Re: [Dynapi-Dev] Can this project be brought back to life?

[Andrew G. <an...@zo...>]

Leif W wrote:

>> "Andrew Gillett" <an...@zo...>; 2005-03-29@21:11 -0500
>>
>> David Kings question, "Is this project dead?", got me thinking about 
>> the state of the DynAPI project.
>
>
> It's sad, disappointing, and so on, regarding my own level of ability 
> and what I didn't do with it.  I could go on beating myself up about 
> personal reasons about what holds me back when I could have been 
> contributing.  Anyways, if this project still has a reaon to be alive, 
> then I want to see it stay alive and do what I can to that end.
>
>> I've been using DynAPI for nearly two years now to build a rather 
>> complex internal web application. To implement this project in 
>> straight HTML & JavaScript would almost certainly have ended in 
>> failure without a library like DynAPI. So I have a real stake in 
>> seeing the project survive.
>
>
> I think what used to be fun, was to have demonstrations from other 
> people that show the amazing things that can be done, with some kind 
> of interactive application, with the full documentation.  Or even just 
> one or two little things, and how to combine them in differnt ways.

A few things I would like to do are to include the dynapi 3 examples and 
documentation on the main web page. Some of the examples are very 
impressive (those that work ;-). I would also like to set up a wiki as a 
kind of "shared staging area" for development of the documentation.

>
>> My purpose with this post is to see how much interest there is in 
>> possibly reviving the project.
>
>
> I am somewhat interested.  I've been in a personal rut for so long 
> that I can't get much interested in anything, or stay interested in 
> one thing for very long.  One of the many things I am disappointed 
> with myself.
>
>> If there there are people out there who are willing to put their hand 
>> up to contribute to DynAPI, perhaps we could work towards getting a 
>> final Release 3 out. Some of the things this would involve would 
>> include getting admin access to the SourceForge project, updating the 
>> web site, writing more documentation, and testing the existing code 
>> base.
>>
>> Anyone interested?
>
>
> If I have any hope of doing anything meaningful, I'll need to identify 
> specific tasks, and break it up into small bits of work, and set a 
> specific 1-2 hour block time each day to work, wether I feel like it 
> or not.  Of course I could do more if motivated.
>
> In any case, I've always been good for submitting to CVS those small 
> patches to test and fix typos here and there.  Andrew, I think you 
> submitted most of them.  ;-)  And I did already step up to fix the PHP 
> error of the original poster.  I had even asked about that error 
> several weeks before the poster but got no response.
>
> I still have a rough idea of all the "unfixed" things in the DynAPI. 
> This is off the top of my head.  I'd have to search the archives for 
> better details.
>
> * code compression, something about it's relation to the "p." naming 
> convention
> * PHP/Perl SODA/IOElement
> * Mac OSX issues?
> * Linux/Konqueror issues?
> * Windows IE6/Mozilla/Firefox/Netscape/Opera issues (various)
> * Review and integration of Raymod Irving's 2004-05-27 release.
> * API and widget documentation.
> * Web site could be updated (help content, SF-specific stuff, etc.).
> * cross-browser text field autocomplete
> * Admin issues?

There are a whole bunch of bug reports and submitted patches and so 
forth on the project trackers page 
(http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=5757).  If we're going to do 
anything with dynapi, we should do it properly and use the existing 
tracking systems. I would want to add these issues to the tracker and 
work through the outstanding bugs that have been logged and either fix & 
close them or delete them.

> Hey, someone make me an admin and I'll take care of that boring stuff. 
> ;-)  Perhaps time to lock down the CVS access, restrict access or 
> remove entirely past contributors who I've never seen email on this 
> list in the past 3 years, or really in the past 6 months.  Clean up 
> the CVS (remove that typo-module).  Send out nag messages to people 
> (hey, how's that code coming along?).  Monkey around with the site.  
> Field bug andpatch submissions and try to find someone to take care of 
> it.  Announce releases, set up the file release system.  Err, whatever 
> else the SF admin does.
>
> Leif


Leif, you've clearly been a dynapi enthusiast since well before I first 
heard of it, and I greatly appreciate your quick response. I would still 
like to see a few more people express some interest before making a 
significant commitment myself. And of course we need to hear from at 
least one of the existing site admins.



Andrew