Module "Black-Hole" revival

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Souvent22's picture

There are a "LOT" of contrib modules out there. Even more so, there are a great deal of good modules that have been neglected. Lets be honest, a developers time is precious, and we all get spread thin and a bit scattered sometimes, and we leave our children (modules) to the way side for other things (like "bill-paying" modules/development so we can eat from time to time :) ).

What I am thinking of is a session of "Module Black-Hole Revival". What I mean by this is this is a chance for the community to comment on the modules they would like to most see "pushed" on, upgraded, looked at, re-factored, etc. that have been neglected or even forgotten, and then perhaps the maintainer and/or volunteers agree to meet during Drupal-Con to make a large push on that particular module.

The key here is "neglected". E.g. OG has an active community extending, commiting and maintaining it, thus I would not consider it a candidate.

I think Drupal-Con is a perfect place for this. You have some of the best and brightest at your disposal for instant feed back and help, and an army of developers to contribute if they get bored and want a challenge.

So, if some are interested, please post a comment; and if enough interest is generated, I'll create a poll of the top 10 or 15 or so and we can vote on those ( and still comment if there is still a strong feeling that others should be included out of the top filtered ones).

I know Drupal-Con is a ways away, but factoring in a developers time, etc. by the time this thing comes to life, Drupal-Con will be here. I'm hoping to go to Drupal-Con this year with a bit more preparation to be focused on accomplishing certain tasks, but still leave room for the "fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants-for-whatever-happends" that I like about Drupal-Con also.

So...hmm..I suppose I should cast the first stone....I personally would like to see MailHandler extended and documented more thoroughly; oh, Case-tracker is sorely lacking some advanced features and has been stale for some time. (this is also me offering my time to develop on it during Drupal con....beer would be nice payment ;) ).

(Please post at the bottom of your comment the module(s) you would like to see pushed on, this will make it easier to tally. So thus as follows: )

  • MailHandler
  • Casetracker

Comments

+1 (but don't forget core)

Boris Mann's picture

Great idea, but I would also say "don't forget core".

An example is my wiki page for working with core aggregator patches: a little bit of coordination this early in the cycle can mean some great capabilities for core.

I can't think of any "orphaned" modules off hand. Continuing on with aggregation, there are lots of things that could be added to SimpleFeed.

Yes: core included

Souvent22's picture

Agreed, yes, core patches/implementations should be included. I know there's a large patch for registering function call backs to speed up drupal floating around that i'd also like to see worked on.

Need more structure and funding model...

dahacouk's picture

There are many people who would give cash into a central pot or individually for specific module/core development if there was seen to be a more transparent and equitable funding model and funding tracking system. There are so many users crying out for development and very willing to pay for that development.

My interest in attending DrupalCon is to discuss this issue with those people that seem to be heading the Drupal project. I know there is work being done in this area but there is nothing like a face to face meeting.

Don't get me wrong. I love the open, pretty flat and non-hierarchical (?) way that development currently takes place. I'm not suggesting that this changes. I'm suggesting that better tools are created to track funding requests and offers. This needs to be more database like and less like the forum we have now.

This is not of topic. There is a link. A "developers time is precious". We need to make the whole process of funding developers slicker and more transparent. When I and others can see what's going on with our cash I believe there will be enough to take Drupal to the stars. It'll come flooding in. But we need the mechanism to observe, track and manage this process. When we trust it I and others will give.

Also, you'll get a lot more developers switch to Drupal when they realise that they can earn a living by working on the project.

Many thanks for you time. Looking forward to DrupalCon.

Cheers Daniel

Re-vamp

Souvent22's picture

Hm. Yes, seeing the comments thus far, I see the scope is slightly larger that I had first thought of. It seems there are 3 issues at hand:

  • giving old modules "new life"
  • "purning" the tree of dead/old modules
  • a better system to push on those modules that people feel are important enough to fund development

Daniel,

what you propose, the more i ponder on it, is very fresh and unique; the first time where the community of developers "funds" the project. It's unique because most developers who would fund a project just need the module "stabilized", and not "customized". Meaning, and "end-user" wants all the bells, whistles, a tweaks. A developer just asks for sometime stable to work with and does their own customization. E.g. Give me a good vanilla flavor, i'll add my own strawberries.

Perhaps that should be a brainstorming break out session....or why wait, perhaps a group needs to be formed. Let's be honest, a system like that takes some administrator overhead, so there will need to be a dedicated group of individuals/people to control/maintain the system (and i mean the system as a whole from programming, planning, etc.). Any...i should say the large majority of open source projects are successful because of this semi-lose "corporate" setup (don't flame the "c" word, it's used only as a reference). You need a dedicated group at the core so that the "masses" do not allow the project get out of control (too many chiefs, not enough indians).

I agree, the current forum system is just not working efficiently. It's not easy to navigate, forums is painfully slow, and it can be hard to track "one particular" module. It would be nice to have a "simple", idiot-proof system.

Example, like a table with the names of modules, the name of the maintainer, and the "proposed" bounty that the maintainer will fix a proposed list of issues or create a a certain functionality. And a little "meter" bar saying how much of that bounty has been committed to by people/community. One it's reached, held in escrow, maintainer/person goes to work. Done.

Anyway, thoughts everyone? perhaps i should open up another thread for a discussion on this.

P.S. I have also always thought there should be a site that people/compaines can go to inorder to find "drupal teams". I've run across a few fortune 500 companies that have posted on the forums, and they usually end up going through the back channels to find a drupal shop (which isn't a bad thing), because the forums are really for individual developers; and they're looking for a true "team" for a 6-month to year long type contract on a larger scale. But then again, there's a whole plethra of drawbacks to a site like that. Currently, I'd say the back-channels are the way to go.

A start

Walt Esquivel's picture

Please take a look at Projects Needing Financing and Projects Needing Volunteer Developers.

They were created to try and do some of the things you mentioned. Although far from being the solution, I think they're a start in the direction you seek.

I welcome other folks' comments and ideas in helping move these ideas further along.

Walt Esquivel, MBA; MA; President, Wellness Corps; Captain, USMC (Veteran)
$50 Hosting Discount Helps Projects Needing Financing

Walt Esquivel, MBA; MA; President, Wellness Corps; Captain, USMC (Veteran)
$50 Hosting Discount Helps Projects Needing Financing

Thanks

Souvent22's picture

Walt,

ah, thanks for those. yes, i def was not trying to re-invent the wheel here :). i was just looking for a minor through to organize something for drupalcon, perahs i should have posted it to those groups also, and it seems that hose groups are, as you said, doing what i am proposing.

I very much agree on the need for a central pot

mlncn's picture

I applaud Walt's work in promoting projects needed financing and projects needing developers, and I see this idea as a way to build on it.

Sorry to continue the hijacking of this thread... so before doing so, I'd say the Captcha / Text Image combination could use important polishing, and documenting.

As for a system going forward:

  1. Letting people put money up for specific needs will give people who have that fabled itch to scratch – but without the time or Drupal experience to scratch – actually do something about getting that itch scratched: namely, say (and put money behind their words) "I want this feature / bug fix / functionality / module".
  2. The Drupal Association could hold the money (and skim interest off it!) until the financed improvement is made
  3. In the vast majority of cases the money would go to a developer or developers at the independent approval of the people who put up the money initially. (It would have to go to people who signed up to work on the request, to avoid someone redirecting the cash to a cousin at the last second.) Some appointed board (or democratic sample) could make a quick decision (including to have Drupal Association just keep the money, or split the difference) in the minority of cases where disagreements arise.
  4. If not enough money is raised or work isn't done for some other reason, the Drupal Association can offer to refund it at a certain point-- but most people will re-assign it to another project, rather than cashing out.
  5. This should be integrated into Drupal.org as much as possible, as in the issue queue and projects' pages. Two Summer of Code projects will be working in this area, Project quality metrics system and Extend Case Tracker Module, so now is a good opportunity to work in this area.
  6. The same system can be used to support needed core changes, of course, although in this case its more likely to take the form of Dries or someone else with a bit of core developer cred pointing to an issue, saying this needs support, and letting us freeloaders give back. Also, people could make general donations at any time which some Drupal Association appointed group (or maybe someday a broad democratic vote) could direct.

Agaric Design Collective isn't raking in money yet, but we're already contributing to the Drupal Association. We want to build into our rates both general support for Drupal (and CiviCRM) and money we set aside for specific development we see as important.

That includes money or coding help to create software to make this decentralized, targeted donation system possible!

~ ben, member, Agaric Design Collective, http://AgaricDesign.com

benjamin, agaric

Oh, and any that should stay

sime's picture

Oh, and any that should stay in the black hole... maybe commit an empty file called simply "RIP".

Syntax highlighting

Jax's picture

+1 for reviving one of the syntax highlighting modules or extend codefilter. There are a couple of different ones:

VIM Color: http://drupal.org/node/21368
Codefilter: http://drupal.org/project/codefilter (only does PHP though)
Nonstop Highlighter: http://drupal.org/node/14986
GeSHi: http://drupal.org/node/65961

Some of the code didn't make it to d.o but I think there are even more modules who once tried to accomplish syntax highlighting that are buried somewhere.

Update: Apparently GeSHi is still alive. I just needs new management.

Re: Syntax highlighting

User Maintenance

catch's picture

http://drupal.org/project/user_maintenance could do with some love for 5.x - and all those user/troll handling modules in general.

Troll, abuse

Boris Mann's picture

Troll and abuse are the other two modules that I'm aware of. Abuse seems to work really well.

A bunch of the "advanced user" modules really need to just be merged. E.g. AdvUser is one I'm thinking of, which does some of the same things as user_maintenance. There are others, but I don't know the names off hand.

Yeah, there's a lot of

catch's picture

Yeah, there's a lot of duplication, and it's not the sort of thing you want to just install to see if it works.

I really need some extended user management but got burned with troll module (for instance the blocked user role allowing bypass of access control moduels unless you specifically set up zero permissions on it. That wasn't fun when the first person we banned posted in the admin forums!) and haven't had the will to trawl through the options again.

I'll look into abuse though, worth a try.

Cpanel and TinyMCE

canadrian's picture

These are the two main modules that I personally see being semi-developed, enough to draw attention, but the usage is not smooth and needs a lot more work.

"Being tired is like playing mind games with some of the pieces missing."
- Canadrian

I am a proud member of the ElectricTeaParty.net online community.


"Being tired is like playing mind games with some of the pieces missing."
- Canadrian

I am a proud member of the ElectricTeaParty.net online community.

drupalcat's picture

For a not informatic person to have a modules evaluation panel it will be perfect. I proposed this in BXL con but there had another problems and projects discussions.
I remember someone who said .... The participation of an OS community depend on how low the code is develop.... Drupal is a lot active however sometimes we are focused on developing new applications and forget to maintain and improve the old and more used modules.

en Ferran Cabrer i Vilagut - Skype: Ferran.Cabrer
CONSEN.org - Euro-Cluster Pro-Information Society
MUFICATA s.l. - Natural Information Environments
T1:+34 934238267 T2: +34 93 423 9164 M:+34 600649364 F:+34 934233430
Jaume Fabra 12 08004 Barcelona

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