Raising barriers

[Rui Silva <fl...@rduartes.net>]

Hi,

It's about 2 o'clock in the morning  here in Portugal and I just went 
through the last of today's (yesterday's?) posts on the mailing list and I 
must confess that having gone through them all in a short period of time it 
does look like we're trying really hard to find ways this project could or 
should fail.

Don't get me wrong, I love things being discussed in the list (The current 
discussion around the component model is a bliss to read), but there's a 
lot of other stuff that seems to raise more barriers than to actually find 
the energy to move forward.

Come on guys! This is our project now! We'll make it whatever we want it to 
be. There's no need to dig up old ghosts and try to reason out some things 
that are unreasonable, largely by nature. And we need a lot of momentum, we 
can't afford to wander off and spend time and energy on incidental facts. 
The world is looking at us right now! They're anxious to see what comes out 
of here and we're charged with the gigantic task of keep this behemoth 
called Flex alive and make it even better so that it can survive in a 
changing world.

I'll take this chance to make a statement of intent: I will not engage nor 
answer to threads that basically deal with things that have no real 
influence on the immediate future of Flex and how we can bring that to 
fruition. My time is too precious and instead of doing that I'll try to 
find ways to fix and improve this awesome applications development 
framework (any mention to RIA, Web or any other specification intentionally 
left out)!

I'm here to stay and I'll dedicate as much of me as I can spare to help out 
the Flex community. If I may so bold to do so, I'd ask everyone to recheck 
their commitment to the project and decide if and how they wish to be here 
too.

Sorry if I'm sounding a bit dramatical, but I sincerely think that right 
now, we're the biggest menace to Flex's survival. Fortunately we're it 
greatest hope too, so let's make that happen. Alex and Carol, not to put 
more pressure on the amazing effort you guys are already doing, but we 
really need that code and JIRA ported as soon as humanly possible. I have 
complete faith that you will do your absolute best.

Cheers,
Rui 

Re: Raising barriers

[Peter Elst <pe...@gmail.com>]

> I'll be careful to not create additional barriers for this project.
>

Thank you Raju, I think we're all aware well of some of the possible
obstacles but trying to focus on the here and now to move things forward.

As the *cliché* says: "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single
step" :)

- Peter

Re: Raising barriers

[Raju Bitter <ra...@googlemail.com>]

I've thought again about Rui's comments, and I think he's right: The
first thing Apache Flex needs is a positive start, and not additional
barriers. The Apache Flex community has to proof that the community is
capable of releasing a first version of  Apache Flex, and to have the
project infrastructure setup in (source code, Jira, etc.).

Maybe I'm a bit too concerned that there might be too much influence
by Adobe on the future of the project, but the discussions in the
mailing list should have ensured me that the community is strong
enough to make Apache Flex fly.

Thanks, Rui, for your valuable comment. I especially appreciate that
extremely friendly general tone of your message, something you don't
always see in open source community discussions.

I'll be careful to not create additional barriers for this project.

Best,
Raju

Re: Raising barriers

[Sebastian Mohr <ma...@gmail.com>]

1+

On Jan 11, 2012, at 3:04 AM, Rui Silva wrote:

> Alex and Carol, not to put 
> more pressure on the amazing effort you guys are already doing, but we 
> really need that code and JIRA ported as soon as humanly possible. I have 
> complete faith that you will do your absolute best.

@Alex and @Carol ... and when you have finished, 
you should go on vacation for a while! Really stressful 
times, I guess.


-- Sebastian

Re: Raising barriers

[Raju Bitter <ra...@googlemail.com>]

2012/1/11 Paul Evans <pa...@creative-cognition.co.uk>:
>
> On 11 Jan 2012, at 02:04, Rui Silva wrote:
>
>> look like we're trying really hard to find ways this project could or
>> should fail
>
> I have to say I personally didn't reach that conclusion from anything so far written.
Thanks, Paul. I think that everyone within the Flash/Flex community
had their share of heated discussions around the technology. Most of
us would probably prefer to not get into another one of those,
including me. That doesn't mean that I'm not going to voice my
concerns, though. :-)

In his presentation at the Flex summit Roy Fielding said: "The main
benefit of open source is independence of any particular vendor".
That's very true!

But even If I am concerned with some aspects of the Apache Flex setup,
I don't want to make it more difficult for other community members
like Rui or Alex to quickly get started working on a first release of
Flex. The activity of a the community, and the resulting releases will
be the best proof that there's enough life in the Flex community to
make something happen for us.

- Raju

Re: Raising barriers

[Paul Evans <pa...@creative-cognition.co.uk>]

On 11 Jan 2012, at 02:04, Rui Silva wrote:

> look like we're trying really hard to find ways this project could or 
> should fail

I have to say I personally didn't reach that conclusion from anything so far written.

IMO, where people perceive issues I'd much rather they were aired and on the list where they can be addressed, or deferred if there are no clear answers yet. For questions not to be asked, or to be asked and ignored, just because it might not look great in pr terms or might be perceived as a lack of commitment to the cause would imo be far more damaging long term.

Open, frank, honest, dispassionate questions and answers get my vote - no matter how 'difficult' the subject. So far that's how I've read pretty much everything on this list.

Other than that point - I appreciate positive energy in the original post and concur with the desire to make this a success.

Re: Raising barriers

[Omar Gonzalez <om...@gmail.com>]

> But I don't want to spend any more time discussing it right now.  We need
to
> get a couple of regular release in ActionScript as we know it out the
door.
>
> --
> Alex Harui
> Flex SDK Team
> Adobe Systems, Inc.
> http://blogs.adobe.com/aharui
>
>

+1 - let's take that first step...

Re: Raising barriers

[Raju Bitter <ra...@googlemail.com>]

And you are right, Alex and Carol are doing an amazing job, which I'm
very thankful for.

Re: Raising barriers

[Alex Harui <ah...@adobe.com>]

On 1/11/12 2:43 AM, "Raju Bitter" <ra...@googlemail.com> wrote:

> If you want to turn Apache Flex into a software development team
> outside Adobe, executing an Adobe roadmap for Flex, well that's not
> what I'm interested in.
Independence from Adobe would be a good thing.  But we have been cautioned
many times already about trying to create roadmaps for an Apache project.
It doesn't matter how many folks care about cross-compilation or if we
somehow state that is or isn't in the vision.  The only thing that matters
is if someone actually makes it happen.

AFIAK, there are no Adobe barriers related to the cross-compilation issue.
But I don't want to spend any more time discussing it right now.  We need to
get a couple of regular release in ActionScript as we know it out the door.

-- 
Alex Harui
Flex SDK Team
Adobe Systems, Inc.
http://blogs.adobe.com/aharui

Re: Raising barriers

[Raju Bitter <ra...@googlemail.com>]

> I'll take this chance to make a statement of intent: I will not engage nor
> answer to threads that basically deal with things that have no real
> influence on the immediate future of Flex and how we can bring that to
> fruition.
Good point, but at the beginning of the project I like to have a clear
understanding of what the targets of Apache Flex are, and what parts
of the underlying technology are still controlled by Adobe (which
means, taken care off by Adobe).

It might not matter to you, but to me the investment into the project
is long-term. I'd say that the development approach with ActionScript
3, the XML language for UI layout, and the great IDE integration
(powerful IDEs by various vendors) is one of the most powerful
packages you can get right now for web development.

Adobe has been seeing Flex mainly as a product, which adds to the
revenue stream of the company (which is exactly what the company
should do). I believe that the conversion into a community-driven open
source project offers the chance to create a vision for Flex, which
would not have been possible inside Adobe. Therefore - in my eyes - it
makes sense to understand how much additional freedom an Apache Flex
has (standards used within the framework, trademarks which affect the
open source project or underlying technologies, etc.).

If you want to turn Apache Flex into a software development team
outside Adobe, executing an Adobe roadmap for Flex, well that's not
what I'm interested in. Therefore the project - from the start -
should show the willingness to improve Flex, but in the long term to
reduce the dependency on Adobe. And Adobe would profit from that as
well, since the increased credibility of Flex as a technology would
help them sell their products as well.

Cheers,
Raju

RE: Raising barriers

["Skogen, Espen" <es...@jpmorgan.com>]

I second that..

E


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-----Original Message-----
From: Rui Silva [mailto:flex@rduartes.net] 
Sent: 11 January 2012 02:05
To: flex-dev@incubator.apache.org
Subject: Raising barriers

Hi,

It's about 2 o'clock in the morning  here in Portugal and I just went 
through the last of today's (yesterday's?) posts on the mailing list and I 
must confess that having gone through them all in a short period of time it 
does look like we're trying really hard to find ways this project could or 
should fail.

Don't get me wrong, I love things being discussed in the list (The current 
discussion around the component model is a bliss to read), but there's a 
lot of other stuff that seems to raise more barriers than to actually find 
the energy to move forward.

Come on guys! This is our project now! We'll make it whatever we want it to 
be. There's no need to dig up old ghosts and try to reason out some things 
that are unreasonable, largely by nature. And we need a lot of momentum, we 
can't afford to wander off and spend time and energy on incidental facts. 
The world is looking at us right now! They're anxious to see what comes out 
of here and we're charged with the gigantic task of keep this behemoth 
called Flex alive and make it even better so that it can survive in a 
changing world.

I'll take this chance to make a statement of intent: I will not engage nor 
answer to threads that basically deal with things that have no real 
influence on the immediate future of Flex and how we can bring that to 
fruition. My time is too precious and instead of doing that I'll try to 
find ways to fix and improve this awesome applications development 
framework (any mention to RIA, Web or any other specification intentionally 
left out)!

I'm here to stay and I'll dedicate as much of me as I can spare to help out 
the Flex community. If I may so bold to do so, I'd ask everyone to recheck 
their commitment to the project and decide if and how they wish to be here 
too.

Sorry if I'm sounding a bit dramatical, but I sincerely think that right 
now, we're the biggest menace to Flex's survival. Fortunately we're it 
greatest hope too, so let's make that happen. Alex and Carol, not to put 
more pressure on the amazing effort you guys are already doing, but we 
really need that code and JIRA ported as soon as humanly possible. I have 
complete faith that you will do your absolute best.

Cheers,
Rui 

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