Re: [Gramps-users] What's good and what needs improvement?

[Bret B. <br...@bu...>]

On Fri, 28 Nov 2003, Don Allingham wrote:

> 
> Another problem that we encounter, is that new versions of the OS's no
> longer support the libraries needed, so an upgrade is necessary. For
> example, while Red Hat 7.3 provided that libraries that GRAMPS 0.8.1
> needed (pygtk-0.6), Red Hat 8.0 dropped these libraries, so GRAMPS 0.8.1
> cannot run out of the box on a Red Hat 8.0, Red Hat 9, or Fedora Core 1
> system.
> 
> So in this case, new distributions would be locked out of GRAMPS.

I had understood that Red Hat was supposed to maintain backwards 
compatibility; that software written for earlier versions would still 
run. They must have dropped that, when they started on Red Hat 8.

Sounds to me, like RH adopting MS tactics.

> 
> I think what you are looking for already exists. Check out GeneWeb
> (http://cristal.inria.fr/~ddr/GeneWeb/en/) for a full web based system,
> or phpGedView (http://phpgedview.sourceforge.net) for a display-only,
> but very slick interface.
> 
> To make GRAMPS web-based would be a complete rewrite from scratch, in
> which case we would be several years behind GeneWeb and we would be
> fairly redundant.
> 
> And unfortunately a rewrite in PHP would not guarantee that the "old-OS"
> problem would go away. Do you write it in php3 or php4? What version of
> MySQL does each distribution ship with? Are they all compatible? What
> about compatibility with Apache 2.X versus Apache 1.3? 
> 
> Don
> 
> 

I assume that php4 would be the version in versions of (for example) Red 
Hat 7.3 and later. But, obviously, I am not sure how recently it was 
implemented, or, what percentage of Linux users have php3 and what 
percentage have php4.

In terms of the MySQL version, as I believe that I had mentioned, if 
standards (eg, ANSI standard SQL, eg ANSI-SQL92 compliance) are applied, 
it should work for most if not all recent versions of Linux with MySQL 
or PostgreSQL, or whatever SQL-based database.

I assume that the methods of accessing MySQL (and other SQL databases, 
like PostgreSQL), would not have changed from, for example, Red Hat 
Linux 7.3 to RH9 or Fedora, or, from Debian stable, to Debian unstable 
(as examples of different "recent" versions of Linux distributions).

Of course, my assumption may be wrong.

I note that discussion has occurred recently, regrading porting to using 
an SQL database rather than XML. Does your response above, mean that 
that proposal has now been abandoned?

I had regarded my suggestions and input as reasonable, and, fitting the 
question that I had cited, to which I was responding.

Input was sought, and I gave my input.

I am sorry that it was not well recieved.

I believe that GRAMPS has its good points, and that the actions that I 
have suggested, would improve it.

At the start of your response, you did concede that the problem of 
compatibility with different versions (as opposed to different 
distributions) of Linux, eg, the latest version of GRAMPS not being 
compatible with Red Hat Linux 7.3 or Debian Linux 7.3, is a problem.

I was merely suggesting a way to overcome this problem.

The question then arises; if such a way as I have suggested, is not 
implemented (and, in that, I am not suggesting or arguing that my 
suggested solution, is the only possible solution to the particular 
problem), then, what happens, when the current libraries on which GRAMPS 
relies, are replaced, thus, causing a recurrence of the problem?

With the current situation, it is a bit like MS Windows and Windows 
software - "If you want to run our software, then you have to upgrade 
your hardware and your operating system".

Red Hat Linux 9 reuires more resources than most of the computers on our 
LAN have possible, just to instal Red Hat Linux 9. My current computer 
is what I regard as borderline, for installing and running Red Hat 
Linux 9, in terms of resources. And, as previously mentioned, in the 
ever-growing nature of Red Hat Linux, version 9 has only another 4 
months of life-support, and, version 7.3 that I use, has only one month 
left, of life-support.

Thus, in the absence of a web-based version of GRAMPS, I am stuck with 
using an obsolete version of GRAMPS, for the life of my OS.

As mentioned, a change that I would like to see (which is what was 
asked of us...), is the conversion to a web-based application, to 
overcome the redundancy problem, where users get left behind.

Input was sought, and I gave what I believe was reasonable input, and, a 
reasonable suggestion to overcome an acknowledged problem with GRAMPS.

Perhaps, it goes back to me, and to other people who want Linux-oriented 
genealogy software, to create our own, leading to a plethora (if people 
can get around to creating the software) of genealogy applications for 
Linux.

Now, if only I could work out that structure of GEDCOM, so that I could 
work out how toimport data from GEDCOM files, to a relational database...

-- 
Bret Busby
Armadale
West Australia
..............

"So once you do know what the question actually is,
 you'll know what the answer means."
- Deep Thought,
  Chapter 28 of 
  "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy:
  A Trilogy In Four Parts",
  written by Douglas Adams, 
  published by Pan Books, 1992 
....................................................