Ironruby core - Oct 2007 - Public versus private discussion and community momentum

It seems like although there''s some discussion on the RubyForge list 
about IronRuby progress, challenges, things to work on, and the rest, 
there''s not as much discussion as a project might like, and practically
none from the Microsoft-based principals. That seems to hinder progress 
and make it look like things are moving a bit slowly.

So this email is mostly for John, but I''d like to hear others weigh
in...

Are there development discussions happening on private lists, say inside 
Microsoft within the IronRuby or DLR team? If so, you should really 
think about moving as much of those discussions as possible into the 
open. They will help show that progress is being made, allow community 
members to see the process and design moving forward, and most 
importantly help the community feel like they''re really a part of the 
project.

I know there''s always thoughts about secrecy and springing the next big
software surprise on the world when working at Microsoft, but secrecy is 
poison to an OSS community. If you want to get people excited about 
helping out and getting involved, you can''t keep them in the dark about
portions of the development process.

I think there''s also a lot to be gained from sharing compiler/runtime 
design discussions with a broader audience; there''s a lot of strategy
we
could share across implementations, to the benefit of all in the Ruby world.

- Charlie

On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 12:39:36 -0600, Charles Oliver Nutter  
<charles.nutter at sun.com> wrote:
> So this email is mostly for John, but I''d like to hear others
weigh in...
Do you have specific evidence that "private" conversations regarding  
IronRuby development are taking place and that these private conversations  
are holding the community back from progress?  Sorry Charlie (pun
wasn''t
intended), but it''s difficult to weigh in on something if that
something
is pure speculation based on list volume.  Also, have you ever or will you  
ever have a private conversation regarding jRuby with someone @ Sun?

 From the outside looking in, I have to be honest: You seem to be  
trolling.  Are you?

-- 
/M:D

M. David Peterson
http://mdavid.name | http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/2354 |  
http://dev.aol.com/blog/3155

>  From the outside looking in, I have to be honest: You seem to be
> trolling.  Are you?
This is Microsoft''s first open source project, as a developer
interested in contributing to IronRuby I am a little hesitant of this
as I see a risk that the development will not be community based and
therefore would be a bad investment of my time... I think Charles is
commenting on this point. If there are internal MS emails about the
design, development, project direction ... of IronRuby then it will
fail as a community based project.

M. David Peterson wrote:
> On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 12:39:36 -0600, Charles Oliver Nutter  
> <charles.nutter at sun.com> wrote:
> 
>> So this email is mostly for John, but I''d like to hear others
weigh in...
> 
> Do you have specific evidence that "private" conversations
regarding
> IronRuby development are taking place and that these private conversations
> are holding the community back from progress?  Sorry Charlie (pun
wasn''t
> intended), but it''s difficult to weigh in on something if that
something
> is pure speculation based on list volume.  Also, have you ever or will you
> ever have a private conversation regarding jRuby with someone @ Sun?
Well I would presume that if the project is moving rapidly forward, 
completing compiler milestones and improving runtime compatibility, that 
discussions are happening somewhere...and though there have been some 
discussion about specific libraries or needs in the core classes, there 
doesn''t appear to be any discussion about the runtime and compiler 
subsystems.

Honestly I just would like to see that you all making contributions to 
IronRuby from the outside are getting a chance to discuss and 
participate in the runtime implementation. And I imagine that it''s a 
very difficult balancing act John has on this project; knowing how 
devoted he''s been to open source in the past, I''d like to see
him able
to keep the runtime dev process as open as possible. Are you saying you 
don''t think that''s a good idea?
>  From the outside looking in, I have to be honest: You seem to be  
> trolling.  Are you?
No. The danger of having an open project and an open community is that 
many people can put forth opinions. Occasionally you will not agree with 
them, but it does not mean they are trolling. I''m merely offering a 
recommendation to the project leads. Take it or leave it, but don''t 
acuse me of being a troll.

- Charlie

On 10/1/07, Nicolai Moles-Benfell <n.molesbenfell at gmail.com>
wrote:
>
> This is Microsoft''s first open source project

This is not really true, depending on what you mean; I think it''s been
over
two years since WiX was made open source.

I have to agree that the original poster''s inclusion of the text

> I know there''s always thoughts about secrecy and springing the
next big
> software surprise on the world when working at Microsoft, but secrecy is
> poison to an OSS community.
>
does not speak well for his intentions.  But if you remove this one
sentence, his concerns seem pretty reasonable.

I think some of what we''re seeing is a result of IronRuby''s
dependence on
the DLR -- which appears to be far from finalized, and which is not going to
be driven by the community at all.

--
Curt Hagenlocher
curt at hagenlocher.org
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On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:17:17 -0600, Nicolai Moles-Benfell  
<n.molesbenfell at gmail.com> wrote:
> This is Microsoft''s first open source project, as a developer
> interested in contributing to IronRuby I am a little hesitant of this
> as I see a risk that the development will not be community based and
> therefore would be a bad investment of my time...
You''re waxing philosophical.  From my own view point, as a community  
member and contributor I want to gain the benefits obtained froma kick  
a$$ implementation of the Ruby language that takes full advantage of all  
the .NET platform has to offer.  The fact that MSFT might want to have  
strategic planning meetings regarding their focus moving forward is their  
business.

 From your viewpoint it seems you want something different.  A  
community-based group hug, or something.  Fair enough.  We''re looking
for
two different things.  But I do believe it''s completely fair and  
reasonable for MSFT to expect the ability to hold private strategy and  
code planning meetings.

Here''s the thing: If you don''t trust MSFT, don''t
contribute any code.
Personally I do trust MSFT.  At least enough to be willing to contribute  
code w/o the need of being a part of every conversation that takes place  
regarding the past, present, and/or future of this project.

Charlie asked for others to weigh in.  I did.  Maybe I stand alone in my  
viewpoint, but this is how I see things.

-- 
/M:D

M. David Peterson
http://mdavid.name | http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/2354 |  
http://dev.aol.com/blog/3155

On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:25:15 -0600, Charles Oliver Nutter  
<charles.nutter at sun.com> wrote:
> Are you saying you
> don''t think that''s a good idea?
No.
> Take it or leave it, but don''t
> acuse me of being a troll.
I didn''t.  I suggested that this is what it seemed like and asked you
if
you were.  Accussing you of being a troll would sound something like,

Charlie, you''re being a troll.

-- 
/M:D

M. David Peterson
http://mdavid.name | http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/2354 |  
http://dev.aol.com/blog/3155

On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:32:27 -0600, Curt Hagenlocher  
<curt at hagenlocher.org> wrote:
>> I know there''s always thoughts about secrecy and springing the
next big
>> software surprise on the world when working at Microsoft, but secrecy
is
>> poison to an OSS community.
> does not speak well for his intentions.  But if you remove this one  
> sentence, his concerns seem pretty reasonable.
Agreed. In fact it was that exact phrase that caused me to look at the  
entire message with shades of doubt.  Maybe his intentions were legit.   
But with that paragraph in place I have my doubts.

-- 
/M:D

M. David Peterson
http://mdavid.name | http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/2354 |  
http://dev.aol.com/blog/3155

M. David Peterson wrote:
> On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:32:27 -0600, Curt Hagenlocher  
> <curt at hagenlocher.org> wrote:
> 
>>> I know there''s always thoughts about secrecy and springing
the next big
>>> software surprise on the world when working at Microsoft, but
secrecy is
>>> poison to an OSS community.
> 
>> does not speak well for his intentions.  But if you remove this one  
>> sentence, his concerns seem pretty reasonable.
> 
> Agreed. In fact it was that exact phrase that caused me to look at the  
> entire message with shades of doubt.  Maybe his intentions were legit.   
> But with that paragraph in place I have my doubts.
I don''t fault Microsoft in any way for wanting to have some surprises; 
that specifically is not any reason for concern. Hell, I have a few 
surprises I like to/plan to spring and we''re a completely open project.
But the tendency to keep things behind closed doors is antithetical to 
the goals of an open project and community. And closed, private 
conversations *are* poison to a community that wants to feel included 
and appreciated.

If that''s not happening, that''s great, honestly. I just want
to bring it
up as a possible concern. I wouldn''t be on this list if I
weren''t
interested in seeing how the IronRuby dev/design process is going.

- Charlie

M. David Peterson wrote:
> Here''s the thing: If you don''t trust MSFT, don''t
contribute any code.
> Personally I do trust MSFT.  At least enough to be willing to contribute  
> code w/o the need of being a part of every conversation that takes place  
> regarding the past, present, and/or future of this project.
It''s not about trust; it''s about open source as a two-way
street. If
you''re going to pour your time into making the public half of IronRuby 
better, perhaps you deserve to know about or have some say in the 
direction of the other half as well. I don''t have any distrust of
John''s
team or intentions; I just would love to see them able to have public 
rather than private discussions, and I think both the IronRuby and other 
Ruby communities would benefit from it.

- Charlie

David,

On 10/1/07, M. David Peterson <m.david at xmlhacker.com>
wrote:
> I didn''t.  I suggested that this is what it seemed like and asked
you if
> you were.  Accussing you of being a troll would sound something like,
>
> Charlie, you''re being a troll.
I don''t think it''s worth going this way.

Obviously it will take time for the Microsoft folks to go from a
completely closed way of working, to an open-source project like those
we''re used to.

But, as Charles Oliver, I''m impatient to see this moving forward.
Today, this list rather feel like a forum for people asking questions
about IronRuby, and sometimes, a Microsoft engineer answers.

I''m a little frustrated as well by this situation, and I''d
like to see
more technical discussions *between MS engineers* on this list. I also
do agree it will probably take some time, we had the exact same issue
at db4o. To be honest, I was even about to raise the same concern. So
I''m glad the question came out.

-- 
Jb Evain  <jb at nurv.fr>

On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:55:35 -0600, Charles Oliver Nutter  
<charles.nutter at sun.com> wrote:
> I don''t have any distrust of John''s
> team or intentions; I just would love to see them able to have public
> rather than private discussions, and I think both the IronRuby and other
> Ruby communities would benefit from it.
Charlie, I can''t help but agree with your overall point.  But what you
are
suggesting is that there *could* be a problem without any real evidence  
beyond suggesting the list volume is low.  Quite frankly while the list  
volume might be less than jRuby, it''s certainly not a ghost town by any
stretch of the imagination.  So I''m failing to see your point; not from
a
philisophical level, but from a very specific "where''s the
evidence?"

Fair enough, if your entire point is to simply open up the pipes a bit  
more, then cool.  But that''s not the way it came across.

-- 
/M:D

M. David Peterson
http://mdavid.name | http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/2354 |  
http://dev.aol.com/blog/3155

On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:59:18 -0600, Jb Evain <jb at nurv.fr> wrote:
> I don''t think it''s worth going this way.
If the end result is that greater interaction takes place, then fair  
enough: Charlie, you''re not being a troll.

But there is something I think seems to be overlooked: As far as I know,  
the IronRuby team is composed of three developers, and (potentially) one  
additional developer on loan.  Their trying to ship a 1.0 product.  How  
much additional time do they have?

Fast forward to a post 1.0 release: I believe it would be fair to expect a  
much more interactive community similar to that which has formed over in  
IronPython.  They''re now two major releases past their 1.0 release, so
it
makes sense that they would be able to be more involved.

-- 
/M:D

M. David Peterson
http://mdavid.name | http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/2354 |  
http://dev.aol.com/blog/3155

M. David Peterson wrote:
> On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:59:18 -0600, Jb Evain <jb at nurv.fr> wrote:
> 
>> I don''t think it''s worth going this way.
> 
> If the end result is that greater interaction takes place, then fair  
> enough: Charlie, you''re not being a troll.
> 
> But there is something I think seems to be overlooked: As far as I know,  
> the IronRuby team is composed of three developers, and (potentially) one  
> additional developer on loan.  Their trying to ship a 1.0 product.  How  
> much additional time do they have?
I heard five developers, but perhaps that was a couple testers/QA as well.

I assume they email each other during this process; make those emails on 
the public list, and suddenly everyone''s a part of it. Granted, they 
also have face-to-face communication, so perhaps there aren''t as many 
email discussions. But I''d love to see more MS chatter on this list,
and
I think others feel the same way. OSS isn''t something you throw over
the
wall and say "here, fix this, I''ll get back to you."
Community takes
communication.

- Charlie

On 10/1/07, M. David Peterson <m.david at xmlhacker.com>
wrote:
> But there is something I think seems to be overlooked: As far as I know,
> the IronRuby team is composed of three developers, and (potentially) one
> additional developer on loan.  Their trying to ship a 1.0 product.  How
> much additional time do they have?
It''s all about perception. IronRuby has been announced as an
open-source project, and as we speak, the development process is
pretty much hidden to me.

I perfectly understand the need of shipping a product. But I also
understand the necessity of being open to succeed in creating an
open-source project. Then as I said, I''m perfectly aware it will take
time to achieve, but opening things seem to me the only way to succeed
in making IronRuby a successful open-source project.

So depending on the goals, there''s a balance to find between moving
the development forward, and getting the community involved.

-- 
Jb Evain  <jb at nurv.fr>

On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 15:17:12 -0600, Charles Oliver Nutter  
<charles.nutter at sun.com> wrote:
> I assume they email each other during this process; make those emails on
> the public list, and suddenly everyone''s a part of it. Granted,
they
> also have face-to-face communication, so perhaps there aren''t as
many
> email discussions. But I''d love to see more MS chatter on this
list, and
> I think others feel the same way. OSS isn''t something you throw
over the
> wall and say "here, fix this, I''ll get back to you."
Community takes
> communication.
Yeah, you''re right.

-- 
/M:D

M. David Peterson
http://mdavid.name | http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/2354 |  
http://dev.aol.com/blog/3155

On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 15:19:35 -0600, Jb Evain <jb at nurv.fr> wrote:
> So depending on the goals, there''s a balance to find between
moving
> the development forward, and getting the community involved.
Agreed.  I think it will take some time, and my point regarding the  
IronPython list is only partially relevant: They don''t currently take  
contributions from the community, so it''s really a completely different
process.

Guess we''ll see where things end up.

-- 
/M:D

M. David Peterson
http://mdavid.name | http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/2354 |  
http://dev.aol.com/blog/3155

I think we''re pretty lucky to have Charles trolling!  And I do agree
that
more info about what''s going on with IronRuby from MS would help us non
MS
people feel involved.  Even if it''s just some meeting minutes or notes
once
a week, that would be appreciated.

It is hard to understand exactly how to contribute at the moment without
some digging and asking lots of little annoying questions of John, John, and
company (who are very gracious and helpful I might add).

It''s really very exciting to see MS take an open approach with IR.  As
long
as the legal team doesn''t stab the community in the back with some
intellectual property garbage down the line, then MS and it''s community
clearly benefit from the cooperation...

I''ve got my fingers crossed,

-Eric

On 10/1/07, M. David Peterson <m.david at xmlhacker.com>
wrote:
>
> On Mon, 01 Oct 2007 15:19:35 -0600, Jb Evain <jb at nurv.fr> wrote:
>
> > So depending on the goals, there''s a balance to find between
moving
> > the development forward, and getting the community involved.
>
> Agreed.  I think it will take some time, and my point regarding the
> IronPython list is only partially relevant: They don''t currently
take
> contributions from the community, so it''s really a completely
different
> process.
>
> Guess we''ll see where things end up.
>
> --
> /M:D
>
> M. David Peterson
> http://mdavid.name | http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/2354 |
> http://dev.aol.com/blog/3155
> _______________________________________________
> Ironruby-core mailing list
> Ironruby-core at rubyforge.org
> http://rubyforge.org/mailman/listinfo/ironruby-core
>
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