity.
>
> If you want. But I'm not sure that this is the right analysis.
>
>> I sent this email in private, because I don't think it would be
>> appropriate to ask some of these questions publicly. However,
>> feel free to reply to any of this in public, as you see fit.
>
> Sure I have no secret on that topic.
>
>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Matthew Fulmer -- http://mtfulmer.wordpress.com/
>>
>