Re: Abi 3.0 should target compatibility issues

From: Dom Lachowicz (domlachowicz@yahoo.com)
Date: Mon Sep 22 2003 - 20:35:27 EDT

  • Next message: Martin Sevior: "Re: Abi 3.0 should target compatibility issues"

    Great. So besides this post, how are you going to help
    out?

    Dom

    --- r coyne <duckingsnofair@yahoo.com> wrote:
    > [If this belongs on the developer list, someone
    > please
    > forward; I've never gotten acquainted with that
    > one.]
    >
    > Now that Abiword 2 is out, more or less (and people
    > are even speaking of 2.2), it's time to put in my
    > two
    > cents worth on planning for Abi 3. Reading the
    > posts
    > here, I am continually struck (and appalled, and
    > scared off) by how fragile abi is. One seems to
    > need
    > exactly the right versions of everything, or they
    > won't work together and may cause very serious
    > problems. What with various projects and developers
    > and packagers and download sites all over the world
    > working rather independently and asynchronously,
    > this
    > degree of coordination is not to be expected. And
    > even if it were possible, purely from the user's
    > point
    > of view it is very inconvenient and offputting to
    > have
    > to upgrade everything at once rather than
    > incrementally at leisure and maybe selectively. And
    > what gets me is that I don't see why it has to be
    > this
    > way.
    >
    > Take plug-ins, for example -- a never-ending source
    > of
    > problems. I don't understand how plugins work, but
    > surely it should be possible to vector them through
    > some sort of table of pointers or jump addresses or
    > instructions in such a way that any given
    > function(ality) is guaranteed to be findable in the
    > same place even as the actual code gets rewritten
    > and
    > moved around and new abilities added in future
    > versions.
    >
    > I realize that abi is designed to run on a multitude
    > of platforms and that this complicates matters. But
    > don't all operating systems nowadays provide pretty
    > much the same basics, like a directory tree,
    > environmental variables, pipes, and so on? And if
    > you
    > stick with a programming language compiler/package
    > that is widely available, won't it do a lot of the
    > work of coordination, adapting to each OS it runs
    > on?
    > So if you take a lowest-common-denominator approach
    > and if you spend enough time and effort early on,
    > like
    > now, working out the conventions for how the various
    > routines, modules, files, programs, plugins,
    > packages,
    > etc. are supposed to find and communicate with each
    > other, I would think you could come up with
    > something
    > less demanding and more robust than the present
    > arrangements.
    >
    > And to the extent this requires discussions and
    > agreements with other projects, get to it; attend
    > those conferences. If somebody in the open-source
    > world has to invent some conventions, why not abi?
    > Design something that will do the trick and put out
    > a
    > RFC.
    >
    > And then, of course, there's the whole issue of
    > intelligent, informative, crash-proof handling of
    > error conditions, and the need for careful, loving
    > attention to documentation.
    >
    > What I am saying, basically, is that with the
    > release
    > of 2.0, abi is probably approaching the point of
    > diminishing returns to features. 3.0 should be
    > about
    > bulletproofing and getting it "ready for prime
    > time";
    > in other words, this is the time to "start over from
    > the beginning and this time do it right," now that
    > you
    > understand the problems.
    >
    > But then, I haven't programmed in years and am far
    > from au courant, so I'm just talking through my hat
    > and may be totally wrong. And I do mean this as a
    > what-the-user-wants tip for 3.0, not a criticism of
    > 1
    > and 2 or the developers who gave them to us. In the
    > early versions, it was only natural and proper to
    > concentrate on getting something up and running that
    > would be worth using. I write this because I
    > suspect
    > that, especially in a decentralized, volunteer
    > organization like abi, with no one exactly in charge
    > and authorized to turn the whole thing on a dime,
    > institutional habit and momentum may inhibit the
    > sort
    > of grand rethinking I'm talking about, even when it
    > is needed.
    >
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