UPnP --> Felix and OSGi vertical solutions

[francesco furfari <fr...@isti.cnr.it>]

>> We would like to maintain the code in Felix community as committers if you accept us, and even to share our ideas
>> and development projects with you.  
> 
> 
> This is what Felix is for re: sharing of ideas.  I look forward to working with you.  Let's get more feedback from the community.

Maybe it's premature talking about the different application domains in
which fits OSGi platform , I understand that a OSGi R4 compliant
implementation is the first target of Felix, nevertheless I would like
to know how (if) do you think to manage the mobile, automotive,
residential gateway, and home automation field for which several
sub-projects might be opened.
Do you intend concentrate only on using Felix as application container
for the suite of apache softwares? if the other option is reasonable
too, is the Apache community able to involve industrial partners to
support the development in those areas (i.e mobile)  ... sorry for the
ingenuous question

ff


Alex Karasulu wrote:
> Francesco Furfari wrote:
> 
>> Dear All,
>> I'm pleased to announce that Domoware team intend to donate his work 
>> on OSGi-UPnP integration to Felix.
> 
> 
> This is excellent Francesco: we look forward to such contributions.  As 
> you may already know we intend to grow this community to include 
> services besides just the core container.
> 
>> The Domoware team is composed by Stefano Lenzi and Matteo Demuru two 
>> very valuable students of the Computer Science course at Pisa 
>> University and me a senior engineering working at ISTI-CNR. Our work 
>> is currently hosted by the  ISTI institute but our contributions are 
>> on a voluntary basis only, you can visit it at 
>> http://domoware.isti.cnr.it
>> The base driver is OSGi R3 compliant, the code has recently optimized 
>> to improve the memory footprint but we haven't
>> never started a software engineering revision.
> 
> 
> This is a very impressive application of OSGi re: the control and 
> programming of home appliances.  I'm already thinking of the 
> possibilities.  I have to read up more but I'd love to hear comments 
> from others with more OSGi knowledge and experience than I.  With 3 
> active committers working on Domoware it's more than just a code 
> contribution and this is much more preferable since we're about 
> community first.
> 
>> We would like to maintain the code in Felix community as committers if 
>> you accept us, and even to share our ideas
>> and development projects with you.  
> 
> 
> This is what Felix is for re: sharing of ideas.  I look forward to 
> working with you.  Let's get more feedback from the community.  I think 
> Domoware and it's committers would make an excellent addition to Felix.
> 
>> We are very new to this large and  collaborative community, I'm sure 
>> we'll try our best  to contribute to Felix success.
> 
> 
> We'll work together to make you comfortable with the dynamics of a large 
> community.  If you have any questions and/or concerns feel free to raise 
> them.  I'm sure several people here would help make the transition as 
> smooth as possible once the decision is made to accept your generous 
> contribution.
> 
>> We look forward to receiving your opinions
> 
> 
> Thank you Francesco ... hopefully we'll get others to chime in so we can 
> act decisively.
> Alex
> 
> 

Re: UPnP --> Felix and OSGi vertical solutions

[Marcel Offermans <ma...@luminis.nl>]

francesco furfari wrote:

> Do you intend concentrate only on using Felix as application container
> for the suite of apache softwares? if the other option is reasonable
> too, is the Apache community able to involve industrial partners to
> support the development in those areas (i.e mobile)  ... sorry for the
> ingenuous question

I think it's a very interesting question.

The strength and simplicity of the OSGi framework makes it useful in 
many different areas, so I don't think the implementation of the 
framework should (or will) make any assumptions about where and how it's 
used.

Where this discussion gets interesting is when you start to implement 
services. These implementations might be created for different 
application domains and for that we need some way of being able to 
incorporate multiple implementations for a service.

Greetings, Marcel

Re: UPnP --> Felix and OSGi vertical solutions

[Enrique Rodriguez <en...@gmail.com>]

francesco furfari wrote:
...
> Maybe it's premature talking about the different application domains in
> which fits OSGi platform , I understand that a OSGi R4 compliant
> implementation is the first target of Felix, nevertheless I would like
> to know how (if) do you think to manage the mobile, automotive,
> residential gateway, and home automation field for which several
> sub-projects might be opened.

Really, this is the sort of thing that the Felix project has to grow 
into.  We need to get out an R4 framework and work on other standard 
services such as accepting your UPnP implementation.  I think that we 
are all open to subprojects in the areas you mention and that, when the 
time comes, you or others can propose new subprojects, and, if they are 
heavily tied to the OSGi framework, for example, the UPnP, Event 
Service, etc, then they would definitely be at home as subprojects of Felix.

So I think your (if) evaluates to 'true' and we'll get to the 'how'.

> Do you intend concentrate only on using Felix as application container
> for the suite of apache softwares? if the other option is reasonable
> too, is the Apache community able to involve industrial partners to
> support the development in those areas (i.e mobile)  ... sorry for the
> ingenuous question

We don't intend to do anything that ties Felix to the specific use cases 
for Apache software, which, from my perspective, means enterprise 
services.  I can see personally wanting server-side packaging, such as 
installers and daemons, but we will certainly maintain the core 
framework as independent of packaging.  In short, where Felix is used 
depends on the projects that choose to use it.

My understanding is that with regard to industrial partners, in short 
the answer is no.  Individuals will contribute to Apache projects and, 
though behind the scenes individuals have to have funding coming from 
somewhere, there are not supposed to be any PR, co-marketing, 
partnership, or joint venture agreements, though certainly businesses 
promote their use of Apache software in a unilateral manner.

Enrique

Re: UPnP --> Felix and OSGi vertical solutions

[Alex Karasulu <ao...@bellsouth.net>]

francesco furfari wrote:

>>> We would like to maintain the code in Felix community as committers 
>>> if you accept us, and even to share our ideas
>>> and development projects with you.  
>>
>>
>>
>> This is what Felix is for re: sharing of ideas.  I look forward to 
>> working with you.  Let's get more feedback from the community.
>
>
> Maybe it's premature talking about the different application domains in
> which fits OSGi platform , I understand that a OSGi R4 compliant
> implementation is the first target of Felix, nevertheless I would like
> to know how (if) do you think to manage the mobile, automotive,
> residential gateway, and home automation field for which several
> sub-projects might be opened.

These are all possibilities.  Who know what shape things may take in the 
future.

> Do you intend concentrate only on using Felix as application container
> for the suite of apache softwares? 

No we're not interested in forcing projects interested in OSGi to use 
just Felix.  Thanks to the specification it really should not make a 
difference.  However licensing and the ability to bundle/distribute 
these containers will certainly factor in.  This is one of the reasons 
why other projects were so interested in Felix.

> if the other option is reasonable
> too, is the Apache community able to involve industrial partners to
> support the development in those areas (i.e mobile)  ... sorry for the
> ingenuous question

Not sure I understand the question completely.  Anyone is welcomed to 
get involved.  Committers and contributions are welcome from anyone or 
any organization.

HTH,
Alex

Re: UPnP --> Felix and OSGi vertical solutions

["Richard S. Hall" <he...@ungoverned.org>]

francesco furfari wrote:

> Do you intend concentrate only on using Felix as application container
> for the suite of apache softwares? if the other option is reasonable
> too, is the Apache community able to involve industrial partners to
> support the development in those areas (i.e mobile)  ... sorry for the
> ingenuous question


I think this is mostly a matter of community interest. Certainly, I will 
probably concentrate on the framework since that is what I have been 
doing. If the community as a whole is only interested in R4 compliance, 
then this is probably the direction things will go. However, if there 
are people interested in other directions, then it can go that way too.

I will guess that the community will encourage experimentation. Projects 
that have enough community interest can likely become part of Felix, 
where ones that don't can be worked on elsewhere, but they are still 
relevant.

As far as involving industrial partners, this is something that would be 
interesting if it were to happen. As Felix evolves it is possible that 
we will attract such attention. Even now, community members are out 
there talking with people asking them to get involved, so anything is 
possible.

-> richard