Re: a small summary - ?

[Michael Meeks <michael helixcode com>]

Hi Mathieu,

On 23 Oct 2000, Mathieu Lacage wrote:
> I personally have the strange feeling that Michael, Miguel and the
> other Michael are trying to enforce something I see as completely
> unlogical: major renames everywhere.

	What !? no, this is totaly contrary to what we are trying to
achieve. We are trying to achieve a minimum of renames across all
free software projects, and the least pain to all developers.

>         - studly caps

	This has been beaten to death on gnome-hackers.

>         - the X

	I don't like the XCell -> Cell thing, as previously
discussed, I criticised this action; read my previous posts on the
subject ( there are only about 5 so it should be easy ).

	However, nothing we do in bonobo needs to involve the
adoption of the convention of naming our 'service' descriptors
with an 'X' prefix.

	The Sun guys have what is known as a published API; this
means that lots of people are using it, and developments have to
be backwards compatible. This means if we say:

	 "Well I'm sorry but you should rename all 'X's in your
	method names to be 'V's"

	then _IF_ they do it, which seems extremely unlikely they
have to create thousands of classes that map the new API to the
old one; a very tedious and pointless process. Similarly with
stdlycaps, it is not feasible to rename their entire API ( parts
of which will move to bonobo, parts of which will be used as is )
and it would be a disaster area not to have consistancy across
the component world ( which extends well beyond Gnome ). Can you
see this ?

	Conversely, if we do sufficiently technicaly astute
adaptation of the ( as yet unreleased ) bonobo, then we can
minimise the global impact of the changes and make the platform
more attractive to all concerned.

> What I cannot get and there might be a logical explanation to this
> which I would dearly like to hear is why those changes are necessary
> for the integration in open office:

	No; I don't think this is what needs prooving, we want
everyone to be using the same API across the Bonobo world. Tell me
why your approach, which seems to make you feel good about it makes
more sense than the change ( which is not difficult to change; in
fact a simple Sed job for the most part ).

> I cannot understand why they cannot use either a different naming
> convention when trying to access bonobo interfaces or a wrapper for
> bonobo interfaces. Is it soo difficult to get used to different
> naming schemes and architectures ?

	Do you want Bonobo to be something StarOffice 'tries to
access' or for it to be the foundation of their component strategy.
We are not looking at some feeble 'Bonobo compatibility' bullet point
here we are looking at a common Unix component model.

> To summarize how I feel about all this: "It is just like hitting
> wall of concrete with bare fists". It seems as if all the people on
> the list had already made their minds about what they want to
> do. Discussion seem to be useless unless we agree with them.

	Well; we have spent a very long time talking about this and
we have presented our arguments; why is this like hitting a wall of
concrete ? it is not the case that everyone can win in a situation
where groups of people want A and !A simultaneously.

> The main purpose of this post is to point out my growing frustration
> because of this obvious unwillingness to compromise. I know others
> feel the same. So, if what I described is not something which is
> done on purpose I would strongly suggest interested parties to think
> about it.

	Compromise !? perhaps we could have every other method
stdlycapsified and the rest '_'d ? is that a compromise ? or is you
getting what you want a compromise ? As the maintainers we have already
made the decision ( after much discussion ) to do the change. This is
for the reasons, as previously presented at _great_ length and time
wastage on gnome-hackers. We have done this in the best interests of
the creation of a wider Unix component model, compatibility with
existing component models and their users, ease of integration with
another huge free software product (OpenOffice) and I don't understand
why you are bringing this issue up again.

> If I were not working at Eazel right now, I would already have
> unsubscribed from this list and quit the Gnome project.  It is far
> from being fun anymore and quiting is what I will do when I go back
> to university in december

	Well, it is quite beyond me why this is no fun any more; I
still enjoy working on Bonobo, and I too prefer '_'s to stdlycaps.  I
think if a minor naming standard change can ruin your whole view of
the Gnome project then perhaps you are taking life too personaly.

> (I hear people doing happy sounds at this but those people who are
> happy to see me get out soon should wonder how such a happy
> enthousiastic young lad as me turned into a bitter old asshole so
> quickly)

	Well; I'm afraid it is rather beyond me how you stopped being
an enthusiastic young lad and fell for the 'the bonobo maintainers are
all evil' gag. [1] I havn't experienced much of this bitterness
though. Perhaps you should step back and consider our total lack of
motive for this evilness :-)

> I hope the above mail will make people think. I even folishly
> believe it might make them change their behaviour.

	What 'behavior' do you want changing ? we have discussed this
point endlessly, and I have read _every_ mail against and for the
argument. I am not ignoring the other point of view, I have tried to
inject balance, reason and fact into the debate where possible. The
fact that we made a decision that is in the best interests of the
wider free software community ( try getting the OpenOffice hackers
to vote if you want a vote; there are 400 or so of them ) and in the
interests of many people who, as yet, do not use Bonobo. Also, I
do not judge consensus by the bulk of mail sent on the issue, but
by who sends it and how reasoned it is. Some people are very
prolific senders of mail.

	We can't do better than consider all the users and future
users wishes. I'm sorry that the decision so profoundly disagrees
with you, but we have to make tough decisions sometimes, and the
decision is a compromise.

	Regards,

		Michael.

[1] - NB. for historical context see the preponderence of 'Miguel is
Evil' style mail on gnome-hackers over the last years whenever a big
decision had to be taken, unfortunately due to me being involved in
this decisions it seems 'Michael is Evil' has been appended to the
mantra.

-- 
 mmeeks gnu org  <><, Pseudo Engineer, itinerant idiot