Beefy Boxes and Bandwidth Generously Provided by pair Networks
The stupid question is the question not asked
 
PerlMonks  

Re^3: The quantity vs. quality lesson

by flyingmoose (Priest)
on Jun 03, 2004 at 17:02 UTC ( [id://360283]=note: print w/replies, xml ) Need Help??


in reply to Re^2: The quantity vs. quality lesson
in thread The quantity vs. quality lesson

"You don't find often books of 1st grade students in the university libraries"

Awesome point. Very concise. You should have led with it as it would make your argument for "levels of CPAN" more clear. Perhaps (though I have alluded to it), we should have varying levels of approval, such as in the Debian system, where private packages can be seperated from the "uber packages", making it easier to tell what you are downloading. That sort of direction is *definitely* an improvement and is doable, much easier than just begging for quality.

I am disappointed your requests for quality are falling on deaf ears and we're hearing "but I should be allowed to upload my buggy code and bad designs!". I think, once, CPAN served a place like that. But this is horrific on the users, and that time has gone. If we want to establish a CPAN experimental, unstable, testing, and stable, that's fine, and I will gladly set my configuration files to not search through it!

Anyhow, if Perl is to grow up, it needs to take on a better goal of quality, not quantity. Quantity is for first graders, and I want rock-solid code, because I write rock-solid code. Modules that are halfway-implemented source filters or broken implementations do not intest me, and we need a way to seperate the wheat from the chaff. Not to grade the wheat and the chaff, mind you, but to organize it.

Something also needs to be done about namespace sprawl to confine modules to more logical places.

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re^4: The quantity vs. quality lesson
by dragonchild (Archbishop) on Jun 03, 2004 at 17:37 UTC
    I --'ed nearly every single reply you made in this thread, and I'm going to explain why.

    Both you and Fatvamp are completely missing the point of CPAN. CPAN isn't, nor should it be, a moderated list of modules. SourceForge, which is built on a very similar model, isn't moderated, either. I don't hear people bitching about it ...

    Furthermore, I don't hear you or Fatvamp offering to take on the effort of moderating the submissions. If you were willing to go ahead and do this moderation, I would be willing to listen. Heck, I'd even donate1 some of my time to that effort. Are you?

    Until you are willing to do what Jarrko et al have done and donate 20-40 hours per week of your own time, you don't have the right to get on that soapbox and bitch up a storm.

    Yeah, I'd love to have a place where I can go and know that every module has been vetted and tested and works perfectly. Except, none of my code would ever be there. But, my code2 fills a niche that nothing else does. So, your perfect CPAN would have only the best of the best ... which means it won't fulfill most needs. Are you willing to put the time in to improve the software that people want, but isn't up to your standards? I know I have better things to do with my life, and I'd hope you would, too.

    1. Remember - the entire of CPAN is donated to you, the user. You have never had to pay a penny for it. You get what you pay for.
    2. PDF::Template and Excel::Template create different formats using the same data structures as HTML::Template. TT2 doesn't write to those formats (not easily, at any rate).

    ------
    We are the carpenters and bricklayers of the Information Age.

    Then there are Damian modules.... *sigh* ... that's not about being less-lazy -- that's about being on some really good drugs -- you know, there is no spoon. - flyingmoose

    I shouldn't have to say this, but any code, unless otherwise stated, is untested

      I --'ed nearly every single reply you made in this thread, and I'm going to explain why.

      Well - dragonchild - if it makes you feel better, please do so. I personally will refrain from - - ing your nodes, because this would be CHILDish no mather whether one is a manchild or a dragonchild.

      Both you and Fatvamp are completely missing the point of CPAN. CPAN isn't, nor should it be, a moderated list of modules. SourceForge, which is built on a very similar model, isn't moderated, either. I don't hear people bitching about it ...

      Well - first off, this is Perlmonks, my opinion about content of SF is quite similar to CPAN. The major difference is, that SF offers you several indices to blend out "unmature" projects. But SF should not be an issue here.

      I think this thread brought up the essence/gist of the matter up very well. Actually this is what I intended to say, but was somehow unprecise. For this unprecision, I do well deserve the - - es. The gist - with which I completedly agree is:

      The problem of CPAN isn't having both good and bad modules, but the difficulty to separate the wheat from the chaff (I think adrianh mentioned it first.

      Furthermore, I don't hear you or Fatvamp offering to take on the effort of moderating the submissions. If you were willing...

      I wasn't aware of the CPAN ratings system until I wrote that first node. My bad. But you may have realized, that I have submitted some reviews already and will of course continue with that. I also offered Ask B. to edit the bad revisions, but that will need some changes in the code.

      Until you are willing to do what Jarrko et al have done and donate 20-40 hours per week of your own time, you don't have the right to get on that soapbox and bitch up a storm.

      I agree. Unfortunatedly you are quite misinformed about the amount of contributions (money, time and code) I'm responsible for. (No - not just my time, but also the time of developers I am responsible for.) And therefore I think I HAVE the right to "bitch up a storm".

      So, your perfect CPAN would have only the best of the best ... which means it won't fulfill most needs.

      It is probably my failure for not being that precise, although I believe there are always two sides when it comes to a misunderstanding (sender and receiver - assuming the channel is ok). I'd be fully satisfied with a CPAN that would allow me to blend out modules whose "reputation" is below a certain mark. Yes, CPAN does that somehow a little bit in a way...

      Bye
       PetaMem
          All Perl:   MT, NLP, NLU

      I --'ed nearly every single reply you made in this thread, and I'm going to explain why
      The experience cut hurts so very very much. I might not attain level vroom now. Anyhow, I am downvoting all of your nodes every time you advertise for your own 3 little modules when it was unneccesary to do so.
      Furthermore, I don't hear you or Fatvamp offering to take on the effort of moderating the submissions.
      Nope, I wouldn't work on it -- but a community can always listen to suggestions -- I chose to work on other things, and volunteerism doesn't always have to be software related -- the point is you contribute. Meanwhile, openness is important, but evidentally you don't think that way. I think you exist only to advertise your contributions and your 3 modules in every post -- ok -- fine, nice, good for you -- but this does not make your ideas any better than mine.

      So, your perfect CPAN would have only the best of the best ... which means it won't fulfill most needs.
      Do you run Debian? I'm asking for tiers of quality/safety/completeness, that's all.

      Until you are willing to do what Jarrko et al have done and donate 20-40 hours per week of your own time, you don't have the right to get on that soapbox and bitch up a storm.
      So I don't have the right to discuss feature improvements on a public forum? Great. I love the openness here. It's lovely.

      So, anyhow, I'm enjoying the holier-than-thou atmosphere here, someone tries to get the Perl community to rise above it's "line noise" and "crap code" stereotypes and the community just backs them up. What sort of environment is that? It can't excel. It will be continually held back by this small thinking. It grows, and grows, but completely without form, design, and planning. So it's an archive... put it is *not* fit for a standard library or something that would pretend to be one. It says a convient way to download things and resolve dependencies, but it does not recieve attention ... one man's modules are one man's modules, and features are added sporadically -- modules are instead forked or cloned, and there is much duplication -- but little to no cooperation! The source is open to these modules, but the development and maintaince process isn't. Hence the dispartity.

      Yes, this is another post to downvote. Have at me, I don't care. The attitude towards change and free discussion here is really depressing. I don't want everyone to agree, but it would be nice if they got off their high horses once and awhile.

      Well, anyhow, I'm glad some of you have shown your true colors -- I'm resigning from this community as I have no intention of being associated with biggots like you.

Log In?
Username:
Password:

What's my password?
Create A New User
Domain Nodelet?
Node Status?
node history
Node Type: note [id://360283]
help
Chatterbox?
and the web crawler heard nothing...

How do I use this?Last hourOther CB clients
Other Users?
Others having a coffee break in the Monastery: (8)
As of 2024-03-28 09:13 GMT
Sections?
Information?
Find Nodes?
Leftovers?
    Voting Booth?

    No recent polls found