bbPress Plugin is Born
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Just spotted the foliowing on Twitter by @petemall:
bbPress plugin is born… http://trac.bbpress.org/changeset/2463
bbPress plugin is born… http://trac.bbpress.org/changeset/2463
— Pete Mall (@petemall) July 13, 2010
Not done any investigation yet…
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bbPress 1.0.3, and bbPress 1.1, are still being actively developed. Once those versions are available, what /more/ would you want bbPress to do on its own?
Honestly mate? Bug fixes.
Some big bugs that we’ve had for over a year have been bumped because Matt told us we weren’t to have a bug fix release, and instead were to roll out a release with 2 new features instead.
8 weeks ago Matt started deleting milestones from Trac. Didn’t tell anyone. Took him 3 weeks to reply to emails wondering why.
bbpress1.0.3 was ready over 3 months ago (save for a Backpress bug we could live with/patch ourselves). Matt decreed we’ve not to package it and give it to folks as an alpha or even an actual release. We have to wait for 1.1 and the next version of BackPress to be ready. In order to speed that up, we’ve had to bump loads to 1.5, which now isn’t going to happen.
This is the end of the line for the current implementation of bbPress.
Yes. Just like 2.9.2 was the end of the road for the 2.9 branch of WordPress when 3.0 came along. I understand the obvious differences, but at the end of the day, it’s just another day.
Two differences here though bro.
1) No-one has actually said that yet.
2) The new bbPress plugin is a totally separate project, being run under the same banner. Other than being able to import the data from the existing project, its totally different. It doesn’t even have the same requirements. Or any of the same code.
This isn’t resistance to change, nothing is being changed, it’s being replaced. And someone needs to be very clear and categorical about that. This is very very different from going from WP2.9.2 to WP3.
This is effectively a hostile takeover. The people with the keys to this website are handing the reins over to new management; while everyone is speaking in positive PR/Management speak. I’m not saying that the hostile takeover won’t be benefitial in the long run or benefitial to more people than currently use this product – i’m just syaing that hostile takeovers breed questions and uncertainty. Some of that uncertainty needs to be managed.
I know that you’re a real positive guy JJJ, and I’ve said before it’s infectious because you deliver, and deliver with a smile. I can think of no-one better to deal with this.
But the horse has bolted, the cat’s out the bag, the jig is up; and it’s a shame your left here answering questions, but in honesty – to some of us this is our livelyhood and we really need definative answers that are crystal clear so we can quote them as needed and make business decisions that affect our lives.
I am sorry tht you couldn’t have done this in your own time and in your own way. Your handling and galvanising of the BuddyPress community has been great, as I’m sure it will be here as well, we just need to get over this hump so that we can work with you
Which Dev Update site should we be looking at now?
http://bbpdevel.wordpress.com/
This is just the beginning of the confusion, I’m sure. Thanks for keeping us posted. We’ve been in the dark for a while, and it’s nice to hear from the plugin developers, even though some of us still use bbpress 0.9.
Yeah… We both basically missed each other when we started both of those. That was just a miscommunication and probably a blunder on my part. I’m not sure who did what first, but we’re going to merge those two and close one of them down soon.
The way it sits today, is that ‘bbdevel’ is and has been the existing standalone development blog, and I opened ‘bbpdevel’ back in January when I originally started writing plugin bbPress code, not knowing if there was an existing dev blog, because there weren’t really existing devs
. I got busy with work, and it sat for a while, and now it’s back in full swing.If you need a way to remember it, think ‘bbp’ means bbPress plugin maybe? It wasn’t originally intended to be like that, but might help. I basically mirrored wpdevel(WordPress) and bpdevel(BuddyPress)
It’s hardly dismissive. Sorry you feel that way, but it’s meant to say that those of you that are upset, are also choosing not to hear what we’re saying anymore; you’re just mad and there’s not much I, or Matt, or anyone can do about that.
Over the past year, we’ve seen people request more features, people request less features, people want new leadership, people want to know the direction of the project, etc… The fact is that you can start developing the core right away by submitting patches in the trac. If you’re not doing that, then you’re not investing in the future of the platform, you’re investing in your own ventures which I’m happy to help with, but can’t be responsible for.
Sorry you feel it’s been badly handled, but to be quite fair, it’s partly because we’ve been directly answering everyone’s questions in this topic, and partly because this won’t happen for several months anyhow. This is big news to deliver, that’s why it hasn’t been delivered yet.
John, you can continue to spend as much money as you’d like on the future of bbPress, doing those exact same things the exact same way. If you’re satisfied with what you’ve invested in today, you will continue to be tomorrow. Nothing changes other than bbPress has a team of developers that are communicating to everyone now.
I’ve answered the ‘same name’ question a few times already, as have a few others. I mean nothing but the utmost respect when I say this, but there is nothing preventing anyone that’s upset here from developing bbPress core themselves and keeping up a stable branch if they see fit. It’s very much a meritocracy, so if you keep developing, you’ll keep climbing the ladder.
There’s also nothing wrong with forking it the same way WordPress did with b2 in the beginning. We’d rather have you on board, but if you just can’t and won’t be involved in the future bbPress plugin, then all I can do is keep repeating myself.
I think what I might be confused about, is if bbPress as it is today is close to exactly what it should be, what would you want it to do 2 years from now that wouldn’t add more bloat or slow it down?
bbPress0.9 is as good as any forum software out there, save for 2 things. Moderation and the Admin section. It’s crazily fast, secure, and extentable. It’s let down by lack of actions/filters, default theme and documentation.
bbpress1.0 is 50% slower and breaks alot of plugins but has some more hooks and an Admin section. Moderation is still the big thing, as is the default theme.
A clear out (archiving) and rethink of the plugin section and the creation of a new theme would make it very very useable.
Additionally both have also been let down by the layout/use of this forum, which makes finding information difficult; and a plugin section that doesn’t work.
Basically, all the feature requests we recieve, all go over the same ground – and can be covered by plugins. Most are covered by plugins (in a 90%) sort of way. With everything in Limbo there is no need to take things to the n-th degree.
From an honest to goodness Project management point of view, bbPress can be where we need it to be within 9 month – a year. But that time grows as we add more features (that we already have as plugins grrr) and less bug fixes.
So yeah we could fork it as is. But given Matt’s current desire to berate us (both the people here and the software) in public at Wordcamps, and his latest more… evangelistic approach to publicly taking umbridge at anyone he doesn’t like or disagrees with him; he makes the envornment out there relatively difficult to consider moving into, while intentionally hampering our efforts here.
If today, it’s good; then let’s fix up what we have to put out a solid 1.1 stand-alone, and when shift gears to focus on 1.2 as the plugin milestone.
Dude, we’re trying.
I mean, i know you know that
But in order for that to happen, we need the head honcho or “he who wont talk to us, only about us in keynote speeches”. All Keymasters, all of those who package things up and can edit the website… AutoMattic. The same folks who’re scrapping us for you.
I hate this looking like an US vs. THEM scenario, it just polarises people, and looks childish. But in honesty, “we” didn’t put ourselves in this holding pattern.
Additionally, putting out a solid 1.1 standalone will be tough and time consuming. We’ve 13 months of bugs, we’ve 13 months of backPress changes and potential changes in 3 releases of WordPress to contend with; there is going to be alot of bugs found in testing – and with Jane telling people that bbPress in its current implementation isn’t going to even work the WordPress.org forums and Matt telling people not to use the software we’re are hemmoraging people.
All this has been said, and answered before. I just downloaded 2 plugins from the repo, and they worked fine enough. I am also of the opinion that this iteration of bbPress.org is the best looking and working one so far.
In Matt’s defense, I haven’t seen anything that Matt said qualify as berating, and the people he disagrees with, are people already on a verbal or moral offensive. Having been able to see through both sides of that looking glass, I can tell you with first hand experience that Matt is almost always on his A game, even if you don’t understand it at the time. But, this isn’t something I really want to get into because it just isn’t classy to do.
I get that everyone wants to hear from Matt and/or Jane. It sounds to me like you really want an apology more than you want anything else, because you’ve answered your own questions about how gaps in development have been filled in.
At the end of the day it’s free, open source software. Polarized or not, bbPress has a team now. If this can just be summed up as a years worth of pent up frustration coming out, I can understand that, but we’ve all been going at this for almost 3 days now, and I’d rather write code and fix stuff and make progress than rehash bbPress’s tumultuous existence.
P.S. – BuddyPress uses bbPress internally, so I’ve lurked for the past year+ and paid attention to the goings on. I just didn’t have the time or energy to have these discussions then. Now, I do, but there’s not much more I can say; it comes down to what we do about it. Like it or not, this is the hand we’ve been dealt… Time to make the best of it.
Hi John JJ,
thanks for your long statements here. For me – it’s great to hear about the future von bbPress. And even greater – bbPress has a team now!
Yeahhh…
Looking back through a lot of this discussion, I can see how some of my posts in here sound a little crass; and that isn’t my intention or goal.
So, let me apologize to each of you for that, if it came across that way.
My intentions with bbPress are to be helpful, provide guidance, be a sounding board, commit patches, and make the bbPress plugin something everyone here can be proud to use.
I don’t want anyone to fork anything; to feel left out, pushed out, forced out, any of that stuff. I very badly want everyone to feel comfort that we’re putting bodies and eyes on something that’s needed it for a long while, even if it isn’t exactly the way everyone agrees it should be.
You all have my word that I’ll be combing the trac, and helping things around and about as much as I can. My concentration is on bbPress the plugin, and BuddyPress, but any place else I can spread some bandwidth, I’m glad to do it. If anyone else wants to help out, I’m happy to have you aboard.
Pete Mall stepped up right away to help several months ago when this idea first cropped up in IRC and at a few WordCamps, so naturally he’s on board. The existing committers aren’t going anywhere, and everything is going to be A-okay.
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