I can understand some frustration about bugs etc. Perhaps someone in the community can make a unofficial ‘patch’ for CI 1.5.1. (Unfortunately I do not have the time for it)
Features I would rather see as “addons” to keep CI clean for those who do not need them. One thing I would rather like is a better “addon” manager on this site to find them and for their users to update them as needed.
I can understand some frustration about bugs etc. Perhaps someone in the community can make a unofficial ‘patch’ for CI 1.5.1. (Unfortunately I do not have the time for it)
Features I would rather see as “addons” to keep CI clean for those who do not need them. One thing I would rather like is a better “addon” manager on this site to find them and for their users to update them as needed.
Oh boy, this is a long topic. isn’t it? We have a collection of interesting subjects here. I’m gonna pick some up and leave my two cents.
1) The lack of roadmap – Although I’m not an active community member, I’m here since CI 1.3, and I can tell you that every release of CI exceeded my expectations. Now seriously, who needs a roadmap anyway? I like Rick’s surprises about CI.
2) There’s a long list of unattended requests – We can do pretty much anything with CI as it is. That’s because CI is modular and flexible. So, if we need anything we can just code it. I did that with YATS and a number of other libraries, it was easy and I’m pretty happy with the results.
3) There’s a long list of bugs – So does Windows, and I don’t see anyone lining up in front of Microsoft whining about them (btw, that’s why I got a mac ). Again, fix it by yourself and share with us your solution, so others can enjoy your enlightenment and wealth. And for those bugs we can’t figure out I say we just have to wait patiently for the next release.
4) Rick doesn’t care about us – Yes he does! That’s why we all can work with CI and complain about it. Now tell me, do you fell lonely? No? So why this desperate need for Rick? Seriously, the man has his own life to live, as we as well. If he’s not here to code for you, code it for yourself. And always remember, there are other people here that can help you out when things go bad on your code.
5) CI is not PHP5 – Well, I am not a techie, neither my clients. Truth be told, they don’t care about the technology we’re using to deliver them solutions. All they care about is the solution itself. Not so long ago I was managing two teams, one developing on Java and the other on PHP4. The Java guys were always showing off telling they were the best dudes working on the best technology. On the other hand there were the PHP guys desperate crying to work on PHP5 because it’s architecturally better. The conclusion was, the Java guys took four to five times more than the PHP guys to deliver something to the clients, and the bottom line is that the app was always broken. On the other hand, the PHP guys delivered to the clients, but they didn’t care that much about them. On the other side there were the clients that didn’t want to change their servers just to run the same thing they already have up and running for months. For them dropping PHP4 for Java and PHP5 was a unnecessary and costly move. So, the real question you should ask yourself is: what my client cares more about, the technology or the solution itself?
6) CI doesn’t have a subversion server – That’s because CI is not an usual open source project. pMachine develops CI, not us. And since we’re not the developers, what’s the point on having a repository? We have a Wiki, we could write articles on the bugs we fix or the libraries we write and post there.
7) CI is not internationalized – However it works well with western languages, and for that I am grateful. But the world is big, and there are more people speaking other languages than those supported by CI. But hold on, how many people that uses CI really need to develop sites on other languages? Hard one, isn’t it? We have to ask questions like this in order to sort things out and to figure what is best to develop now. That’s part of managing.
Opinions apart, CI in all its youth is already a great framework with a brilliant future ahead. Let’s stop talking about breaking apart or forking. Let’s quit pissing Rick off. Why not to turn these discussions in planning and therefore some good code? And for that we have the skilled people and resources.
Incidentally, he has discussed internationalization. http://codeigniter.com/forums/viewthread/44560/. He’s also discussed wanting an AJAX library, community support, SVN access, releases, feature additions and many other things. Most (all?) of these he discussed on these forums.
Perhaps things aren’t moving fast enough for some users, and that’s understandable, but things are moving. CI can only ask for your patience here. The fact is, pMachine is growing, ExpressionEngine is growing, and CI is growing. As EE2 comes out, CI will see more code, in addition to the fine work that the community has already done.
Rick does not want people pestering him?
That’s your perception, and I understand it; but I certainly don’t share it. I think Rick’s been open and honest every step of the way, and he has consulted the community. You can’t please everyone all the time.
And everyone, your contributions to the framework, in terms of code, in terms of support, in terms of evangelism, in terms of discussion and in terms of use have not been overlooked. I for one am grateful for them all. I’ve never, and I mean never, seen a community like ours. Here’s a sampling of what we bring to the table:
- We’ve seen “newbies” post basic questions and are answered (often within minutes) with helpful, respectful, useful information;
- We’ve seen advanced users write insanely difficult conceptual problems and generate interesting and insightful responses;
- We’ve seen “newbies” grow into good programmers, and actually return to the community after they’ve solved their problem just so that they can give back more.
I could go on. To those of your talking about forking CI (I’m not one of them) I wish you luck, but I’d miss your contributions to the community. Personally, my strategy is to continue to use CI to make me more productive, and to be patient with a maturing framework.
You know, this morning I was shouting at my kid (yes I do that!), but she just kep quite, which made me even more cross, as she wasn’t answering my questions to her.
Later I thought maybe I was too hard on her, and scared her, until my son gave me the reason why: Yesterday, when I told my son not no go near the calculator that he broke - he was in the process of responding when I told him that he shouldn’t talk back!
So pity my duaghter; Damned if you do…
[/off topic]
(Sorry, this topic just reminded me of my daughter - minus the hair)
OK, back to the issue.
I had mixed feeling, and also started to thing what I’ll do if CI forks, as Code Igniter is part of my toolset that is helping me earn me a living. It was important to look for alternatives.
Then I realised that you don’t really need to fork CI, do you? Over the past few releases, CI has become so versatile that you can even extend and replace most core libaries, and create ones that are not there.
So perhaps we should look at this approach, together with CI forge as a repository for bug fixes, etc. I’m not sure how it will work, or be coordinated etc, but I’m sure those challenges will be there as well if the product forks.
I would like to tell my own humble opinion about this thread.
Why do some people talk about forking CI? Would they expect a new release of CI every week? Which other software (even commercial ones) does it? We are just two months after 1.5 and I think it’s still young…
Sure, me too I jump into the forum every day eager to see if there are some news but - be realistic.
I like CI very much and I plan to use it for every new work I will start in the next months, but I don’t want it to fork into multiple subversion loosing its unity.
I would rather expect for Rick to take his time and make a new release when he thinks the time has come.
In the meantime I really much appreciate the contributions from the people who post their applications, libraries, plugins and so on.
Please don’t break the unity of the CI core.
Thanks a lot for reading me.
You are a great community.
Hey folks, before you panic about someone forking CI, try to find any posts where someone is actually volunteering to do it.
I have mentioned it several times because forking is a right that comes with free, open source software. I have also mentioned several times that it would be an incredible amount of work.
And Rick has done such a really good job on CI that I’m sure the overall satisfaction here would compare very favorably with any other framework.
Hey folks, before you panic about someone forking CI, try to find any posts where someone is actually volunteering to do it.
I have mentioned it several times because forking is a right that comes with free, open source software. I have also mentioned several times that it would be an incredible amount of work.
And Rick has done such a really good job on CI that I’m sure the overall satisfaction here would compare very favorably with any other framework.
Indeed, and even IF someone would attempt to fork it. Those that do not want it will remain here. In my opinion most of us will stay.
... I have already replaced the original Language class with my own class and config file for each locale used in my project. The Language class has i18n and l10n features and of course it is ten times bigger
....
Well, Why dont you post your additions in the Wiki and contribute?
There are ongoing changes. I will post in wiki after the project will be tested in production stage.
Since you guys are on the topic (and I don’t often stop by here anymore).. I’ve basically “forked” at this point. It’s not official yet (and I’m a bit hesitant to post this), but it’s started. Basically I got tired of trying to work around CodeIgniter and took it and morphed it around to do what I wanted it to do. I believe it still maintains most of the spirit of CodeIgniter - that is: lightweight, flexible, basically get out of the way and let you code.
Now, I put the word “forked” in quotes because really, what I’ve done is reinvent a few parts of it, and I’ve done it in ways that means its probably not (directly) compatible with existing apps written with CodeIgniter. CI’s DB layer - gone. The already-written, maintained, and mature ADODB library is used instead. Models act totally different: when you load a model, an object is returned (and no global $this->modelname object is created). Models are designed with the intent of being integrated with ADODB’s ActiveRecord class (that is, your model is an ActiveRecord object) but it doesn’t have to be that way. My (adding back of) init files and input::get() patches are included. Quickformsare also integrated (this is why I haven’t really done any more work on my supermodel/quickmodel library), and automation functions exist (well, not totally done yet) to integrate them with the ActiveRecord implementation. I’ve removed some of the silly libraries from the core project (this is just a purity/keep-the-user-guide-short-and-sweet thing). I also plan on adding AJAX support (not sure which library yet, but the goal is to make it easy to call special controller functions). I also may end up giving up PHP4 support - not if I don’t have to, but I also don’t want to have to “settle” for doing things a certain way just for PHP4. I have the luxury that I usually control the platform, most of the apps I build are for specific sites I run or appliance-type devices.
The other big goal of this is to be a regular open source project, that is: a clear roadmap (yes, this IS important btw, it’s nice to know if a feature you’re planning to use/using/relying on is going to be removed or replaced in an upcoming version, or if something you’re planning on writing is already being written or planned), public subversion repository, and most of all, I’d be more than happy for other people to contribute with subversion access. In fact, that’s partly the reason I’m posting this, just to see who is interested in helping out or wants some input.
I should make it clear, I’m not trying to compete with CodeIgniter, I’m just changing it where my own needs and implementation ideas differ, and perhaps it will help some other people out as well. A lot of the stuff could be done with MY_ classes, but .. why? I plan on using these modifications in every project I use this for.. if I’m chunking out a bunch of custom libraries every time, I pretty much HAVE forked, and it just gets confusing when the project actually does need something specific extended. If there are other people doing the same thing and who need the same modifications I do, then it just makes sense for us to work together and mutually benefit.
Anyways, send me a private message if you’re interested in some way. I’m sure many people will be put off by changing major details that will break existing CI applications, or that I don’t care so much about PHP4. But again, I’m not trying to compete, I’m just taking what I think is a nice base and changing the things I disagree with, and adding some features.
I’m both excited and scared at the news. Excited because the functionality you listed sounded like I was writing this. Scared because I have a vested interest in CI became I am using it in projects that pay my rent.
Fragmenting the community that follows a fork may mean that eventually some developers may have to choose one or the other, and whichever side you are on, we are going to lose some pretty good folks to “the other side’.
However, I’m not one to stop innovation, and what you’ve started is not going to die, so I believe the best at this stage is to “officially” kick off the project and allow things to take its course. I’m sure that will be some interest initially from people that are curious, but I’m sure that there will be some “group” that will quickly form that will announce their modifications to your base code, that others may be interested in.
First prize, however, remains the eventual release by pMachine/Rick of Code Igniter the community. For this reason it may be a good idea to create multiple “branches” so that people may at least have easy migration of components in any direction, with the idealistic view of the eventual merge of the two projects.
The features sound really great. I wish we could avoid a fork though. This is the worst thing that could happen to this great community.
I can understand your frustation. Rick doesn’t even post on this forum anymore. We have a great community but without Rick I don’t really see a future for CI. Regarding the community it seems that not one single forum user is in contact with Rick.
Sometimes I have the feeling the whole CI thing was just some experiment and marketing activity for EE. At least when reading interviews with Rick you might get the impression. I am still hoping Rick will return to CI and his community. If this is not going to happen, there is no other way than forking I am afraid.
Please make a new topic for this information. I think this is very important for everybody.
I support Greg’s right to do what’s best for Greg.
However, I don’t agree with shocki: CI’s future is perfectly OK even if it’s without Rick. Don’t see this as a choice between fork or die. There are enough competent pairs of hands here to keep an “original/generic” CI framework developing if necessary.
Good luck with your route, Greg. Will this affect CIforge in any way?
CI’s future is perfectly OK even if it’s without Rick
Martin,
As long as bugs and security issues (!!!) are not fixed in the core we cannot live without Rick im my opinion.
There are enough competent pairs of hands here to keep an “original/generic” CI framework developing if necessary.
Yes. I just wish Rick would communicate with those guys to make CI more complete and stable. Many people here would like to help with coding.
But without any feedback this is not much fun to do.
). Again, fix it by yourself and share with us your solution, so others can enjoy your enlightenment and wealth. And for those bugs we can’t figure out I say we just have to wait patiently for the next release.
