[squeak-dev] Re: Squeak Forks Popularity & Trends Estimate

Nevin -

Now that's a -5 troll if I've ever seen one. Please, everyone let's not
get into pointless "oh, my god, the sky is falling" discussions.

At Squeak.org we got our work carved out for us. Here is what we need to
concentrate on: Fix our processes, enable contributions, discuss
strategy. Part of that strategy discussion obviously needs to include
positioning but there is really no point in dwelling about who is the
most popular Squeak in town.

Cheers,
   - Andreas

Andreas Raab wrote:
It's not intended to be a troll.  Right now we are running a large (to
me) commercial website on Squeak/Seaside, but Seaside seems to be moving
to Pharo.  Do I move to?  I've got a commercial interest in this, and
anything I do involves costs.  I'd like to minimize those costs, if at
all possible.

And, there's nothing wrong with your opinion-- it's another data point,
and I thank you for it.  It shows strong support for the base Squeak
distro, and that's what my site is running right now.  I'm glad to see
that support.

Nevin

Nevin Pratt wrote:
> And, there's nothing wrong with your opinion-- it's another data point,
> and I thank you for it.  It shows strong support for the base Squeak
> distro, and that's what my site is running right now.  I'm glad to see
> that support.

If your question is about whether Squeak will be supported over the next
years, then the answer is: Yes. As you can see we are currently trying
to fix our processes and get the contribution process unstuck. We are
working diligently to join the SFC and give use the same legal backing
that other large OSS projects have. We are very close to having a
squeaky-clean MIT licensed 4.0 release. And I'm pretty sure we still got
most of the mindshare. It doesn't mean that some communities go with an
alternative for some time, but to be honest, the judgement about the
longevity of these alternatives is still out and having run two of such
efforts in the past I know full well how difficult it is to capture
enough mindshare and what effective competition looks like.

Squeak is dead? Don't get me laughing.

Cheers,
   - Andreas

Nevin Pratt wrote: My personal view is that in the process of doing all this work on pharo,
and recruiting all these developers away from squeak, the pharo guys
have done absolutely nothing at all to make your job easier. The net
result is that a group of people, outside of your control have ended up
making unnecessary work for you and for every other squeak package
maintainer (of which I have some 16 active projects)

This is why I have stayed with squeak. Because I feel we can achieve the
same results through specific focused planned and integrated projects,
while at the same time appreciating the process of migration and the
needs of existing users.

just my 2p

Keith

Andreas Raab wrote:
In my opinion, Squeak will never die.  I never said it would, and I
never intended to even imply it would.  I'm sorry if you mistook it that
way.

My question was also not intended to imply whether or not any particular
distro would or would not be supported over the years.

Furthermore, I personally think that having multiple forks for multiple
purposes is entirely reasonable.  And all of them can be supported, and
many of them *will* be supported.  I personally think that's fine.

But it's still interesting to look at trends.  My questions were
specifically meant to try to fish out community perceptions about trends
regarding the application of development resources from a finite
development resource pool.  Nothing more.

When you say "I'm pretty sure we still got most of the mindshare", that
statement also is interesting, because it implies doubt-- and that doubt
would not have even existed (in my opinion) a few years ago.

Also, for what it's worth, I currently have no plans to move off of
Squeak and onto Pharo.  If I were going to move the site right now, the
most likely candidate would be GLASS (GemStone).

Nevin
 

Hi Nevin -

Nevin Pratt wrote:
> In my opinion, Squeak will never die.  I never said it would, and I
> never intended to even imply it would.  I'm sorry if you mistook it that
> way.

I didn't. I used your comments to make a statement to "whom it may
concern" ;-) Hope you didn't take it personally (if so, I apologize).

> Furthermore, I personally think that having multiple forks for multiple
> purposes is entirely reasonable.  And all of them can be supported, and
> many of them *will* be supported.  I personally think that's fine.

I do, too.

> When you say "I'm pretty sure we still got most of the mindshare", that
> statement also is interesting, because it implies doubt-- and that doubt
> would not have even existed (in my opinion) a few years ago.

Trust me, coming from me that statement implies no doubt whatsoever ;-)
I've been merely trying to be polite.

Cheers,
   - Andreas

Nevin Pratt wrote:
> Furthermore, I personally think that having multiple forks for
> multiple purposes is entirely reasonable.  And all of them can be
> supported, and many of them *will* be supported.  I personally think
> that's fine.
>
I do too. As an example of this, I'd like to point out that NetBSD,
FreeBSD, OpenBSD and DragonflyBSD are all quite alive and they're forks
from the same codebase for different purposes, and there is a great deal
of cross-pollination between them.

On Mon, 06 Jul 2009 03:56:59 +0200, Nevin Pratt wrote:

Hi Nevin,

when I have to base a project on an alternate framework, then there are at  
least two things that I have to value: available resources and available  
skills (both long term, of course). And I have done such decisions for  
many decades (counting, 1, 2, 3, ...).

I have never based such a decision on popularity, even if that meant that  
then we are the very first user of a framework.

Just another 0.05 CHF.

/Klaus

> And, there's nothing wrong with your opinion-- it's another data point,  
> and I thank you for it.  It shows strong support for the base Squeak  
> distro, and that's what my site is running right now.  I'm glad to see  
> that support.
>
> Nevin
>
>
>



--
"If at first, the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it".  
Albert Einstein