World: r3wp

petr, if it's Core only as you say, what would be different from 
the current status of R3? just bug fixes? so why should people here 
wait for xmas for? i really don't understand. if we want release 
early, forget features, just release what you have and make it clear 
that there is no support. if you want a final product you can use 
in production, just wait until all bugs are fixed and everything 
is settled on, which could be three months or three years depending 
on what the community asks for and which bugs they find.

Gabriele - no, no bug fixes only - R3 alpha has one and only scheme 
- http - where is pop, ftp, smtp?

So, from the practical core like usability, it is missing some very 
important things. So my suggestion was - finish schemes, update/improve 
dll, describe embeddability and porting, if time permits, add own 
console and rebservices (not necessarily)

And R3/Core 3.1 - add rebcode as a base. Ppl already found its uses. 
IMO it was already usefull and it is a pity it was later excluded 
from the Core ...

Gabriele - what you propose is still the same song - no product development 
strategy. Read also Greggs comments - noone knows what should do 
what, when some feature comes etc.

But - if I should choose between the project staying closed, or release 
in current state, then let's release and not frustrate ppl further. 
I was trying to offer some intermediate solution, a little bit better 
organised effort ...

I think your instincts are right Pekr

If a release happens to this group, people will have to understand 
that it's a work in progress and commenting on design decisions and 
general behavior after limited use is not recommended. Spend time 
in the docbase and on the bug tracker to see if an issue has been 
discussed. Current VID3 bugs are not in the tracker, due to its incomplete 
state, so there are probably 50 of those lurking.


If you find a bug that causes a crash, i.e. WinXP's bug report window 
and it isn't in the tracker, then it should of course be placed there.

Petr's proposal sounds very good to me. Except that RebCode is probably 
a luxury at this moment

Reading the R3 alpha changelog, it is clear that Core and View are 
developed together now. While I know that this leads to a balanced, 
integrated product, it is an enormous blocker to release anything. 
This is redoing a decade of existing work. There is a point that 
you must decide that the Core/View integration issues are worked 
out far enough to focus on the first development release, and that 
must naturally be Core

petr, what would having pop or imap change? (btw, ftp... that's a 
mess of a protocol. find someone wanting to write that one :P) i 
really don't understand the point. pop and imap are "trivial". VID 
is the focus. i can't wast time on pop now. that can be done later 
on. i must spend my time on what's important - VID. having an R2-like 
R3 is just crazy. R2 is already here.

Well, there's not much point in repeating myself

Yes, at some time the decision has to be done, but I don't think 
we're talking about a developers release now. A developers release 
won't happen in the timeframe you are wishing for. So what we're 
talking is trash release (or pre-developer - by pure conincidence 
some things might work ...) so there's no need to add anything to 
this release just to give it the look of a developer release.

It looks like from what Gabriele is saying, it's at a state where 
one can write their own protocols such as pop, and imap

Gabriele - I really don't understand your aproach. I don't believe 
you are able to finish VID sooner than in few months of work. You 
seem not to be able to understand fundamental reason behind what 
I say. I dare to say, that developers should not be allowed to talk 
how to aproach product strategies, sorry ;-)

I have to be really critical here, but guys, that is becoming really 
childish.

You act like anyone is able to write imap or pop protocols themselves. 
And yes, ftp might be the mess, so we are not going to have one, 
right?

But never mind, Carl will soon decide about further aproach ....

Petr;  I'll defend Gabriele on this.  Yes I would say most REBOL 
developers can code schemes given the motivation and due diligence 
reading the IETF docs.  I count myself amongst the clowns and after 
a few days I had a dict: scheme converted from old Jeff Kries code 
that I'm pretty proud of.  It would be a little different if that 
work had been in a vacuum, but it's not.  There are templates already 
and the RFCs are well established professional specs.  Am I dutifully 
impressed with some rebol's code, absolutely, but don't underestimate 
the power of "average" REBOL coders.

yes, but there is new anync kernel you need to adapt it to .....

And my opinion still is, that developers should not be allowed to 
define product strategy. And if so, they can surely contribute, but 
there should be the strategy. From the public pov, it seems like 
there is not one ...

marketing team
 should work one step before development team.

That point I will agree on.  Skill sets are skill sets.

Pekr, you can say that about many things. There are many protocols. 
Which one should go in first? HTTP was logical here. Now which one 
goes next? If Gabriele spends time on FTP and not on VID, I can't 
work on skinning. It could be other things, but VID is far more important 
right now than FTP, because FTP is probably fairly trivial to do, 
but still a one-man project that should be done when Gabriele can 
be free to do that.

but - all that escalation had to happen in order for Carl to react 
to current situation. So I take it happened for the good, and I hope 
it will result in some actions which are for the good of whole group.

Henrik - as a developer, you should understand priorities.

And you seem not to.

pekr, I do. you are the one ignoring priorities between developers.

Petr;  I'm chuckling as I type this ... so take it for what it is 
...

Hey!  Stop dissin' the developers!

:)

Thank you, Brian :-)

We talk two complety separated issues here. First is my proposal 
to AT LEAST release Core like products. You talk about current development 
aproach. Of course VID is more important. But you still describe 
model which is happening here, which is like without any strategy 
being defined.

yes, that would be a good argument, but Carl wants VID out as quickly 
as possible.

Henrik - we will see ....

gotta go to the other world. Carl is delivering a lot of info right 
now :-)

I think there is strategy...we may not be in that loop...yet.  And 
I'll agree it's a little frustrating, mainly because we all feel 
and care deeply.  We all want "better" for REBOL.

Brian - many of my words here are not because of my comfort. But 
I bear with guys as Graham, Kaj, and others ....

I agree completely.  Let's push to get more people included.  There 
are people here who have put in the time and just deserve an open 
door, or at the very very least, a window seat.

It seems we are starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel 
:-)

yeah, that was a quick turnaround there :-)

petr: no matter how much time does vid take, either we release in 
whatever state it is, or we wait until it's finished. inventing something 
unrelated like adding pop just takes time from the end goal of R3, 
and does not help anyone. people want a toy to play it? so, let's 
just release early and often, no matter how badly it crashes or how 
much it destroys your hd - we put a warning in there. people want 
a finished product? then, just wait until it is there, and don't 
tell me you want a date for it, because noone in the world is able 
to give you one.

petr... yes... anyone is able to write imap or pop. i don't think 
i'm a god or something like that, you know.

If someone needs pop, imap or ftp now, probably he will write it 
self. If it's not good enough for official R3, discard it. Someone 
else will try again.

I would prefer R3 now, even if it is unfinished, but with a clear 
plan and roadmap what it should support and what not.

And from time to time the roadmap should be updated to the reality.

Gabriele, it is not going to be a toy. By playing with it, we can 
adjust our brains to it and be ready when R3 is ready, and we can 
even help. This is the very way a community works. Either you want 
a community or you don't

A community has to be developed together with the product

I'd rather have a polished R3/core sooner than later, same goes for 
R3/View. I don't have any inside into the current development state, 
so I don't know how much it will take to get a polished product ready.

On the other hand, I feel it is really important for the community 
to see _something_. To be able to adjust, learn, be ready.

Maybe some people will see the the current state, and think that 
this isn't worth their time, but nowadays people should know about 
alpha, beta, pre-alpha, development ... versions.

And Pekr, yes, everyone _can_ code a pop / imap / ... protocol in 
rebol. You may not yet be abel to, but you can. On the other hand, 
you can't code the port system, or view basics, because wou would 
need access to the c source code.

We're going to end up with two groups of people ... those with 1 
year or more of R3 experience, and the others with none

On the bright side, the R3 coders won't have time to delve into Syllable 
Server ;-)