new IDE FAQ/project intro?

[Richard Gaskin]

Alex Rice wrote:

> Is there a homepage for the new IDE project? FAQ?

There will be.  I'm ready to go with a number of small but useful changes to
the IDE, waiting for the two core issues to be resolved:

- Licensing
I sent a note to Scott Raney letting him know that the general consensus on
licensing leans toward the X11 verbage (see
<http://www.x.org/Downloads_terms.html>), and offering to save him time by
making the modifications to his About box an needed, so all he has to do is
approve it and post it.   I have not heard back from him yet, and cannot
distribute modified copies of the IDE until we have a version with the
verbage that allows us to do so.

- Hosting
There seems to be a preference among the readers here for Yahoo Groups as a
home for this project if only because it's simple and accessible, and a
number of other small MC-related open source projects are doing well there.
But along the way there was a discussion of someone willing to pay for the
domain name and hosting of a neutral domain, yet nothing definitive has been
posted to the list. I haven't been in a big rush to push the hosting issue
since we can't legally post anything there until the licensing issue is
done.  But in the interest of time I've aleady set up a Yahoo Group called
"MC IDE" - once we can legally distribute modified copies of the MC IDE
we're good to go there, and as other hosting options become available we
could move the project at any time if needed.


> Mostly I'm interested in
> 
> what are the project goals

Simply put, to maintain and enhance the MC IDE for the foreseeable future.

Those of us who use it like it for its nimble simplicity, and in the spirit
of democratic process the goals were discussed in depth over the last few
months here.  The general consensus is that most generally like it as it is
and are looking to see as few changes as possible in the IDE proper,
modifying it for compatibility as the engine changes and making other minor
changes to address annoyances like the Message Box placement.

In the short term, significant changes are encouraged as plug-ins, with the
addition of a Rev-like plug-in menu among the earliest changes planned.
This way folks can use additional features as they like without being
saddled with the ones they don't.

Another benefit to enouraging plug-in development as a way of enhancing the
IDE is that it benefits both the Rev community and the plug-in developer:
anyone putting significant effort into a major IDE component can also
deliver it to the other 90% of the Transcript community who use Rev.  Those
plug-in projects that are open source further benefit by allowing the many
smart folks like Dar, Jan, and others who only use Rev to be able to
contribute without requiring them to switch their entire preferred IDE.  By
making plug-ins that work interchangeably we keep both IDE plug-in specs
clean and simple.

In an informal voting process here on this list, last month I was elected
"Poohbah", or project steward, for a six month period ending arbitrarily on
Groundhog Day (Feb 2).  But placing community needs above all else, an
impeachment process is fully encouraged if ever I stray from the community's
wishes. :)

As with any open source project, there may from time to time be forked
projects as well, perhaps to explore more exotic changes beyond the needs of
the community or just for fun.  While there is certainly benefit in seeing
energies coordinated in a consistent direction to serve a common goal, I see
no reason why other more specialized goals should not also be explored;
while most of us use the IDE to support our existing businesses and
workflows, there may be interesting ideas to be had from more exotic
explorations which might benefit us all in the long term.  As a forked
project the possibilities are as limitless as one has time on their hands,
without affecting the primary IDE and the businesses that dependent on it.


> what engine it uses

Always the most recent release version of Rev available, and ideally
backwardly compatible with the baseline, MC 2.5. There may be a time when we
need to ditch backward compatibility (such as a file format change), but as
long as I'm poohbah I would do my best to try to avoid that as long as
possible.


> how the engine fits into the IDE

This should in theory require nothing from us, yet in practice there are
minor steps that must be taken to use the engine from the Rev distro with
the MC IDE:  you need to change the name of the engine to "mc.exe" on Win,
"MetaCard" on Mac Classic, and on OS X you have to move the executable from
the Revolution bundle into the MetaCard bundle, renaming it to "MetaCard" to
match the value in the bundle's info.plist file.

We may be able to automate updates once we get a version of the IDE we're
allowed to modify.


> what are metacard.com runrev.com's positions are towards the project

Support appears generally favorable on all sides.  Taking the IDE open
source was Raney's idea, and while Kevin would like us to consider using Rev
the FAQ on the acquisition clarifies the position of both companies:

<http://www.runrev.com/metacardpr.html>

    We strongly recommend everyone to upgrade to Revolution.
    However, for those existing MetaCard customers that want
    to continue to use the MetaCard tools, we will arrange
    an outside group of volunteer developers to maintain the
    existing MetaCard user interface so that they may do so.

Tuviah has said that he sees the MC IDE as a valuable test bed and given
that it was written by the engine's inventor I agree, as it reflects a way
of thinking about Transcript and working with object model that is tightly
coupled with the strengths of the engine.

I'll save this post for use as an interim FAQ once we get the home
distribution page set up.  Thanks for the good questions.  It was about time
for a status report anyway. :)

-- 
 Richard Gaskin 
 Fourth World Media Corporation
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