Michael Jouravlev wrote:
On 3/23/06, Jonathan Revusky <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
In order to be able to offer something
reasonably state of the art, the Struts community is basically
abandoning the Struts 1.x codebase and inviting the Webwork people in.
The Webwork 2.2 codebase then gets rechristened "Struts Action Framework
2". But what has happened is definitely a failure of the Struts people
to stay competitive technically.
You like to write a lot, but you don't like to read. You don't find
searching for answer yourself quite entertaining too. I will try again
to explain the possible reason for Struts->WebWork move, as *I* see
it:
In the above you say you will "try again" to explain this. I have no
recollection that you ever tried to explain it to me before.
In any case, I appreciate the explanation. Thank you. However, I have
the honest impression that I understood all of this already by now.
Core Struts people are moving to JSF/Shale, leaving the original
Struts Classic niche up for grabs.
Well, this means that nobody wants to work on the Struts 1.x codebase.
Why? I presume because it's considered to be technically obsolete.
Why is the Struts 1.x codebase technically obsolete?
This niche could (and still can) be
taken by a "next best thing in action frameworks" whatever it may be,
WebWork or Stripes or Spring MVC or something else. In this case the
public perception would have been that Struts lost the battle.
Well, as far as I can see, that perception would be correct. There has
been a failure to keep Struts up to date with the state of the art. That
is what is behind the move of Webwork over here.
Struts guys made a smart move bringing WebWork in as Struts 2.0. The
name is preserved and all that is related to the name is preserved
too, not just software but people as well. This way Struts originators
and committers retain their respectable status, while WebWork guys get
the market: "I was a Struts committer once" - "Oh, cool! I've heard
that version 2.0 will be really a leap forward". Very, very nice deal
for all interested parties.
One problem is that the whole thing seems to have intent to deceive
behind it. A casual observer will believe that Struts Action 2 is the
continuation of the Struts 1.x codebase and the work of the Struts
community. It is not. It is a codebase that was a competing product,
developed by a different community.
The whole thing is structured so as to create a maximum of confusion
about what really happened. This is an objection that I lay out here:
http://freemarker.blogspot.com/2006/03/musings-about-competition-ego-open.html
Committers work on new interesting stuff, releaving themselves from
boring 1.x maintenance.
Well, maintaining 1.x is quite uninteresting because it has become
technically obsolete, due to a failure to keep up with other things in
the space, like Webwork. There seems to be a "beg the question" fallacy
in what you're saying.
Six years, are you kidding? After all, they
work on a new product now, so it will be beneficial for the community
too. WebWork guys get the recognition, the market and the influence.
Struts Action users get new version of the framework. Who cares that
it was called WebWork before?
Well, what you're saying, Michael is basically: "Yeah, isn't this great
marketing?"
Maybe it is, but you're talking like a marketing guy, not an engineer.
The intent behind this is to mislead people. The casual observer will
think that this Webwork codebase is the continuation of Struts 1.x.
Eventually, people will even point to Struts Action 2 (i.e. Webwork) as
an example of how well "the Apache way" works. However, it is not an
example of that. The whole thing is an example of a project that
presumably followed the so-called Apache Way failng to stay competitive
technically with another project that was developed outside ASF.
I see intent to deceive. And that does not set well with me.
Jonathan Revusky
--
lead developer, FreeMarker project, http://freemarker.org/
Struts Classic needs/needed a serious makeover anyway, so why not to
take others' code instead? Do you care that Pontiac GTO is actually a
Holden Monaro, which is heavily based on Opel Omega? GM did not have
anything like it anyway, they killed Camaro/Firebird because it was a
farm tractor not a sports car. Bringing in GTO was an answer to public
demand for a new muscle car. Was this a reasonable choice? Um, for
"true" Camaro aficionados, maybe not. For them, Camaro will probably
be revived in couple of years.
But software is not exactly like automotive industry anyway. GM does
not give away GTO for free.
Michael.
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