Post APBR4PUr77C8gEmXM8 by chopsstephens@mastodon.nzoss.nz
(DIR) More posts by chopsstephens@mastodon.nzoss.nz
(DIR) Post #AP93jsZF9DnDUy9grA by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T01:59:23Z
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@lightweightAfter years of watching free code software, I've noticed that most projects don't age well (accumulation of technical debt, loss of interest from unpaid maintainers) and tend to be supplanted by a newer shinier thing, more often than radically improved. Case in point, Odoo supplanted CiviCRM, and is now aging out itself 😏
(DIR) Post #AP943zMbabd4Msphmi by lightweight@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T02:01:10Z
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@strypey yup. I hear ya. I think it's more likely to be 'generational' issues. The software discipline (and tooling!) has marched forward quickly and inexorably. Any 10 yo codebase is a couple 'generation' out of date - of little interest to most devs today as it'll be based on passe ideas & languages, and it might still use Subversion or even CVS. The longer-lived projects are constantly reinventing themselves, replacing their inner workings & tooling over time. (Notable exception: WordPress).
(DIR) Post #AP94FjZY7uY2rqUK24 by vik@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T02:05:02Z
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@strypey @lightweight *blows dust off copy of vi*
(DIR) Post #AP94YyrXVCnXn752Ce by lightweight@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T02:05:34Z
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@vik @strypey heh - well, some things never age. I've got a few vim sessions open as I type...
(DIR) Post #AP95dHG79AXtxWBh7Q by phlash@mastodon.me.uk
2022-11-01T02:17:02Z
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@strypey @lightweight Hot take: much like startups, 99% of FOSS is junk and dies away...? Closed source software is just as bad but has vendor lock-in to grift it along 🙃 Then again: https://xkcd.com/2347/Slightly more seriously, as @vik notes, some FOSS survives for a very long time, possibly as sufficient people care about it?
(DIR) Post #AP96dUm2zwqppTn9sW by xurizaemon@toot.cafe
2022-11-01T02:25:53Z
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@strypey @lightweight Sure, I'll take that bait :)CiviCRM has been extremely stable at circa 9-10K installs for a long time. It provides a great tool to some large and small communities.What does "supplanted" mean here - should CiviCRM even attempt to track against Odoo, NationBuilder or Salesforce?Or could it be Actually Great if CiviCRM fits an ecosystem niche and continues to exist and support orgs and developers, without chasing year-on-year growth or new technologies?
(DIR) Post #AP96dVglb4DmfOKSHo by xurizaemon@toot.cafe
2022-11-01T02:28:25Z
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@strypey @lightweight I'm no longer contributing or using it [1] but I miss so much being part of the community CiviCRM represented. Nothing's perfect, things can still be good![1] (thinks hard if there's a forgotten install somewhere... nope)
(DIR) Post #AP9QYATP2wbkVFoAca by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T06:13:32Z
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@lightweightThis is really insightful, thanks. Do you see any organizational patterns common to the projects that can keep up with state of the art, or to those that get left behind? Also, would you care to speculate on why WP is the exception to the rule?
(DIR) Post #AP9R3eWlM78igwOPrc by lightweight@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T06:19:11Z
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@strypey :) - I think that some developers are very quality-focused (obsessed) & they share the general idea that 'code is cheap', so they just, for example, follow interesting new development methods/toolsets and are motivated to exercise them & happily crack into re-implementing what their successful projects (often when they start getting bored with them), building on their existing knowledge, to create a new version of their app incorporating the new shiny. That mentality seems contagious.
(DIR) Post #AP9jZBsNDNjEGwgmjA by xurizaemon@toot.cafe
2022-11-01T02:33:16Z
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@strypey @lightweight It's probably fair comment that as a project with a very liberal strategy on merging submissions, and put together largely by low-funded orgs, it was almost a perfect engine for creating TD - so the pace and progress CiviCRM has achieved over time might be exemplary in dealing with that.It also fostered the development of lot of folks involved. I suspect it's actually a fascinating topic to dig into. Or I'm nostaligizing again.
(DIR) Post #AP9jZCLRTIyrj6I02L by lightweight@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T02:34:21Z
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@xurizaemon @strypey I'm already ruing the fact that so little of that era seems to have been documented... I wonder how much will make it into the history books...
(DIR) Post #AP9jZCfIHUrOifZqym by xurizaemon@toot.cafe
2022-11-01T02:33:50Z
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@strypey @lightweight source for install stats:http://stats.civicrm.org/?tab=sites
(DIR) Post #AP9jZCm1sSFR3YjETg by xurizaemon@toot.cafe
2022-11-01T02:43:02Z
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@lightweight @strypey Anyway, synapses, I am interested to better understand "supplanted by" means, and what measures we value for the success of any project. Because available developer count does matter, and under capitalism the orgs funding it count, and tech choices play into that.
(DIR) Post #AP9jZDOfYn9kzOo5ho by lightweight@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T02:46:49Z
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@xurizaemon @strypey to explain 'supplanted by', I think most devs, over time, start to feel a bit stale working with the same technologies and start to look with envy at emerging tech, living in hope that the flaws of their existing tools set will have been overcome/sidestepped with the new shiny. Sometimes it is (although the new stuff usually introduces new classes of problems too, which sow the seeds for future tech migrations :) ).
(DIR) Post #AP9jZDuZeAg2aLjZR2 by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T09:44:37Z
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Great to see you coming in on this@xurizaemon , I remember you being one of my go-to experts for Civi stuff when I was pitching it to PiNZ. When I talk about this supplanting that, I'm in no position to evaluate the merits of codebases, as you know ;) So all I can comment on is what I see being used in the wild, and what folks who do hosting say they're willing to support. @lightweight
(DIR) Post #AP9k78zwQBXJBzQ3Gq by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T09:54:04Z
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My point was not that the new shiny is *better*, I can only evaluate that from a fairly shallow UX POV anyway. But I do see mass migrations to new and shiny, more often than I see projects get radically improved to keep up with changing expectations. The exceptions, like kernels and text editors (looking at you @vik ), tend to be ones where expectations don't change much. Non-geek users expect far more from UI than geeks, and what they expect evolves much more quickly.@lightweight @xurizaemon
(DIR) Post #AP9ky4Sm0r70TX8uEC by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T10:03:36Z
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@phlashAll true. But we're not talking about itch-scratching hobby projects, rather projects that become a de facto standard in a given domain (in this example CRM), infrastructure people and orgs depend on for years. Then a few years later, I notice something new has become standard.> has vendor lock-in to grift itThat goes some way to explaining why folks using free code can migrate to new and shiny, but it doesn't really explain much about why they do.@lightweight @vik @xurizaemon
(DIR) Post #APAXEgzjJhHePbY7Hc by lightweight@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T19:02:02Z
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@strypey @vik @xurizaemon don't forget the software niche maturity effect, too. Some software, e.g. vim, has comprehensively achieved its aims & doesn't need a huge amount of new dev - it's already close to optimal for its users. Also, it has a high learning curve & (like e.g.touchtyping) people who've invested in learning it & can be massively more productive than those who haven't climbed the curve. But a lot of the 'move to new shiny' is about managing technical debt, which can be crushing.
(DIR) Post #APAXXrzUeoZs1BaDUO by lightweight@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-01T19:03:46Z
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@strypey @xurizaemon I recently helped out on a local gov't campaign, and rather than CiviCRM (which I considered!), I deployed Mautic, another FOSS CRM/Mailchimp replacement. It's great (although, having been acquired by Acquia, it's not nearly as FOSS as it used to be... :( ).
(DIR) Post #APBBXo5p96lY5z4L2W by chopsstephens@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-02T01:48:04Z
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@lightweight @vik @strypey I spend most of my time in an IDE these days, but there's still nothing like vim when you're at a command line and just want to do a quick edit.
(DIR) Post #APBBXoXTUIsrTk0Q8e by lightweight@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-02T01:59:29Z
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@chopsstephens I use Geany sometimes for projects now that Microsoft Github has EOL'd atom. I won't use VSCode on principle... Vim for everything else...@vik @strypey
(DIR) Post #APBBXoyPs8R0pIbw8G by chopsstephens@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-02T02:09:23Z
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@lightweight @vik @strypey oh no, Atom is EOL 😢 I love it and use it every day.I'm guessing your aversion to VSCode is because of MS? Respect to that. But I'm quite happy to use it, and have been very impressed, although I spend most of my time in PyCharm these days.I would be significantly less productive without a full blown IDE, good intellisense, being able to do things like effortlessly refactoring methods between classes is so powerful.
(DIR) Post #APBBXpPiEeGkBxNjg8 by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-02T02:29:18Z
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@chopsstephens @lightweight Either of you tried Eclipse or Ninja?@vik
(DIR) Post #APBCBncqIr9kEGaDB2 by lightweight@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-02T02:31:22Z
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@strypey I haven't used Eclipse in many years. I break out in hives if I use java-based desktop apps. Not heard of Ninja... @chopsstephens @vik
(DIR) Post #APBDH52x3jNNf5sSS8 by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-02T02:40:34Z
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@lightweight This one:https://ninja-ide.org/From memory I went to a talk on it at a KiwiPyCon.@chopsstephens @vik
(DIR) Post #APBOXZb0LQHaXOs8uW by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-02T04:53:01Z
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@lightweight> technical debt, which can be crushing.Maybe there's a parallel here with the built environment? At what point does it become a better use of resources to demolish and rebuild, rather than carry out another round of structural repairs. As with buildings, I'm guessing the quality of the initial design is a factor. Some buildings continue to be worth repairing for decades, if not centuries, while others... do not.@vik @xurizaemon
(DIR) Post #APBR4PUr77C8gEmXM8 by chopsstephens@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2022-11-02T05:05:48Z
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@strypey @vik I'm with @lightweight on Java based desktop apps, certainly for anything resource intensive like an IDE. It's been many years since I've used Eclipse, but I remember changing from it to IntelliJ and being blown away by the improvement.Haven't encountered Ninja IDE. I find IDEs have a lot of intertia; I only looked at VS Code because it was the recommended IDE for a Typescript project I wanted to contribute to, and I didn't have an Typescript/Javascript IDE.