Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Hi, 2009/11/10 Inge Solvoll inge.tapes...@gmail.com Maybe it would be a good idea to find out what most newcomers ask for, and just put it in there, even if it doesn't make that much sense? It COULD attract more people. That is exactly why I opened http://tapestry5.ideascale.com/ -borut
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
And of course we can make more of this: http://www.questionpro.com/akira/ShowResults?id=1151880mode=data The above was initiated long time ago: http://bbwebcraft.blogspot.com/2009/02/wishlist-and-survey-for-tapestry-5.html -borut 2009/11/10 Borut Bolčina borut.bolc...@gmail.com Hi, 2009/11/10 Inge Solvoll inge.tapes...@gmail.com Maybe it would be a good idea to find out what most newcomers ask for, and just put it in there, even if it doesn't make that much sense? It COULD attract more people. That is exactly why I opened http://tapestry5.ideascale.com/ -borut
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
My 2 cents, in order of priority: 1. Ongoing bug fixes, prioritized by severity and then community votes 2. Comprehensive multi-language docs (preferably community driven via collaboration software), including ALL types of docs (cookbook, API reference, tutorials, quickstart) and all in one place 3. A Tapestry Bible, but not another beginners book, it should have intermediate and advanced concepts explained with examples. 4. Least of all is new features in my list, they are nice to have but maintaining the user base means putting your house in order first (i.e.: all of the above) before doing new funky stuff with Tapestry 5. This last one is not critical, but an idea stemming from Tapestry 3 days: a place once again for users to share custom components, preferably directly off the Tapestry site... I personally see the Tapestry site as a hub of all Tapestry related activities. best wishes! Peter - Original Message - From: Borut Bolčina borut.bolc...@gmail.com To: Tapestry users users@tapestry.apache.org Sent: Tuesday, 10 November, 2009 12:58:34 GMT +02:00 Athens, Beirut, Bucharest, Istanbul Subject: Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry And of course we can make more of this: http://www.questionpro.com/akira/ShowResults?id=1151880mode=data The above was initiated long time ago: http://bbwebcraft.blogspot.com/2009/02/wishlist-and-survey-for-tapestry-5.html -borut 2009/11/10 Borut Bolčina borut.bolc...@gmail.com Hi, 2009/11/10 Inge Solvoll inge.tapes...@gmail.com Maybe it would be a good idea to find out what most newcomers ask for, and just put it in there, even if it doesn't make that much sense? It COULD attract more people. That is exactly why I opened http://tapestry5.ideascale.com/ -borut - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Kalle Korhonen: By now, you probably have a fairly good idea how you could improve things and I'd hate to have the first book on Tapestry5 to already become outdated right away if you start on T5.2 only after releasing the book. Kalle Korhonen: Yes, there are a few active committers but the community still needs your direction and you have a superior ability to generalize concepts and turn them into brilliant implementations. +1 2009/11/9 Kalle Korhonen kalle.o.korho...@gmail.com Howard, you touch too many points to make a very concise reply, but I agree with many others encouraging you to continue coding 5.2 before you start writing a book. By now, you probably have a fairly good idea how you could improve things and I'd hate to have the first book on Tapestry5 to already become outdated right away if you start on T5.2 only after releasing the book. Yes, there are a few active committers but the community still needs your direction and you have a superior ability to generalize concepts and turn them into brilliant implementations. I'm not sure the committers would be able to lay out a release plan without you either - bug fixes and some pet improvements yes, but coming up and deciding features for a new major release is a different ballgame. Of course, it's always easy for people like me who are sitting on the sidelines to tell what you should and shouldn't do. On the matter of new features, I'm more and more convinced that web conversations can be simplified a lot if they stay on the same page - as proven by my Tapestry-conversations module (http://docs.codehaus.org/display/TRAILS/Conversations+in+Trails). As good as Spring Web Flow is, it's cumbersome and unnecessarily heavy for modern ajaxified web. A built-in conversational scope with a better mechanism for dealing with different page context entry points (I'm likely not the only one with long if-elses in my onActivate methods) might be enough for 90% of the use cases. Still, a book is badly needed. The inconvenient truth is there are very very few users of Tapestry anymore, the popularity of Tapestry is declining and new Java developers are not finding the framework (as proven by http://www.google.com/insights/search/#q=tapestry%20java%2C%20wicket%20java%2Cgrails%20javacmpt=q - by know T5 release should have made a bump in those graphs). And don't get me wrong - I've never believed that popularity would make anything better, but without a wide enough user base it's difficult to make a living out of it even if you want to and a healthy user base is needed for a project to alive and active. I'm sure you've gone out of your way to evangelize Tapestry but I'm amazed by (and I bet you've been equally amazed, even envious at times) how some other frameworks such as RoR and Grails have been able to market themselves so well. It's baffling as we all know that purely from technological standpoint, T5 is easily on par with the rest out there and often surpassing the competition on specific areas. Clearly, but sadly, eye-candy and looks over substance plays a big part here even among engineers and I'm sure Tapestry could do more there. Documentation is an issue with new-comers and a book would help. The reference documentation is great but what missing is the longer, more descriptive tutorials on how to get started and a book would at least partially address those needs. It's not really just Tapestry's fault, just that modern Java is complex and there are various tools like Maven and other frameworks that you need to know about compared to lighter, but easier all-in-one frameworks. But when it comes down to choosing between coding and writing (a book), I think most would agree that your time is better spent improving the core framework and pushing the envelope further, while letting somebody else fill the gap for the book. If you start feeling like it's getting harder to find new things that might be worthwhile to add to the framework, at that point it may be the right time for you to write a book. Hopefully that time is not yet. Just my 2 cents, Kalle On Sat, Nov 7, 2009 at 10:11 AM, Howard hls...@gmail.com wrote: I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration
RE: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
You need to write the book IMO. We've seen several attempts to start a book* on here but it hasn't happened and probably won't. Others will contribute to the current code. 5.2 can wait, I'm sure. * an English Tapestry 5 book, that is. -Original Message- From: Howard [mailto:hls...@gmail.com] Sent: 07 November 2009 18:11 To: users@tapestry.apache.org Subject: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely. -- Posted By Howard to Tapestry Central at 11/07/2009 10:11:00 AM ** Experience the British Library online at http://www.bl.uk/ The British Library’s new interactive Annual Report and Accounts 2008/09 : http://www.bl.uk/knowledge Help the British Library conserve the world's knowledge. Adopt a Book. http://www.bl.uk/adoptabook The Library's St Pancras site is WiFi - enabled * The information contained in this e-mail is confidential and may be legally privileged. It is intended for the addressee(s) only. If you are not the intended recipient, please delete this e-mail and notify the mailto:postmas...@bl.uk : The contents of this e-mail must not be disclosed or copied without the sender's consent. The statements and opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the British Library. The British Library does not take any responsibility for the views of the author. * - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Book. Web site. Marketing. Strategy. Just to make a statement here: THE TAPESTRY 5 CODE IS MORE THAN GOOD ENOUGH!! The quality of the code and the framework just isn't the bottleneck. I think we all can agree on that? Who cares about Spring Web Flow or portlet support? Do we really think that such features would generate exponential amounts of traffic to the T5 website? Because that's what we need. Exponential growth in the user base. My fear is that T5 will simply die within a couple of years if we don't get massive growth and popularity. So what can we do to achieve that? Exposing internal services as public sounds like a great idea to me, but it sure won't help much for the exponential growth. I think the best way for Howard to spend his time would be to find more people to delegate work to, and spend some quality time with those people. And after that, focus on marketing and documentation. Hope I didn't offend anyone with this rather brutal post. I want only the best for this excellent framework and its very talented founder :) On Mon, Nov 9, 2009 at 8:59 AM, Newham, Cameron cameron.new...@bl.ukwrote: You need to write the book IMO. We've seen several attempts to start a book* on here but it hasn't happened and probably won't. Others will contribute to the current code. 5.2 can wait, I'm sure. * an English Tapestry 5 book, that is. -Original Message- From: Howard [mailto:hls...@gmail.com] Sent: 07 November 2009 18:11 To: users@tapestry.apache.org Subject: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely. -- Posted By Howard to Tapestry Central at 11/07/2009 10:11:00 AM ** Experience the British Library online at http://www.bl.uk/ The British Library’s new interactive Annual Report and Accounts 2008/09 : http://www.bl.uk/knowledge Help the British Library conserve the world's knowledge. Adopt a Book. http://www.bl.uk/adoptabook The Library's St Pancras site is WiFi - enabled * The information contained in this e-mail is confidential and may be legally privileged. It is intended for the addressee(s) only. If you are not the intended recipient, please delete this e-mail and notify the mailto: postmas...@bl.uk : The contents of this e-mail must not be disclosed or copied without the sender's consent. The statements and opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the British Library. The British Library does not take any responsibility for the views of the author. * - To unsubscribe, e-mail:
RE: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
I think you should write the book, but only if there's going to be a T5.1.1.x set of releases with bugfixes - this is long overdue in my opinion. (we have too many 'temporary' tapestry fixes - it's annoying embarrassing) I don't think there's any pressing need for T5.2 yet (IMHO) but there are a lot of bugs in JIRA and some of them are quite serious. You have a few good committers and a community who often submit patches when they enter bugs. What's missing is getting some momentum and getting the results out there in official releases! Doing this would allow you to carry on your consulting, write the book (very important, although just having an English language version of Igor's might be enough, especially if you rounded out any areas you felt needed expanding - maybe a joint effort?) and spend a little time here there on any bugfixes you feel need your personal attention. (if there are any) Whether or not you're involved in the releases is up to you, but at the moment nothing's happening which is not good. Cheers, Andy Blower. -Original Message- From: Howard [mailto:hls...@gmail.com] Sent: 07 November 2009 18:11 To: users@tapestry.apache.org Subject: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely. -- Posted By Howard to Tapestry Central at 11/07/2009 10:11:00 AM - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
I think you should write the book, but only if there's going to be a T5.1.1.x set of releases with bugfixes - this is long overdue in my opinion. (we have too many 'temporary' tapestry fixes - it's annoying embarrassing) I don't think there's any pressing need for T5.2 yet (IMHO) but there are a lot of bugs in JIRA and some of them are quite serious. Spot on. There are definetly many areas that need to be polished in 5.1.x, and JIRA is flooded with issues, quie of few of them with patches pending. BR, Vjeran - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
+1 for code The Tap 5 codebase lacks aome givens in nowadays development. Getting a simple app up and running with basic user management and security shouldn't take longer than 10 minutes and also flow support out of the box is mandatory. Other than that the online docs and tutorials should be considerable beefed up. The main point is to make evaluation a simple, quick and straightforward process. And only after that a definitive guide is needed, since people usually first look at a framework and its online docs and only with convincing results there they consider buying a book. Actual users of Tapestry are convinced already of course, hence no wonder that they long for the definitive bible :) From the said my opinion on the flow of events would be to include at least flow support and a basic security/user management module for T5.2 and in parallel work on online docs and tutorials with the evaluation process in mind. And for the book I think it is best if Igor gets his book translated for the time being. A publisher won't easily publish a book about tapestry with a stagnant or even declining user base, so the best bet is to get that rising first. 2009/11/9 Inge Solvoll inge.tapes...@gmail.com Book. Web site. Marketing. Strategy. Just to make a statement here: THE TAPESTRY 5 CODE IS MORE THAN GOOD ENOUGH!! The quality of the code and the framework just isn't the bottleneck. I think we all can agree on that? Who cares about Spring Web Flow or portlet support? Do we really think that such features would generate exponential amounts of traffic to the T5 website? Because that's what we need. Exponential growth in the user base. My fear is that T5 will simply die within a couple of years if we don't get massive growth and popularity. So what can we do to achieve that? Exposing internal services as public sounds like a great idea to me, but it sure won't help much for the exponential growth. I think the best way for Howard to spend his time would be to find more people to delegate work to, and spend some quality time with those people. And after that, focus on marketing and documentation. Hope I didn't offend anyone with this rather brutal post. I want only the best for this excellent framework and its very talented founder :) On Mon, Nov 9, 2009 at 8:59 AM, Newham, Cameron cameron.new...@bl.uk wrote: You need to write the book IMO. We've seen several attempts to start a book* on here but it hasn't happened and probably won't. Others will contribute to the current code. 5.2 can wait, I'm sure. * an English Tapestry 5 book, that is. -Original Message- From: Howard [mailto:hls...@gmail.com] Sent: 07 November 2009 18:11 To: users@tapestry.apache.org Subject: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely.
Re: Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
I think that Inge Solvoli is right, but rather than writing a book first i think that the Tapestry site need to be redone (what happened to the redesign?), it's the first place that people new to Tapestry will look at and i think that today's design and layout give people the impressions: complex, difficult to understand how to create and use zones for example, needs organization: components - Tapestry version x, how to for specific versions etc. People convinced that it's a good framework will buy the book but if not they will not spend money and time on a Tapestry 5.1 book. What if rather than writing a book and selling it, write and redesign the site using the material that was to go for the book? It's the Main Store for Tapestry. If the site's documentation is good enough it will be echoed on the net: Want to learn Tapestry, go to the tapestry site, the documentation is awesome!. Just my thoughts! On Nov 9, 2009, at 9:35 PM, Inge Solvoll wrote: From: Inge Solvoll inge.tapes...@gmail.com Date: November 9, 2009 5:34:33 PM GMT+09:00 To: Tapestry users users@tapestry.apache.org Subject: Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry Book. Web site. Marketing. Strategy. Just to make a statement here: THE TAPESTRY 5 CODE IS MORE THAN GOOD ENOUGH!! The quality of the code and the framework just isn't the bottleneck. I think we all can agree on that? Who cares about Spring Web Flow or portlet support? Do we really think that such features would generate exponential amounts of traffic to the T5 website? Because that's what we need. Exponential growth in the user base. My fear is that T5 will simply die within a couple of years if we don't get massive growth and popularity. So what can we do to achieve that? Exposing internal services as public sounds like a great idea to me, but it sure won't help much for the exponential growth. I think the best way for Howard to spend his time would be to find more people to delegate work to, and spend some quality time with those people. And after that, focus on marketing and documentation. Hope I didn't offend anyone with this rather brutal post. I want only the best for this excellent framework and its very talented founder :)
Re: Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
I would prioritize the directions in the following way: 1) T5.1.1.x with important bugfixes 2) The website ( the future book can be just a compilation and extension of website materials) 3-4) T5.2 and book - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Shadow builders? I've only been using T5 for about 2 months now. When do I learn about shadow builders? :-) mrg On Sat, Nov 7, 2009 at 4:34 PM, Carl Crowder carl.crow...@taptu.com wrote: Agreed: the main thing Tapestry is lacking is a book that explains not just the basics but also concepts that it takes months of working with Tapestry to discover. Things like shadow builders and so on. I don't care who writes one as long as there's a definitive guide! - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
You know how you can inject the Request? Well the Request service is really an extension of the per-thread RequestGlobals object, which stores the Request and Response. Turns out, Tapestry can implement this approach for you automatically; creating a proxy object that delegates all of its method invocations to another object (accessed as a property of some known service or object). There's a few special builders used for edge cases like this. On Mon, Nov 9, 2009 at 1:35 PM, Michael Gentry mgen...@masslight.net wrote: Shadow builders? I've only been using T5 for about 2 months now. When do I learn about shadow builders? :-) http://tapestry.apache.org/tapestry5.1/tapestry-ioc/shadow.html mrg On Sat, Nov 7, 2009 at 4:34 PM, Carl Crowder carl.crow...@taptu.com wrote: Agreed: the main thing Tapestry is lacking is a book that explains not just the basics but also concepts that it takes months of working with Tapestry to discover. Things like shadow builders and so on. I don't care who writes one as long as there's a definitive guide! - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org -- Howard M. Lewis Ship Creator of Apache Tapestry The source for Tapestry training, mentoring and support. Contact me to learn how I can get you up and productive in Tapestry fast! (971) 678-5210 http://howardlewisship.com - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Em Mon, 09 Nov 2009 19:35:09 -0200, Michael Gentry mgen...@masslight.net escreveu: Shadow builders? I've only been using T5 for about 2 months now. When do I learn about shadow builders? :-) The documentation is here. The concept is simple. :) -- Thiago H. de Paula Figueiredo Independent Java, Apache Tapestry 5 and Hibernate consultant, developer, and instructor Owner, software architect and developer, Ars Machina Tecnologia da Informação Ltda. http://www.arsmachina.com.br - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
I think documentation and small/focused cookbook-type examples (thank goodness for JumpStart) are the biggest hurdle to people learning and using T5 currently. (At least that is my experience.) The user community and framework are robust, but figuring out how to do something can be challenging at times (even when searching the mailing list). I'm not exactly sure what the motivation for writing a book would be. Maybe you want to make some money off of it or use it as a marketing tool (developers can tell their PHBs there is a Tapestry book)? My personal preference would be to have good documentation at tapestry.apache.org -- something that can be updated (paper dates itself quickly, especially when Tapestry 5.2.0.24 comes out) and is searchable (Google is my brain these days). Maybe even have it as a downloadable PDF that people can put on digital readers. My hope for you (and us) would be that with good documentation (including examples/tutorials) and marketing, more developers would come, and a larger developer base could increase your consulting business. As for a 5.2 release, it is important, but not as important as good documentation at this point. At least that's my opinion. You could even do a few bug-fix releases (5.1.0.x) before 5.2 while working on the documentation/book. Thanks! mrg PS. I also think having fragmented documentation (the web site, the wiki, etc) makes things harder to find, too. On Sat, Nov 7, 2009 at 1:11 PM, Howard hls...@gmail.com wrote: [lots of things about books and coding] - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
I thought I had been through most of the site, but I had never seen the shadow services page. Thanks for the link, Howard! mrg On Mon, Nov 9, 2009 at 4:43 PM, Howard Lewis Ship hls...@gmail.com wrote: You know how you can inject the Request? Well the Request service is really an extension of the per-thread RequestGlobals object, which stores the Request and Response. Turns out, Tapestry can implement this approach for you automatically; creating a proxy object that delegates all of its method invocations to another object (accessed as a property of some known service or object). There's a few special builders used for edge cases like this. On Mon, Nov 9, 2009 at 1:35 PM, Michael Gentry mgen...@masslight.net wrote: Shadow builders? I've only been using T5 for about 2 months now. When do I learn about shadow builders? :-) http://tapestry.apache.org/tapestry5.1/tapestry-ioc/shadow.html mrg On Sat, Nov 7, 2009 at 4:34 PM, Carl Crowder carl.crow...@taptu.com wrote: Agreed: the main thing Tapestry is lacking is a book that explains not just the basics but also concepts that it takes months of working with Tapestry to discover. Things like shadow builders and so on. I don't care who writes one as long as there's a definitive guide! - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org -- Howard M. Lewis Ship Creator of Apache Tapestry The source for Tapestry training, mentoring and support. Contact me to learn how I can get you up and productive in Tapestry fast! (971) 678-5210 http://howardlewisship.com - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
There are features that could help gain attention to the framework. A lot of people ask for the same things on this list: - How to submit with a select - How to make dependent selects that works with AJAX. - How to easily make custom AJAX functionality (not necessarily forms) Maybe it would be a good idea to find out what most newcomers ask for, and just put it in there, even if it doesn't make that much sense? It COULD attract more people. I'm just saying :) Inge On Mon, Nov 9, 2009 at 10:57 PM, Michael Gentry mgen...@masslight.netwrote: I thought I had been through most of the site, but I had never seen the shadow services page. Thanks for the link, Howard! mrg On Mon, Nov 9, 2009 at 4:43 PM, Howard Lewis Ship hls...@gmail.com wrote: You know how you can inject the Request? Well the Request service is really an extension of the per-thread RequestGlobals object, which stores the Request and Response. Turns out, Tapestry can implement this approach for you automatically; creating a proxy object that delegates all of its method invocations to another object (accessed as a property of some known service or object). There's a few special builders used for edge cases like this. On Mon, Nov 9, 2009 at 1:35 PM, Michael Gentry mgen...@masslight.net wrote: Shadow builders? I've only been using T5 for about 2 months now. When do I learn about shadow builders? :-) http://tapestry.apache.org/tapestry5.1/tapestry-ioc/shadow.html mrg On Sat, Nov 7, 2009 at 4:34 PM, Carl Crowder carl.crow...@taptu.com wrote: Agreed: the main thing Tapestry is lacking is a book that explains not just the basics but also concepts that it takes months of working with Tapestry to discover. Things like shadow builders and so on. I don't care who writes one as long as there's a definitive guide! - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org -- Howard M. Lewis Ship Creator of Apache Tapestry The source for Tapestry training, mentoring and support. Contact me to learn how I can get you up and productive in Tapestry fast! (971) 678-5210 http://howardlewisship.com - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Howard, why don't collaborate with Igor to have the book in Engllish? Instead of starting a new project for it you can try to have Igor book as a starting point or even better a final point and only have to translate a commonly reviewed version and publish it together . I understand you want to have T5 up to date against the competition but really the book is mandatory if you want to have people to use it consciously and having it only in German means to exclude the great majority of the web developers. If you go ahead with it I could help in reviewing it and I also suggest you try to use some list members as an help, like it was made for the web site. cuartz ha scritto: I think both are necessary to make tapestry more popular, but i think would be better if you work on code, tapestry is already known by a lot of people, i’m a 24 years old Mexican and in my 3 years of experience i already have been part of 2 tapestry 5 big projects, the first last 10 months and i’m working on the second project 3 months ago, and today when there is a discussion of which framework to use at the start of a project, tapestry 5 is consider, so now there is a matter of which framework is better, i know this from myself and from the developers i know. Also the book can be written by other people but you are the only one who can work in the code. i think that any improvement you maid (faster requests or richer web apps) is going to be great and i can’t wait to see it. cheers and sorry for my bad english. - Carlos Araham U. Bayona Smythe. -- == dott. Ivano Mario Luberti Archimede Informatica societa' cooperativa a r. l. Sede Operativa Via Gereschi 36 - 56126- Pisa tel.: +39-050- 580959 tel/fax: +39-050-9711344 web: www.archicoop.it == - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
I understand that book would be valuable addition to Tapestry, but I would also prefer you to spend your time doing the coding, and if I may add, not so much on new features (like Spring Web Flow), but more on improving already present ideas since there are many places for improvement. One thing that comes to my mind is - various ways of passing parameters between pages (for example for search form criteria etc..), Javascript support that you mentioned, etc... These things are pretty much needed in every web app out there. I just converted my first T4 app to T5, and although it was generaly better experience, I have found few places where things became harder that it was before, for eg - no properly working submit button context, no easy option to turn of sorting in grids, and similar bits and pieces... Regards, Vjeran - Original Message - From: Howard hls...@gmail.com To: users@tapestry.apache.org Sent: Saturday, November 07, 2009 7:11 PM Subject: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely. -- Posted By Howard to Tapestry Central at 11/07/2009 10:11:00 AM No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 8.5.425 / Virus Database: 270.14.53/2486 - Release Date: 11/07/09 07:38:00 - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Howard: I agree with the posters that say refine your code-base as priority one, and I agree that writing the book is a very close priority two. So the question isn't really which should you do, as both are crucial to Tapestry the product and it's community of users. The problem is how best to leverage your knowledge. You must delegate and direct, or you become Tapestry's main growth bottleneck. You already know this, of course, so the question is how do I leverage me? Number one: find a book author that knows almost as much as you do. Maybe Igor's that person, since he both knows the product (I guess; haven't read his book) and has written a book. The question then is incentives. Writing a book is tough, and Tapestry's market is narrower (but not for long!) than other possible uses of book-writers' time. What can you do to make it economically worthwhile for that book-writer, or an existing book-writer's publisher, to write another? My next phone call would be to Igor's publisher, and say Hey, you guys just wrote a book for the German market. You already sunk all those costs, now why not make a lot more revenue from your investment? How would you like to do a good translation, and sell into the vastly larger English market (~80Mil audience .vs. 500Mil)? Tapestry is used in Europe, U.S., English-speaking Asia, Australia, U.K, etc Find out if that publisher's ready to expand into U.S. - that may be on their mind. Also, see about electronic publishing instead of hard-bound. I bought an e-book on Tapestry a while back, and it was pretty helpful. I'd do it again in a heartbeat. That'll reduce the publisher's risk a LOT. Also, there's a good UK publisher that does e-books already, and does it well. I bought a Lucene book that way not long ago, and would use them again in a heartbeat. Think reduced publisher risk, and I.T. users are ideal e-book buyers. Next: Think about the steps that the SpringSource people went through as they spun up their business. They added a consulting arm, and that generated enough revenue to do documentation - hiring a full-timer to do it right, did a really strong online reference, etc. Consulting is an excellent revenue-producer. Can you replicate you in that capacity also? Would you want to? How do you see growth and managing stuff? Some people (very logically) run screaming from the room if the subject's brought up ;) Another idea: ask your contributors here at the forum to consider writing documentation modules. Consider an annual subscription fee of $20-50 to be a member of a support system that has a bunch of contributed modules. Pro-rata distribute the subscription fee to the modules-writers based on hits. There are a number of people here that are capable, and if you provided the incentive...they might do it. If you can provide the money-channel and the set of next-most-needed topics, I bet you might find some takers. The problem is centrally a one of incentives for the right people to step up and do the work. Why would someone want to write documentation? Credit, money, resume-stuffer, book-deal...what? OK, now find a way to get them what they want in order to remove info-flow bottlenecks that are impeding Tapestry's growth. You may also consider moving away from the book format altogether and concentrate your writing onto your website. Make it a knowledge vending machine. Ask your forum of smart people this question: If I was to design a self-sustaining, revenue-producing mechanism that produced great on-line doc for Tapestry, leveraged all you brilliant people, and made it worth your while to do it, what would that design be like? I think the key is to leverage existing Tapestry knowledge, especially yours. How can that knowledge be replicated, extended, sub-classed...? How can the knowledge of your many very talented forum posters be captured, replicated, distributed...? Good luck. We all wish for your continued success. I'll be in your neck of the woods 2nd week of Dec if you want to meet for a cuppa joe and discuss it further. -- View this message in context: http://old.nabble.com/-Tapestry-Central--Next-Steps-for-Tapestry-tp26248673p26253018.html Sent from the Tapestry - User mailing list archive at Nabble.com. - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Couldn't it be a hybrid approach? One day or week coding Tapestry, then the next writing the book? By the way, I'd love write a Tapestry book. One company here at Belo Horizonte, Brazil has just contracted me to have both introductory and advanced Tapestry courses. My plans are to write the textbooks with the target of being transformed in a book later, first in Portuguese, then translated to English. The more Tapestry books, the better. -- Thiago H. de Paula Figueiredo Independent Java, Apache Tapestry 5 and Hibernate consultant, developer, and instructor Owner, software architect and developer, Ars Machina Tecnologia da Informação Ltda. http://www.arsmachina.com.br - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Well, I think you should do what you feel is best for you right now. If you need a timeout from coding then write a book. If you feel a book will take too much of your time then code again. I'm still hoping my publisher will translate my book. So maybe there will be an english book even if you decide not to write one. I asked the published several times but didn't get any feedback yet. I suppose they are not ready to make a decision right now. However, if you need some co-authors I'm ready. Not sure I'm allowed to but I can check it. I remember some clause in my contract about writing competing books. Don't get me wrong but a 5.2.0.0 release without any single commit of Howard would be something awful. :) It would be a historical event and the final prove that Tapestry is no longer a one men show. We have 29 fixed issues in current 5.2 trunk. The both most popular issues will be fixed in the next days. I'm on the verge of committing fix for http://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/TAP5-138 . Robert was going to provide a fix for https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/TAP5-815 this weekend. JSR 303 support is almost there. On Sat, Nov 7, 2009 at 7:11 PM, Howard hls...@gmail.com wrote: I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely. -- Posted By Howard to Tapestry Central at 11/07/2009 10:11:00 AM -- Best regards, Igor Drobiazko
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Igor : just an idea on the translation front. I know that the NetBeans community already did two community translated books from German, so it might be interesting if the same model is possible in the Tapestry community. I think it was mostly a volunteer effort but it got two NetBeans RCP books translated in no time. In other words, if there are half a dozen to a dozen people in the community who know both German and English and are willing to translate a chapter or two, then the publisher only needs an editor to verify that the translation is good - much less effort on their part, much faster to get the books selling in English speaking countries, much faster way to get the books into the community. On my part, although I can't offer any skills in doing the actual translation, I can offer some of my time to proof read chapters that are already translated. Luckily, code (usually) doesn't need much translating. Cheers, Alex K On Sun, Nov 8, 2009 at 10:55 AM, Igor Drobiazko igor.drobia...@gmail.comwrote: Well, I think you should do what you feel is best for you right now. If you need a timeout from coding then write a book. If you feel a book will take too much of your time then code again. I'm still hoping my publisher will translate my book. So maybe there will be an english book even if you decide not to write one. I asked the published several times but didn't get any feedback yet. I suppose they are not ready to make a decision right now. However, if you need some co-authors I'm ready. Not sure I'm allowed to but I can check it. I remember some clause in my contract about writing competing books. Don't get me wrong but a 5.2.0.0 release without any single commit of Howard would be something awful. :) It would be a historical event and the final prove that Tapestry is no longer a one men show. We have 29 fixed issues in current 5.2 trunk. The both most popular issues will be fixed in the next days. I'm on the verge of committing fix for http://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/TAP5-138 . Robert was going to provide a fix for https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/TAP5-815 this weekend. JSR 303 support is almost there. On Sat, Nov 7, 2009 at 7:11 PM, Howard hls...@gmail.com wrote: I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely. -- Posted By Howard to Tapestry Central at 11/07/2009 10:11:00 AM -- Best regards, Igor Drobiazko
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Hi Alex, I'll ask the publisher again and suggest your idea. 08.11.2009, в 17:41, Alex Kotchnev akoch...@gmail.com написал(а): Igor : just an idea on the translation front. I know that the NetBeans community already did two community translated books from German, so it might be interesting if the same model is possible in the Tapestry community. I think it was mostly a volunteer effort but it got two NetBeans RCP books translated in no time. In other words, if there are half a dozen to a dozen people in the community who know both German and English and are willing to translate a chapter or two, then the publisher only needs an editor to verify that the translation is good - much less effort on their part, much faster to get the books selling in English speaking countries, much faster way to get the books into the community. On my part, although I can't offer any skills in doing the actual translation, I can offer some of my time to proof read chapters that are already translated. Luckily, code (usually) doesn't need much translating. Cheers, Alex K On Sun, Nov 8, 2009 at 10:55 AM, Igor Drobiazko igor.drobia...@gmail.com wrote: Well, I think you should do what you feel is best for you right now. If you need a timeout from coding then write a book. If you feel a book will take too much of your time then code again. I'm still hoping my publisher will translate my book. So maybe there will be an english book even if you decide not to write one. I asked the published several times but didn't get any feedback yet. I suppose they are not ready to make a decision right now. However, if you need some co-authors I'm ready. Not sure I'm allowed to but I can check it. I remember some clause in my contract about writing competing books. Don't get me wrong but a 5.2.0.0 release without any single commit of Howard would be something awful. :) It would be a historical event and the final prove that Tapestry is no longer a one men show. We have 29 fixed issues in current 5.2 trunk. The both most popular issues will be fixed in the next days. I'm on the verge of committing fix for http://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/TAP5-138 . Robert was going to provide a fix for https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/TAP5-815 this weekend. JSR 303 support is almost there. On Sat, Nov 7, 2009 at 7:11 PM, Howard hls...@gmail.com wrote: I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely. -- Posted By Howard to Tapestry Central at 11/07/2009 10:11:00 AM -- Best regards, Igor Drobiazko - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Howard, you touch too many points to make a very concise reply, but I agree with many others encouraging you to continue coding 5.2 before you start writing a book. By now, you probably have a fairly good idea how you could improve things and I'd hate to have the first book on Tapestry5 to already become outdated right away if you start on T5.2 only after releasing the book. Yes, there are a few active committers but the community still needs your direction and you have a superior ability to generalize concepts and turn them into brilliant implementations. I'm not sure the committers would be able to lay out a release plan without you either - bug fixes and some pet improvements yes, but coming up and deciding features for a new major release is a different ballgame. Of course, it's always easy for people like me who are sitting on the sidelines to tell what you should and shouldn't do. On the matter of new features, I'm more and more convinced that web conversations can be simplified a lot if they stay on the same page - as proven by my Tapestry-conversations module (http://docs.codehaus.org/display/TRAILS/Conversations+in+Trails). As good as Spring Web Flow is, it's cumbersome and unnecessarily heavy for modern ajaxified web. A built-in conversational scope with a better mechanism for dealing with different page context entry points (I'm likely not the only one with long if-elses in my onActivate methods) might be enough for 90% of the use cases. Still, a book is badly needed. The inconvenient truth is there are very very few users of Tapestry anymore, the popularity of Tapestry is declining and new Java developers are not finding the framework (as proven by http://www.google.com/insights/search/#q=tapestry%20java%2C%20wicket%20java%2Cgrails%20javacmpt=q - by know T5 release should have made a bump in those graphs). And don't get me wrong - I've never believed that popularity would make anything better, but without a wide enough user base it's difficult to make a living out of it even if you want to and a healthy user base is needed for a project to alive and active. I'm sure you've gone out of your way to evangelize Tapestry but I'm amazed by (and I bet you've been equally amazed, even envious at times) how some other frameworks such as RoR and Grails have been able to market themselves so well. It's baffling as we all know that purely from technological standpoint, T5 is easily on par with the rest out there and often surpassing the competition on specific areas. Clearly, but sadly, eye-candy and looks over substance plays a big part here even among engineers and I'm sure Tapestry could do more there. Documentation is an issue with new-comers and a book would help. The reference documentation is great but what missing is the longer, more descriptive tutorials on how to get started and a book would at least partially address those needs. It's not really just Tapestry's fault, just that modern Java is complex and there are various tools like Maven and other frameworks that you need to know about compared to lighter, but easier all-in-one frameworks. But when it comes down to choosing between coding and writing (a book), I think most would agree that your time is better spent improving the core framework and pushing the envelope further, while letting somebody else fill the gap for the book. If you start feeling like it's getting harder to find new things that might be worthwhile to add to the framework, at that point it may be the right time for you to write a book. Hopefully that time is not yet. Just my 2 cents, Kalle On Sat, Nov 7, 2009 at 10:11 AM, Howard hls...@gmail.com wrote: I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Book ! Book ! Book ! El 07/11/2009, a las 19:11, Howard escribió: I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely. -- Posted By Howard to Tapestry Central at 11/07/2009 10:11:00 AM - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Agreed: the main thing Tapestry is lacking is a book that explains not just the basics but also concepts that it takes months of working with Tapestry to discover. Things like shadow builders and so on. I don't care who writes one as long as there's a definitive guide! jose luis sanchez wrote: Book ! Book ! Book ! El 07/11/2009, a las 19:11, Howard escribió: I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely. -- Posted By Howard to Tapestry Central at 11/07/2009 10:11:00 AM - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
There already is one - written by Igor - but unfortunately not (yet?) available in English. Uli Carl Crowder schrieb: Agreed: the main thing Tapestry is lacking is a book that explains not just the basics but also concepts that it takes months of working with Tapestry to discover. Things like shadow builders and so on. I don't care who writes one as long as there's a definitive guide! jose luis sanchez wrote: Book ! Book ! Book ! El 07/11/2009, a las 19:11, Howard escribió: I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely. -- Posted By Howard to Tapestry Central at 11/07/2009 10:11:00 AM - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
+1 Bible Book :-) Antonio Carl Crowder escribió: Agreed: the main thing Tapestry is lacking is a book that explains not just the basics but also concepts that it takes months of working with Tapestry to discover. Things like shadow builders and so on. I don't care who writes one as long as there's a definitive guide! jose luis sanchez wrote: Book ! Book ! Book ! El 07/11/2009, a las 19:11, Howard escribió: I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely. -- Posted By Howard to Tapestry Central at 11/07/2009 10:11:00 AM - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? +1 for coding, as there already is a very good book available (written by Igor). Why do it twice - what's lacking is just an english translation. Piero - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
I think both are necessary to make tapestry more popular, but i think would be better if you work on code, tapestry is already known by a lot of people, i’m a 24 years old Mexican and in my 3 years of experience i already have been part of 2 tapestry 5 big projects, the first last 10 months and i’m working on the second project 3 months ago, and today when there is a discussion of which framework to use at the start of a project, tapestry 5 is consider, so now there is a matter of which framework is better, i know this from myself and from the developers i know. Also the book can be written by other people but you are the only one who can work in the code. i think that any improvement you maid (faster requests or richer web apps) is going to be great and i can’t wait to see it. cheers and sorry for my bad english. - Carlos Araham U. Bayona Smythe. -- View this message in context: http://old.nabble.com/-Tapestry-Central--Next-Steps-for-Tapestry-tp26248673p26251316.html Sent from the Tapestry - User mailing list archive at Nabble.com. - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
Re: [Tapestry Central] Next Steps for Tapestry
Carl Crowder schrieb: Agreed: the main thing Tapestry is lacking is a book that explains not just the basics but also concepts that it takes months of working with Tapestry to discover. Things like shadow builders and so on. I don't care who writes one as long as there's a definitive guide! +1 Michael Gerzabek jose luis sanchez wrote: Book ! Book ! Book ! El 07/11/2009, a las 19:11, Howard escribió: I've been consciously letting Tapestry 5.1 sit and stabilize for a while ... a time that's stretched a few months longer than I initially intended. This is due to a number of factors: my return to independent consulting, my desire to write a definitive Tapestry 5 book, and preparations for many trips and speaking engagements. All of these factors have worked on each other: I've been improving and extending my Tapestry Workshop training materials which can be quite time consuming. I've also (over the last several months) been on the road several times, talking about Tapestry or doing Tapestry training. I do want to write a book on Tapestry but if I start writing 5.2 code, I know I'll be sucked right in ... lots of code (that darn Spring Web Flow integration for sure this time) and bug fixes. In addition, I've had an embarassment of riches: two main clients, one regular part time, and the other requesting (but not always getting) all my remaining time. I also have additional clients and training engagements waiting in the wings. I simply have a lot of draws on my time. As usual, working on real-world projects lets me experience the rough edges of Tapestry and fills me with ideas on how to address those in the next release ... often by splitting up Tapestry services into smaller, more easily overridden chunks and carefully moving internal services out into the public APIs. Finally, I've been very pleased by the fact that as I've stepped back temporarily from my normal stream of commits, the other Tapestry developers have stepped in and filled the gap. There's been quite a bit of activity especially from Igor that I've barely had a chance to keep up on. So the question is: do I wait and see if time opens up in Q1 to actually start on a T5 book ... or do I jump into 5.2 coding and leave books to others? It's much, much easier to write code than to write a book ... a book is a large amount of concentrated effort. It's very hard to accomplish anything on a book using an hour here or an evening there ... whereas Tapestry's code base lends itself to that kind of effort quite nicely. -- Posted By Howard to Tapestry Central at 11/07/2009 10:11:00 AM - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org - To unsubscribe, e-mail: users-unsubscr...@tapestry.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: users-h...@tapestry.apache.org
