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leaving ofbiz for a while

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snowch

leaving ofbiz for a while

For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole process
very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a lot of
effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe my emails
are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working (what about
lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?

Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
(integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving my
way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before getting
to find what I needed).

Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.

> http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf

See you in a few months ...

--
This message has been scanned for viruses and
dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
believed to be clean.

cjhowe

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

Hi Christopher,
I'm sorry to hear of your frustrations. I think most people who
frequent the lists will be disappointed to read your message as we all
put in quite a bit of time to help grow the community by pointing
people in the direction of the resources they seek or in answering a
direct question head on.

I might suspect that the mailing lists were broken as well if it
weren't for the 30+ messages I receive a day from them. Looking
through the archive, I can't see too many of your questions that went
unanswered from myself, much less from someone else in the community.
So, I'm at a bit of a loss as to how we can prevent users like yourself
from becoming disenchanted with the project. If you have suggestions,
I would certainly enjoy reading them.

In any event, thank you for putting together your notes and making them
available for others. I look forward to pointing people in it's
direction so that they may learn from your experiences. Hopefully the
break will be a short one and you can come back and reap the benefits
of the project and we will, in turn, be able to reap the benefits of
your contributions. Good Luck!

Chris

--- Christopher Snow <[hidden email]> wrote:

> For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
> technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
> and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
> of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole process
>
> very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a lot of
> effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe my emails
>
> are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working (what about
> lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
>
> Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
> users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
> (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
> knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
> to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving my
>
> way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before getting
>
> to find what I needed).
>
> Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
> awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
>
> > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
>
> See you in a few months ...
>
> --
> This message has been scanned for viruses and
> dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
> believed to be clean.
>
>

David E Jones

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

In reply to this post by snowch

Christopher,

It's really great to see people interested in working on
documentation, especially interested enough to actually put something
together like this.

I'd like to make a small suggestion, for you and for anyone else
interested in a documentation effort: just as with source code, the
most effective way to work on documentation is to start with what
exists and work on improving it incrementally. There is a lot of
documentation on the docs.ofbiz.org site, and room for many thousands
of hours of work to improve and flesh out that documentation.

The great thing about helping with incremental improvements on
existing documents (even if the incremental improvement means a
reorganization or refacturing or the like; though that is obviously
dangerous when just starting out) is that your efforts become part of
something bigger, and with enough people doing this eventually the
combined effort will result in something great.

-David

On Apr 10, 2007, at 11:42 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:

> For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
> technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
> and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
> of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
> process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a
> lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
> my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
> (what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
>
> Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
> users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
> (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
> knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
> to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
> my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
> getting to find what I needed).
>
> Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
> awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
>
> > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
>
> See you in a few months ...
>
> --
> This message has been scanned for viruses and
> dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
> believed to be clean.
>

smime.p7s (3K) Download Attachment

Shi Jinghai

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

In reply to this post by snowch

Sailing, wiki or blog. I think this is the most effective way at current
period.

Good luck,

Shi Jinghai/Beijing Langhua Ltd.

在 2007-04-11三的 06:42 +0100，Christopher Snow写道：

> For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
> technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
> and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
> of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole process
> very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a lot of
> effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe my emails
> are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working (what about
> lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
>
> Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
> users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
> (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
> knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
> to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving my
> way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before getting
> to find what I needed).
>
> Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
> awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
>
> > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
>
> See you in a few months ...
>

Scott Gray

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

In reply to this post by David E Jones

Hi All,

Whenever I come across something new while looking at the code or reading
the mailing lists, my thoughts usually run along these lines:
1. I think I'll add that to the docs
2. Where shall I put it?
3. I/We need to create a better structure
4. I don't think I have the time or "big picture knowledge" to do this
5. I need to get back to what I was doing
And then I leave it at that

I think if we had a relatively full table of contents as a starting point it
would be much easier to add snippets here and there with out them being
disorganized and hard to find. Then the hard work would be in cleaning the
pages up every now and again rather than deciding where to put things.

Regards
Scott

On 11/04/07, David E. Jones <[hidden email]> wrote:

>
>
> Christopher,
>
> It's really great to see people interested in working on
> documentation, especially interested enough to actually put something
> together like this.
>
> I'd like to make a small suggestion, for you and for anyone else
> interested in a documentation effort: just as with source code, the
> most effective way to work on documentation is to start with what
> exists and work on improving it incrementally. There is a lot of
> documentation on the docs.ofbiz.org site, and room for many thousands
> of hours of work to improve and flesh out that documentation.
>
> The great thing about helping with incremental improvements on
> existing documents (even if the incremental improvement means a
> reorganization or refacturing or the like; though that is obviously
> dangerous when just starting out) is that your efforts become part of
> something bigger, and with enough people doing this eventually the
> combined effort will result in something great.
>
> -David
>
>
> On Apr 10, 2007, at 11:42 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:
>
> > For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
> > technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
> > and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
> > of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
> > process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a
> > lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
> > my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
> > (what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
> >
> > Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
> > users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
> > (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
> > knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
> > to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
> > my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
> > getting to find what I needed).
> >
> > Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
> > awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
> >
> > > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
> >
> > See you in a few months ...
> >
> > --
> > This message has been scanned for viruses and
> > dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
> > believed to be clean.
> >
>
>
>

snowch

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

In reply to this post by David E Jones

David,

I was trying to improve the documentation incrementally...

In effect, I was taking the existing documentation and improving it by
digesting and understanding the material, filling the holes and
presenting it in a flow suitable for learning. The problem I had was
getting the answers to fill the holes!

With the framework intro videos, you have provided a path to guide new
users through learning ofbiz. Paths are very important to new users.
With the book, I was trying to provide a path also, but with more detail
and it could also have been used as a reference. The videos aren't very
useful as a reference, and the existing documentation is too scattered
(especially without the path).

Maybe there should be a mailing list dedicated to the documentation
effort. That way people like me could compile the documentation by
asking questions, and people who know the answers could pop in to answer
them?

Cheers,

Chris

On Wed, 2007-04-11 at 00:38 -0600, David E. Jones wrote:

> Christopher,
>
> It's really great to see people interested in working on
> documentation, especially interested enough to actually put something
> together like this.
>
> I'd like to make a small suggestion, for you and for anyone else
> interested in a documentation effort: just as with source code, the
> most effective way to work on documentation is to start with what
> exists and work on improving it incrementally. There is a lot of
> documentation on the docs.ofbiz.org site, and room for many thousands
> of hours of work to improve and flesh out that documentation.
>
> The great thing about helping with incremental improvements on
> existing documents (even if the incremental improvement means a
> reorganization or refacturing or the like; though that is obviously
> dangerous when just starting out) is that your efforts become part of
> something bigger, and with enough people doing this eventually the
> combined effort will result in something great.
>
> -David
>
>
> On Apr 10, 2007, at 11:42 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:
>
> > For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
> > technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
> > and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
> > of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
> > process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a
> > lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
> > my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
> > (what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
> >
> > Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
> > users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
> > (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
> > knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
> > to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
> > my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
> > getting to find what I needed).
> >
> > Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
> > awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
> >
> > > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
> >
> > See you in a few months ...
> >
> > --
> > This message has been scanned for viruses and
> > dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
> > believed to be clean.
> >
>

snowch

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

In reply to this post by Scott Gray

Scott,

I think a detailed TOC is required, here is something I started:

http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/Book_TOC.png

Cheers.

Chris

On Wed, 2007-04-11 at 19:50 +1200, Scott Gray wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> Whenever I come across something new while looking at the code or reading
> the mailing lists, my thoughts usually run along these lines:
> 1. I think I'll add that to the docs
> 2. Where shall I put it?
> 3. I/We need to create a better structure
> 4. I don't think I have the time or "big picture knowledge" to do this
> 5. I need to get back to what I was doing
> And then I leave it at that
>
> I think if we had a relatively full table of contents as a starting point it
> would be much easier to add snippets here and there with out them being
> disorganized and hard to find. Then the hard work would be in cleaning the
> pages up every now and again rather than deciding where to put things.
>
> Regards
> Scott
>
> On 11/04/07, David E. Jones <[hidden email]> wrote:
> >
> >
> > Christopher,
> >
> > It's really great to see people interested in working on
> > documentation, especially interested enough to actually put something
> > together like this.
> >
> > I'd like to make a small suggestion, for you and for anyone else
> > interested in a documentation effort: just as with source code, the
> > most effective way to work on documentation is to start with what
> > exists and work on improving it incrementally. There is a lot of
> > documentation on the docs.ofbiz.org site, and room for many thousands
> > of hours of work to improve and flesh out that documentation.
> >
> > The great thing about helping with incremental improvements on
> > existing documents (even if the incremental improvement means a
> > reorganization or refacturing or the like; though that is obviously
> > dangerous when just starting out) is that your efforts become part of
> > something bigger, and with enough people doing this eventually the
> > combined effort will result in something great.
> >
> > -David
> >
> >
> > On Apr 10, 2007, at 11:42 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:
> >
> > > For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
> > > technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
> > > and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
> > > of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
> > > process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a
> > > lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
> > > my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
> > > (what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
> > >
> > > Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
> > > users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
> > > (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
> > > knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
> > > to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
> > > my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
> > > getting to find what I needed).
> > >
> > > Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
> > > awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
> > >
> > > > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
> > >
> > > See you in a few months ...
> > >
> > > --
> > > This message has been scanned for viruses and
> > > dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
> > > believed to be clean.
> > >
> >
> >
> >
>

Jacques Le Roux

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

Administrator

In reply to this post by snowch

Chris,

The ML for documentation sounds like a good idea IMHO but if the user ML
did not succeed for you why this new ML would ?

Did you try (ie buy) the Advanced Framework Training Videos from David ?
For me they are of great value. And I understand that David does not
want to give for free all the work he did on them. Though I remember
that he explained, when he first spoke about it, that perhaps in a
future he will open these videos. I guess he wait to earn enough money
from them before opening them. Remember, it's "open source" not "work
for free" ;o)

Btw I hope I will find some time to work on your
http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz-forms.odt

I began also to work on FAQ/Cookbook
http://docs.ofbiz.org/display/OFBIZ/FAQ+-+Cookbook+%28work+in+progress%29
inspirated http://ofbizwiki.go-integral.com/Wiki.jsp?page=FAQ from and
http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/tutorials.php (OFBiz Cookbooks
part)
My hope is to compile these works in one only place. But I'm not sure
Open Source Strategy agrees on this. They did not reply on my previous
demand, so I stopped this work for now. I will put at least links though
!

You http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/Book_TOC.png is
interesting too, thanks !

Jacques

----- Message d'origine -----
De : "Christopher Snow" <[hidden email]>
À : <[hidden email]>
Envoyé : mercredi 11 avril 2007 10:10
Objet : Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

> David,
>
> I was trying to improve the documentation incrementally...
>
> In effect, I was taking the existing documentation and improving it by
> digesting and understanding the material, filling the holes and
> presenting it in a flow suitable for learning. The problem I had was
> getting the answers to fill the holes!
>
> With the framework intro videos, you have provided a path to guide

new
> users through learning ofbiz. Paths are very important to new users.
> With the book, I was trying to provide a path also, but with more
detail
> and it could also have been used as a reference. The videos aren't
very
> useful as a reference, and the existing documentation is too scattered

> (especially without the path).
>
> Maybe there should be a mailing list dedicated to the documentation
> effort. That way people like me could compile the documentation by
> asking questions, and people who know the answers could pop in to
answer

> them?
>
> Cheers,
>
> Chris
>
> On Wed, 2007-04-11 at 00:38 -0600, David E. Jones wrote:
> > Christopher,
> >
> > It's really great to see people interested in working on
> > documentation, especially interested enough to actually put

something
> > together like this.
> >
> > I'd like to make a small suggestion, for you and for anyone else
> > interested in a documentation effort: just as with source code, the
> > most effective way to work on documentation is to start with what
> > exists and work on improving it incrementally. There is a lot of
> > documentation on the docs.ofbiz.org site, and room for many
thousands
> > of hours of work to improve and flesh out that documentation.
> >
> > The great thing about helping with incremental improvements on
> > existing documents (even if the incremental improvement means a
> > reorganization or refacturing or the like; though that is obviously
> > dangerous when just starting out) is that your efforts become part
of

> > something bigger, and with enough people doing this eventually the
> > combined effort will result in something great.
> >
> > -David
> >
> >
> > On Apr 10, 2007, at 11:42 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:
> >
> > > For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
> > > technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be

detailed
> > > and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a
lot
> > > of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
> > > process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend
a
> > > lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
> > > my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
> > > (what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
> > >
> > > Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
> > > users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
> > > (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
> > > knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've
had
> > > to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
> > > my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
> > > getting to find what I needed).
> > >
> > > Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but
an

> > > awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
> > >
> > > > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
> > >
> > > See you in a few months ...
> > >
> > > --
> > > This message has been scanned for viruses and
> > > dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
> > > believed to be clean.
> > >
> >

jonwimp

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

In reply to this post by Scott Gray

Scott,

I don't know if you meant those 5 steps as a confession of sorts. If so, I'll add that I am
personally guilty of those.

No time, no impetus.

As I told Chris Snow before, I read the codes easily enough. Eg. if I had a question about
JobManager, it just takes me 5 minutes read the answer from the source codes. Horrible folks like
me don't bother much with documenting OFBiz.

By the way, I also find it difficult to merge in my enhancements into OFBiz. No time. So how many
committers are there now? Actually, the better question is, how many contribution reviewers do we
have?

Jonathon

Scott Gray wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> Whenever I come across something new while looking at the code or reading
> the mailing lists, my thoughts usually run along these lines:
> 1. I think I'll add that to the docs
> 2. Where shall I put it?
> 3. I/We need to create a better structure
> 4. I don't think I have the time or "big picture knowledge" to do this
> 5. I need to get back to what I was doing
> And then I leave it at that
>
> I think if we had a relatively full table of contents as a starting
> point it
> would be much easier to add snippets here and there with out them being
> disorganized and hard to find. Then the hard work would be in cleaning the
> pages up every now and again rather than deciding where to put things.
>
> Regards
> Scott
>
> On 11/04/07, David E. Jones <[hidden email]> wrote:
>>
>>
>> Christopher,
>>
>> It's really great to see people interested in working on
>> documentation, especially interested enough to actually put something
>> together like this.
>>
>> I'd like to make a small suggestion, for you and for anyone else
>> interested in a documentation effort: just as with source code, the
>> most effective way to work on documentation is to start with what
>> exists and work on improving it incrementally. There is a lot of
>> documentation on the docs.ofbiz.org site, and room for many thousands
>> of hours of work to improve and flesh out that documentation.
>>
>> The great thing about helping with incremental improvements on
>> existing documents (even if the incremental improvement means a
>> reorganization or refacturing or the like; though that is obviously
>> dangerous when just starting out) is that your efforts become part of
>> something bigger, and with enough people doing this eventually the
>> combined effort will result in something great.
>>
>> -David
>>
>>
>> On Apr 10, 2007, at 11:42 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:
>>
>> > For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
>> > technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
>> > and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
>> > of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
>> > process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a
>> > lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
>> > my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
>> > (what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
>> >
>> > Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
>> > users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
>> > (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
>> > knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
>> > to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
>> > my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
>> > getting to find what I needed).
>> >
>> > Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
>> > awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
>> >
>> > > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
>> >
>> > See you in a few months ...
>> >
>> > --
>> > This message has been scanned for viruses and
>> > dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
>> > believed to be clean.
>> >
>>
>>
>>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> No virus found in this incoming message.
> Checked by AVG Free Edition.
> Version: 7.5.446 / Virus Database: 269.2.0/756 - Release Date: 4/10/2007 10:44 PM

Scott Gray

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

Hi Jonathon,

I guess you could call it a confession, I just wanted to mention a
difficulty that I had and I what I thought might make it easier.

I'm surprised at time being the factor behind you not contributing your
code, I have always believed that you save time by getting your code into
the trunk. Once it's in the trunk you no longer have to deal with conflicts
and you are no longer the only one charged with improving the code, it also
opens your code to review which may help improve the implementation itself.

I think we have enough contribution reviewers, the shortage is in actual
contributions. There are plenty of bug reports, wishlists and experiments
in jira but not a great deal of contributions awaiting review.

Regards
Scott

On 11/04/07, Jonathon -- Improov <[hidden email]> wrote:

>
> Scott,
>
> I don't know if you meant those 5 steps as a confession of sorts. If so,
> I'll add that I am
> personally guilty of those.
>
> No time, no impetus.
>
> As I told Chris Snow before, I read the codes easily enough. Eg. if I had
> a question about
> JobManager, it just takes me 5 minutes read the answer from the source
> codes. Horrible folks like
> me don't bother much with documenting OFBiz.
>
> By the way, I also find it difficult to merge in my enhancements into
> OFBiz. No time. So how many
> committers are there now? Actually, the better question is, how many
> contribution reviewers do we
> have?
>
> Jonathon
>
> Scott Gray wrote:
> > Hi All,
> >
> > Whenever I come across something new while looking at the code or
> reading
> > the mailing lists, my thoughts usually run along these lines:
> > 1. I think I'll add that to the docs
> > 2. Where shall I put it?
> > 3. I/We need to create a better structure
> > 4. I don't think I have the time or "big picture knowledge" to do this
> > 5. I need to get back to what I was doing
> > And then I leave it at that
> >
> > I think if we had a relatively full table of contents as a starting
> > point it
> > would be much easier to add snippets here and there with out them being
> > disorganized and hard to find. Then the hard work would be in cleaning
> the
> > pages up every now and again rather than deciding where to put things.
> >
> > Regards
> > Scott
> >
> > On 11/04/07, David E. Jones <[hidden email]> wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >> Christopher,
> >>
> >> It's really great to see people interested in working on
> >> documentation, especially interested enough to actually put something
> >> together like this.
> >>
> >> I'd like to make a small suggestion, for you and for anyone else
> >> interested in a documentation effort: just as with source code, the
> >> most effective way to work on documentation is to start with what
> >> exists and work on improving it incrementally. There is a lot of
> >> documentation on the docs.ofbiz.org site, and room for many thousands
> >> of hours of work to improve and flesh out that documentation.
> >>
> >> The great thing about helping with incremental improvements on
> >> existing documents (even if the incremental improvement means a
> >> reorganization or refacturing or the like; though that is obviously
> >> dangerous when just starting out) is that your efforts become part of
> >> something bigger, and with enough people doing this eventually the
> >> combined effort will result in something great.
> >>
> >> -David
> >>
> >>
> >> On Apr 10, 2007, at 11:42 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:
> >>
> >> > For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
> >> > technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
> >> > and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
> >> > of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
> >> > process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a
> >> > lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
> >> > my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
> >> > (what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
> >> >
> >> > Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
> >> > users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
> >> > (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
> >> > knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
> >> > to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
> >> > my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
> >> > getting to find what I needed).
> >> >
> >> > Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
> >> > awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
> >> >
> >> > > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
> >> >
> >> > See you in a few months ...
> >> >
> >> > --
> >> > This message has been scanned for viruses and
> >> > dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
> >> > believed to be clean.
> >> >
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > No virus found in this incoming message.
> > Checked by AVG Free Edition.
> > Version: 7.5.446 / Virus Database: 269.2.0/756 - Release Date: 4/10/2007
> 10:44 PM
>
>

jonwimp

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

Scott,

> I'm surprised at time being the factor behind you not contributing your code,

It seems like whenever somebody contributes code, he/she is about the only one interested in
reviewing it for commit.

The pace at which I add enhancements may be too difficult (for me) to handle. I'd have to neatly
itemize my enhancements, and that takes time. Easier if I just submit one big crude patch.

> I have always believed that you save time by getting your code into the
> trunk. Once it's in the trunk you no longer have to deal with conflicts and
> you are no longer the only one charged with improving the code,

True. But conflicts are easy to handle if you use test branches. Use the branch/explore/prune
strategy. Then you can boldly update wholesale from OFBiz SVN, and pick off new bugs over time.
All that time, you still have your clean stable branch deployed.

I update from OFBiz SVN stream once a week. Wholesale. Then I pick off any new bugs over time.

Also, "once it's in the trunk" doesn't mean you can really kick back. Somebody might break the
existing code!

I enhance/customize OFBiz in a very "insulated" manner. Minimal chance for conflicts upon updates.

> it also opens your code to review which may help improve the implementation
> itself.

Reviews seems to happen rarely in OFBiz, probably given the lack of resources here. I've fixed
some weird bugs in OFBiz that were probably several months old. This project has a spectator size
of 400+? Some open-source projects have 10s of 1000s, and that's when you can be sure reviews will
happen, fast.

> I think we have enough contribution reviewers, the shortage is in actual
> contributions. There are plenty of bug reports, wishlists and experiments
> in jira but not a great deal of contributions awaiting review.

Hmm. Ok, I'll just mention this again, just to be fair to Christopher Snow (the new member).
Anyway, I really don't mind getting roughed up by the core team all over again (yes, I'm thick, a
thick workaholic). No sticks nor stones, though, I do break. :)

Here are steps that a new member goes through:

1. Ask for help, get benefits gratuitously.

2. Realize he's gotten so much for free.

3. Become competent with OFBiz.

4. Feel like making the OFBiz world better in return, spread the good news.

By step 4, the new member is no longer new, and is competent enough to contribute back.

Seldom do you get new members who jump in at step 3. If they don't get past step 1, they won't go
to step 2.

I know David Jones has some theory about this formula: Offering more docs/help does not guarantee
more contributions.

Frankly, I'm no expert on human psychology (did I mention I'm thick?). But as a new member, I
don't find enough slack right now to be able to contribute back to OFBiz. Even writing answers and
responses to other new members was getting to me. To be honest, I didn't get much benefits from
the ML to begin with. Therefore, I have very little slack right now.

BUT.. BUT, nobody in the OFBiz community owes me anything. Help is easier in the form of
references. Most techies who are potential contributors will appreciate reading materials and
manuals more than the human touch.

And to top off the guilty verdict, I did gets things working, and even got to enhancing OFBiz at
its cores. I can't find the time to contribute back right now. So, I am guilty. David Jones once
said (to me, I think) that "many who even got it working in production don't contribute back".
Guilty guilty guilty. Sigh. Maybe OFBiz will become like Linux, more meant for die hards.

Better to teach us newbies how to fish (docs/references) than to help us 1 issue by 1 issue on the ML.

Jonathon

Scott Gray wrote:

> Hi Jonathon,
>
> I guess you could call it a confession, I just wanted to mention a
> difficulty that I had and I what I thought might make it easier.
>
> I'm surprised at time being the factor behind you not contributing your
> code, I have always believed that you save time by getting your code into
> the trunk. Once it's in the trunk you no longer have to deal with
> conflicts
> and you are no longer the only one charged with improving the code, it also
> opens your code to review which may help improve the implementation itself.
>
> I think we have enough contribution reviewers, the shortage is in actual
> contributions. There are plenty of bug reports, wishlists and experiments
> in jira but not a great deal of contributions awaiting review.
>
> Regards
> Scott
>
> On 11/04/07, Jonathon -- Improov <[hidden email]> wrote:
>>
>> Scott,
>>
>> I don't know if you meant those 5 steps as a confession of sorts. If so,
>> I'll add that I am
>> personally guilty of those.
>>
>> No time, no impetus.
>>
>> As I told Chris Snow before, I read the codes easily enough. Eg. if I had
>> a question about
>> JobManager, it just takes me 5 minutes read the answer from the source
>> codes. Horrible folks like
>> me don't bother much with documenting OFBiz.
>>
>> By the way, I also find it difficult to merge in my enhancements into
>> OFBiz. No time. So how many
>> committers are there now? Actually, the better question is, how many
>> contribution reviewers do we
>> have?
>>
>> Jonathon
>>
>> Scott Gray wrote:
>> > Hi All,
>> >
>> > Whenever I come across something new while looking at the code or
>> reading
>> > the mailing lists, my thoughts usually run along these lines:
>> > 1. I think I'll add that to the docs
>> > 2. Where shall I put it?
>> > 3. I/We need to create a better structure
>> > 4. I don't think I have the time or "big picture knowledge" to do this
>> > 5. I need to get back to what I was doing
>> > And then I leave it at that
>> >
>> > I think if we had a relatively full table of contents as a starting
>> > point it
>> > would be much easier to add snippets here and there with out them being
>> > disorganized and hard to find. Then the hard work would be in cleaning
>> the
>> > pages up every now and again rather than deciding where to put things.
>> >
>> > Regards
>> > Scott
>> >
>> > On 11/04/07, David E. Jones <[hidden email]> wrote:
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> Christopher,
>> >>
>> >> It's really great to see people interested in working on
>> >> documentation, especially interested enough to actually put something
>> >> together like this.
>> >>
>> >> I'd like to make a small suggestion, for you and for anyone else
>> >> interested in a documentation effort: just as with source code, the
>> >> most effective way to work on documentation is to start with what
>> >> exists and work on improving it incrementally. There is a lot of
>> >> documentation on the docs.ofbiz.org site, and room for many thousands
>> >> of hours of work to improve and flesh out that documentation.
>> >>
>> >> The great thing about helping with incremental improvements on
>> >> existing documents (even if the incremental improvement means a
>> >> reorganization or refacturing or the like; though that is obviously
>> >> dangerous when just starting out) is that your efforts become part of
>> >> something bigger, and with enough people doing this eventually the
>> >> combined effort will result in something great.
>> >>
>> >> -David
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> On Apr 10, 2007, at 11:42 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:
>> >>
>> >> > For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
>> >> > technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
>> >> > and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
>> >> > of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
>> >> > process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a
>> >> > lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
>> >> > my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
>> >> > (what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
>> >> >
>> >> > Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
>> >> > users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
>> >> > (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
>> >> > knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
>> >> > to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
>> >> > my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
>> >> > getting to find what I needed).
>> >> >
>> >> > Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
>> >> > awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
>> >> >
>> >> > > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
>> >> >
>> >> > See you in a few months ...
>> >> >
>> >> > --
>> >> > This message has been scanned for viruses and
>> >> > dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
>> >> > believed to be clean.
>> >> >
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >
>> > No virus found in this incoming message.
>> > Checked by AVG Free Edition.
>> > Version: 7.5.446 / Virus Database: 269.2.0/756 - Release Date:
>> 4/10/2007
>> 10:44 PM
>>
>>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> No virus found in this incoming message.
> Checked by AVG Free Edition.
> Version: 7.5.446 / Virus Database: 269.2.0/756 - Release Date: 4/10/2007 10:44 PM

Shi Jinghai

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

In reply to this post by snowch

Hi Chris,

After thinking it for a while, I think I can contribute a domain name
such as ofbiz-wiki.org and a website space and templates simplar to
http://www.ubuntu.com/support/local which can help you and your team to
write ofbiz documents eithor in English or in other languages.

If you agree to continue your writing in this way, please feed back, and
then I'll arrange my staff to register the domain and build the website
templates for you.

Kind regards,

Shi Jinghai/Beijing Langhua Ltd.

在 2007-04-11三的 06:42 +0100，Christopher Snow写道：

> For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
> technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
> and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
> of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole process
> very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a lot of
> effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe my emails
> are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working (what about
> lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
>
> Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
> users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
> (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
> knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
> to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving my
> way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before getting
> to find what I needed).
>
> Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
> awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
>
> > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
>
> See you in a few months ...
>

David E Jones

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

In reply to this post by snowch

There are "training" outlines that have been around for years and
these are intended to be the overall structure for documentation, or
at least technical level documentation. They are here:

http://docs.ofbiz.org/display/OFBTECH/Comprehensive+OFBiz+Training
+Outlines

For end-user documentation there is already quite a bit of structure
in the end-user space, especially under the End User Docs Home page:

http://docs.ofbiz.org/display/OFBENDUSER/OFBiz+End+User+Docs+Home

-David

On Apr 11, 2007, at 2:23 AM, Christopher Snow wrote:

> Scott,
>
> I think a detailed TOC is required, here is something I started:
>
> http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/Book_TOC.png
>
> Cheers.
>
> Chris
>
> On Wed, 2007-04-11 at 19:50 +1200, Scott Gray wrote:
>> Hi All,
>>
>> Whenever I come across something new while looking at the code or
>> reading
>> the mailing lists, my thoughts usually run along these lines:
>> 1. I think I'll add that to the docs
>> 2. Where shall I put it?
>> 3. I/We need to create a better structure
>> 4. I don't think I have the time or "big picture knowledge" to do
>> this
>> 5. I need to get back to what I was doing
>> And then I leave it at that
>>
>> I think if we had a relatively full table of contents as a
>> starting point it
>> would be much easier to add snippets here and there with out them
>> being
>> disorganized and hard to find. Then the hard work would be in
>> cleaning the
>> pages up every now and again rather than deciding where to put
>> things.
>>
>> Regards
>> Scott
>>
>> On 11/04/07, David E. Jones <[hidden email]> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> Christopher,
>>>
>>> It's really great to see people interested in working on
>>> documentation, especially interested enough to actually put
>>> something
>>> together like this.
>>>
>>> I'd like to make a small suggestion, for you and for anyone else
>>> interested in a documentation effort: just as with source code, the
>>> most effective way to work on documentation is to start with what
>>> exists and work on improving it incrementally. There is a lot of
>>> documentation on the docs.ofbiz.org site, and room for many
>>> thousands
>>> of hours of work to improve and flesh out that documentation.
>>>
>>> The great thing about helping with incremental improvements on
>>> existing documents (even if the incremental improvement means a
>>> reorganization or refacturing or the like; though that is obviously
>>> dangerous when just starting out) is that your efforts become
>>> part of
>>> something bigger, and with enough people doing this eventually the
>>> combined effort will result in something great.
>>>
>>> -David
>>>
>>>
>>> On Apr 10, 2007, at 11:42 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:
>>>
>>>> For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
>>>> technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
>>>> and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
>>>> of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
>>>> process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a
>>>> lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
>>>> my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
>>>> (what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
>>>>
>>>> Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
>>>> users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
>>>> (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
>>>> knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
>>>> to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
>>>> my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
>>>> getting to find what I needed).
>>>>
>>>> Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
>>>> awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
>>>>
>>>>> http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
>>>>
>>>> See you in a few months ...
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> This message has been scanned for viruses and
>>>> dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
>>>> believed to be clean.
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>

smime.p7s (3K) Download Attachment

Cameron Smith-6

Re: Leaving OFBiz for a while

In reply to this post by snowch

I agree that there are many more issues than contributors.

But I also agree about the shortage of contributors who have time to review. When I first started using OFBiz, I submitted two very small patches and they were quickly included. But the third thing, which was a lot more complex, is still sitting in JIRA unassigned, and my last post on it never received a reply.

We have used the patch locally for many months now without problems, but I am not going to waste more time hassling a commiter (all of them naturally very busy people) to look at it.

So now, when I have several other things I might contribute, creating a JIRA for them always stays at the bottom of my pile.

cameron

----- Original Message ----
From: "[hidden email]" <[hidden email]>
To: [hidden email]
Sent: Wednesday, 11 April, 2007 1:05:26 PM
Subject: user Digest 11 Apr 2007 11:05:26 -0000 Issue 326

user Digest 11 Apr 2007 11:05:26 -0000 Issue 326

Topics (messages 5104 through 5121):

leaving ofbiz for a while
5104 by: Christopher Snow
5105 by: Chris Howe
5106 by: David E. Jones
5107 by: Shi Jinghai
5108 by: Scott Gray
5110 by: Christopher Snow
5111 by: Christopher Snow
5113 by: Jonathon -- Improov
5117 by: Scott Gray
5120 by: Jacques Le Roux

How to develope new apps
5109 by: zzf
5112 by: G.Venkata Phanindra
5114 by: zzf
5115 by: Gautam Deb
5118 by: Scott Gray
5121 by: zzf

how to use mssql database in ofbiz
5116 by: zzf

how does the derby work in ofbiz
5119 by: zzf

Administrivia:

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To post to the list, e-mail: [hidden email]
To unsubscribe, e-mail: [hidden email]
For additional commands, e-mail: [hidden email]

----------------------------------------------------------------------

For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole process
very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a lot of
effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe my emails
are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working (what about
lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?

Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
(integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving my
way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before getting
to find what I needed).

Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.

> http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf

See you in a few months ...

--
This message has been scanned for viruses and
dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
believed to be clean.

Hi Christopher,
I'm sorry to hear of your frustrations. I think most people who
frequent the lists will be disappointed to read your message as we all
put in quite a bit of time to help grow the community by pointing
people in the direction of the resources they seek or in answering a
direct question head on.

I might suspect that the mailing lists were broken as well if it
weren't for the 30+ messages I receive a day from them. Looking
through the archive, I can't see too many of your questions that went
unanswered from myself, much less from someone else in the community.
So, I'm at a bit of a loss as to how we can prevent users like yourself
from becoming disenchanted with the project. If you have suggestions,
I would certainly enjoy reading them.

In any event, thank you for putting together your notes and making them
available for others. I look forward to pointing people in it's
direction so that they may learn from your experiences. Hopefully the
break will be a short one and you can come back and reap the benefits
of the project and we will, in turn, be able to reap the benefits of
your contributions. Good Luck!

Chris

--- Christopher Snow <[hidden email]> wrote:

> For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
> technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
> and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
> of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
> process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a
> lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
> my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
> (what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
>
> Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
> users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
> (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
> knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
> to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
> my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
> getting to find what I needed).
>
> Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
> awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
>
> > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
>
> See you in a few months ...
>
> --
> This message has been scanned for viruses and
> dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
> believed to be clean.
>

Sailing, wiki or blog. I think this is the most effective way at current
period.

Good luck,

Shi Jinghai/Beijing Langhua Ltd.

在 2007-04-11三的 06:42 +0100，Christopher Snow写道：

> For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
> technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
> and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
> of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole process
> very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a lot of
> effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe my emails
> are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working (what about
> lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
>
> Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
> users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
> (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
> knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
> to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving my
> way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before getting
> to find what I needed).
>
> Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
> awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
>
> > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
>
> See you in a few months ...
>

> Hi All,
>
> Whenever I come across something new while looking at the code or reading
> the mailing lists, my thoughts usually run along these lines:
> 1. I think I'll add that to the docs
> 2. Where shall I put it?
> 3. I/We need to create a better structure
> 4. I don't think I have the time or "big picture knowledge" to do this
> 5. I need to get back to what I was doing
> And then I leave it at that
>
> I think if we had a relatively full table of contents as a starting
> point it
> would be much easier to add snippets here and there with out them being
> disorganized and hard to find. Then the hard work would be in cleaning the
> pages up every now and again rather than deciding where to put things.
>
> Regards
> Scott
>
> On 11/04/07, David E. Jones <[hidden email]> wrote:
>>
>>
>> Christopher,
>>
>> It's really great to see people interested in working on
>> documentation, especially interested enough to actually put something
>> together like this.
>>
>> I'd like to make a small suggestion, for you and for anyone else
>> interested in a documentation effort: just as with source code, the
>> most effective way to work on documentation is to start with what
>> exists and work on improving it incrementally. There is a lot of
>> documentation on the docs.ofbiz.org site, and room for many thousands
>> of hours of work to improve and flesh out that documentation.
>>
>> The great thing about helping with incremental improvements on
>> existing documents (even if the incremental improvement means a
>> reorganization or refacturing or the like; though that is obviously
>> dangerous when just starting out) is that your efforts become part of
>> something bigger, and with enough people doing this eventually the
>> combined effort will result in something great.
>>
>> -David
>>
>>
>> On Apr 10, 2007, at 11:42 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:
>>
>> > For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
>> > technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be detailed
>> > and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a lot
>> > of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
>> > process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend a
>> > lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
>> > my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
>> > (what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
>> >
>> > Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
>> > users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
>> > (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
>> > knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've had
>> > to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
>> > my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
>> > getting to find what I needed).
>> >
>> > Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but an
>> > awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
>> >
>> > > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
>> >
>> > See you in a few months ...
>> >
>> > --
>> > This message has been scanned for viruses and
>> > dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
>> > believed to be clean.
>> >
>>
>>
>>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> No virus found in this incoming message.
> Checked by AVG Free Edition.
> Version: 7.5.446 / Virus Database: 269.2.0/756 - Release Date: 4/10/2007 10:44 PM

Hi all,

I am a new learner of OFBiz, and want to develope a new app using the
mssql database. I developed a app in OFBiz long time ago( may be
August, 2005 ). The matter is that it does not work now.

So could anyone can give me any suggestion? Or give some info about
learing how to do that.

Thanks a lot!

--
Sincerely,

Computer Science, Ocean University of China
phone: +86 135 5300 3657
email: [hidden email]

Kelin.

Hi
Can u please more specific with the problem, Your mail is too vague to
help.The exact problem u explain, u can expect support.
Regards
Phani

On 4/11/07, zzf <[hidden email]> wrote:

>
> Hi all,
>
> I am a new learner of OFBiz, and want to develope a new app using the
> mssql database. I developed a app in OFBiz long time ago( may be
> August, 2005 ). The matter is that it does not work now.
>
> So could anyone can give me any suggestion? Or give some info about
> learing how to do that.
>
> Thanks a lot!
>
> --
> Sincerely,
>
> Computer Science, Ocean University of China
> phone: +86 135 5300 3657
> email: [hidden email]
>
> Kelin.
>

--
G.Venkata Phanindra
Mob:: 9849852989

Hi Phani,

Now I am working under ofbiz with the revision number of 527444.
Long time before i worked under ofbiz, and developped my own web
application, it was part of a CRM system. When i transfer this web
application into the newer revision, it does not work. The database
i use is mssql.

Have i described clearly and could you please help me out?
Thanks.

On 4/11/07, G.Venkata Phanindra <[hidden email]> wrote:

>
> Hi
> Can u please more specific with the problem, Your mail is too vague to
> help.The exact problem u explain, u can expect support.
> Regards
> Phani
>
> On 4/11/07, zzf <[hidden email]> wrote:
> >
> > Hi all,
> >
> > I am a new learner of OFBiz, and want to develope a new app using the
> > mssql database. I developed a app in OFBiz long time ago( may be
> > August, 2005 ). The matter is that it does not work now.
> >
> > So could anyone can give me any suggestion? Or give some info about
> > learing how to do that.
> >
> > Thanks a lot!
> >
> > --
> > Sincerely,
> >
> > Computer Science, Ocean University of China
> > phone: +86 135 5300 3657
> > email: [hidden email]
> >
> > Kelin.
> >
>
>
>
> --
> G.Venkata Phanindra
> Mob:: 9849852989
>

--
Sincerely,

Computer Science, Ocean University of China
phone: +86 135 5300 3657
email: [hidden email]

Kelin.

To start with ofbiz, I found these links useful

http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/hello_world1.php

http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/hello_world2.php

http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/hello_world3.php

http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/hello_svn_fixes.php

http://docs.ofbiz.org/display/OFBTECH/Framework+Introduction+Videos+and+Diagrams

Regards,

Gautam Deb

zzf wrote:
Hi all,

I am a new learner of OFBiz, and want to develope a new app using the

mssql database. I developed a app in OFBiz long time ago( may be

August, 2005 ). The matter is that it does not work now.

So could anyone can give me any suggestion? Or give some info about

learing how to do that.

Thanks a lot!

If you post actual errors you getting or specific problems you are
encountering, people may be able to guide you in the right direction.

Regards
Scott

On 11/04/07, Gautam Deb <[hidden email]> wrote:

>
> To start with ofbiz, I found these links useful
> http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/hello_world1.php
> http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/hello_world2.php
> http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/hello_world3.php
> http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/hello_svn_fixes.php
>
> http://docs.ofbiz.org/display/OFBTECH/Framework+Introduction+Videos+and+Diagrams
>
> Regards,
> Gautam Deb
>
>
> zzf wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> I am a new learner of OFBiz, and want to develope a new app using the
> mssql database. I developed a app in OFBiz long time ago( may be
> August, 2005 ). The matter is that it does not work now.
>
> So could anyone can give me any suggestion? Or give some info about
> learing how to do that.
>
> Thanks a lot!
>
>
>

Hi,

The error msg is as follows:

[java] Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NoSuchMethodError:
sun.rmi.tran
sport.ObjectTable.getStub(Ljava/rmi/Remote;)Ljava/rmi/server/RemoteStub;
[java] at
org.objectweb.carol.rmi.jrmp.server.JUnicastRemoteObject.unex
portObject(JUnicastRemoteObject.java:138)
[java] at
org.objectweb.carol.rmi.multi.JrmpPRODelegate.unexportObject(
JrmpPRODelegate.java:94)
[java] at
org.objectweb.carol.rmi.multi.MultiPRODelegate.unexportObject
(MultiPRODelegate.java:132)
[java] at javax.rmi.PortableRemoteObject.unexportObject
(PortableRemoteO
bject.java:119)
[java] at org.objectweb.jotm.SubCoordinator.doAfterCompletion
(SubCoordi
nator.java:1548)
[java] at org.objectweb.jotm.SubCoordinator.doCommit(
SubCoordinator.jav
a:1141)
[java] at org.objectweb.jotm.SubCoordinator.commit_one_phase
(SubCoordin
ator.java:468)
[java] at org.objectweb.jotm.TransactionImpl.commit(
TransactionImpl.jav
a:224)
[java] at org.objectweb.jotm.Current.commit(Current.java:479)
[java] at org.ofbiz.entity.transaction.TransactionUtil.commit
(Transacti
onUtil.java:193)
[java] at org.ofbiz.entity.transaction.TransactionUtil.commit
(Transacti
onUtil.java:173)
[java] at org.ofbiz.entity.GenericDelegator.findCountByCondition
(Generi
cDelegator.java:1982)
[java] at org.ofbiz.entity.GenericDelegator.findCountByAnd
(GenericDeleg
ator.java:1943)
[java] at org.ofbiz.entity.util.EntityCrypto.<init>(
EntityCrypto.java:7
2)
[java] at org.ofbiz.entity.GenericDelegator.<init>(
GenericDelegator.jav
a:215)
[java] at org.ofbiz.entity.GenericDelegator.getGenericDelegator
(Generic
Delegator.java:138)
[java] at org.ofbiz.entityext.data.EntityDataLoadContainer.start
(Entity
DataLoadContainer.java:178)
[java] at org.ofbiz.base.container.ContainerLoader.start
(ContainerLoade
r.java:89)
[java] at org.ofbiz.base.start.Start.startStartLoaders(Start.java
:272)
[java] at org.ofbiz.base.start.Start.startServer(Start.java:323)
[java] at org.ofbiz.base.start.Start.start(Start.java:327)
[java] at org.ofbiz.base.start.Start.main(Start.java:413)

The ofbiz of this error msg is a little old(checked out 1 year ago ). I do
not if it is the problem of jdk.
My jdk version is 1.5.0_06.

Thanks a lot.

On 4/11/07, Scott Gray <[hidden email]> wrote:

>
> If you post actual errors you getting or specific problems you are
> encountering, people may be able to guide you in the right direction.
>
> Regards
> Scott
>
> On 11/04/07, Gautam Deb <[hidden email]> wrote:
> >
> > To start with ofbiz, I found these links useful
> > http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/hello_world1.php
> > http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/hello_world2.php
> > http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/hello_world3.php
> > http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/hello_svn_fixes.php
> >
> >
> http://docs.ofbiz.org/display/OFBTECH/Framework+Introduction+Videos+and+Diagrams
> >
> > Regards,
> > Gautam Deb
> >
> >
> > zzf wrote:
> >
> > Hi all,
> >
> > I am a new learner of OFBiz, and want to develope a new app using the
> > mssql database. I developed a app in OFBiz long time ago( may be
> > August, 2005 ). The matter is that it does not work now.
> >
> > So could anyone can give me any suggestion? Or give some info about
> > learing how to do that.
> >
> > Thanks a lot!
> >
> >
> >
>

--
Sincerely,

Computer Science, Ocean University of China
phone: +86 135 5300 3657
email: [hidden email]

Kelin.

Hi all,

I want to use mssql database in ofbiz instead of derby.
What should i do then? Can anyone give any info about
that?

Thanks a lot for you all.

--
Sincerely,

Computer Science, Ocean University of China
phone: +86 135 5300 3657
email: [hidden email]

Kelin.

Hi all,

The default database of ofbiz is the java database derby.
I check out the newest version of ofbiz to my pc. It can
work well. But my question is that: how does it work?
What forms of the data is accessed? I know little about
the entity engine. But i can make out the whole thing.
Can anyone tell about it?

Thanks a lot for you all!

--
Sincerely,

Computer Science, Ocean University of China
phone: +86 135 5300 3657
email: [hidden email]

Kelin.

___________________________________________________________
Yahoo! Answers - Got a question? Someone out there knows the answer. Try it
now.
http://uk.answers.yahoo.com/

snowch

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

In reply to this post by Jacques Le Roux

Jacques,

I tried learning ofbiz from the *old* advanced framework training videos
from undersun. Thanks for pointing out that the old videos have been
superceeded and much improved with the new ones available from undersun.
That explains a lot of my frustration...

Undersun,

Is it worth a mailshot to all the other customers who bought the old
videos to let them know there is much better training material
available? Is there an upgrade path?

Many thanks,

Chris

On Wed, 2007-04-11 at 12:11 +0200, Jacques Le Roux wrote:

> Chris,
>
> The ML for documentation sounds like a good idea IMHO but if the user ML
> did not succeed for you why this new ML would ?
>
> Did you try (ie buy) the Advanced Framework Training Videos from David ?
> For me they are of great value. And I understand that David does not
> want to give for free all the work he did on them. Though I remember
> that he explained, when he first spoke about it, that perhaps in a
> future he will open these videos. I guess he wait to earn enough money
> from them before opening them. Remember, it's "open source" not "work
> for free" ;o)
>
> Btw I hope I will find some time to work on your
> http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz-forms.odt
>
> I began also to work on FAQ/Cookbook
> http://docs.ofbiz.org/display/OFBIZ/FAQ+-+Cookbook+%28work+in+progress%29
> inspirated http://ofbizwiki.go-integral.com/Wiki.jsp?page=FAQ from and
> http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/tutorials.php (OFBiz Cookbooks
> part)
> My hope is to compile these works in one only place. But I'm not sure
> Open Source Strategy agrees on this. They did not reply on my previous
> demand, so I stopped this work for now. I will put at least links though
> !
>
> You http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/Book_TOC.png is
> interesting too, thanks !
>
> Jacques
>
> ----- Message d'origine -----
> De : "Christopher Snow" <[hidden email]>
> À : <[hidden email]>
> Envoyé : mercredi 11 avril 2007 10:10
> Objet : Re: leaving ofbiz for a while
>
>
> > David,
> >
> > I was trying to improve the documentation incrementally...
> >
> > In effect, I was taking the existing documentation and improving it by
> > digesting and understanding the material, filling the holes and
> > presenting it in a flow suitable for learning. The problem I had was
> > getting the answers to fill the holes!
> >
> > With the framework intro videos, you have provided a path to guide
> new
> > users through learning ofbiz. Paths are very important to new users.
> > With the book, I was trying to provide a path also, but with more
> detail
> > and it could also have been used as a reference. The videos aren't
> very
> > useful as a reference, and the existing documentation is too scattered
>
> > (especially without the path).
> >
> > Maybe there should be a mailing list dedicated to the documentation
> > effort. That way people like me could compile the documentation by
> > asking questions, and people who know the answers could pop in to
> answer
> > them?
> >
> > Cheers,
> >
> > Chris
> >
> > On Wed, 2007-04-11 at 00:38 -0600, David E. Jones wrote:
> > > Christopher,
> > >
> > > It's really great to see people interested in working on
> > > documentation, especially interested enough to actually put
> something
> > > together like this.
> > >
> > > I'd like to make a small suggestion, for you and for anyone else
> > > interested in a documentation effort: just as with source code, the
> > > most effective way to work on documentation is to start with what
> > > exists and work on improving it incrementally. There is a lot of
> > > documentation on the docs.ofbiz.org site, and room for many
> thousands
> > > of hours of work to improve and flesh out that documentation.
> > >
> > > The great thing about helping with incremental improvements on
> > > existing documents (even if the incremental improvement means a
> > > reorganization or refacturing or the like; though that is obviously
> > > dangerous when just starting out) is that your efforts become part
> of
> > > something bigger, and with enough people doing this eventually the
> > > combined effort will result in something great.
> > >
> > > -David
> > >
> > >
> > > On Apr 10, 2007, at 11:42 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:
> > >
> > > > For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
> > > > technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be
> detailed
> > > > and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a
> lot
> > > > of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
> > > > process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend
> a
> > > > lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
> > > > my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
> > > > (what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?
> > > >
> > > > Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
> > > > users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
> > > > (integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
> > > > knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've
> had
> > > > to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
> > > > my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
> > > > getting to find what I needed).
> > > >
> > > > Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but
> an
> > > > awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.
> > > >
> > > > > http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf
> > > >
> > > > See you in a few months ...
> > > >
> > > > --
> > > > This message has been scanned for viruses and
> > > > dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
> > > > believed to be clean.
> > > >
> > >
>
>

Tim Ruppert

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

David has let everyone know that there are updated documents, etc that are available on the undersun site (soon to be HotWax Media!). As for upgrade path, those who bought them in the past get a very substantial savings on the new videos.

Chris, I hope that helps.

Cheers,

Tim

Tim Ruppert

HotWax Media

http://www.hotwaxmedia.com

o:801.649.6594

f:801.649.6595

On Apr 11, 2007, at 2:08 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:

Jacques,

I tried learning ofbiz from the *old* advanced framework training videos
from undersun. Thanks for pointing out that the old videos have been
superceeded and much improved with the new ones available from undersun.
That explains a lot of my frustration...

Undersun,

Is it worth a mailshot to all the other customers who bought the old
videos to let them know there is much better training material
available? Is there an upgrade path?

Many thanks,

Chris

On Wed, 2007-04-11 at 12:11 +0200, Jacques Le Roux wrote:

Chris,

The ML for documentation sounds like a good idea IMHO but if the user ML
did not succeed for you why this new ML would ?

Did you try (ie buy) the Advanced Framework Training Videos from David ?
For me they are of great value. And I understand that David does not
want to give for free all the work he did on them. Though I remember
that he explained, when he first spoke about it, that perhaps in a
future he will open these videos. I guess he wait to earn enough money
from them before opening them. Remember, it's "open source" not "work
for free" ;o)

Btw I hope I will find some time to work on your
http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz-forms.odt

I began also to work on FAQ/Cookbook
http://docs.ofbiz.org/display/OFBIZ/FAQ+-+Cookbook+%28work+in+progress%29
inspirated http://ofbizwiki.go-integral.com/Wiki.jsp?page=FAQ from and
http://www.opensourcestrategies.com/ofbiz/tutorials.php (OFBiz Cookbooks
part)
My hope is to compile these works in one only place. But I'm not sure
Open Source Strategy agrees on this. They did not reply on my previous
demand, so I stopped this work for now. I will put at least links though
!

You http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/Book_TOC.png is
interesting too, thanks !

Jacques

----- Message d'origine -----
De : "Christopher Snow" <[hidden email]>
À : <[hidden email]>
Envoyé : mercredi 11 avril 2007 10:10
Objet : Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

David,

I was trying to improve the documentation incrementally...

In effect, I was taking the existing documentation and improving it by
digesting and understanding the material, filling the holes and
presenting it in a flow suitable for learning. The problem I had was
getting the answers to fill the holes!

With the framework intro videos, you have provided a path to guide

new

users through learning ofbiz. Paths are very important to new users.
With the book, I was trying to provide a path also, but with more

detail

and it could also have been used as a reference. The videos aren't

very

useful as a reference, and the existing documentation is too scattered

(especially without the path).

Maybe there should be a mailing list dedicated to the documentation
effort. That way people like me could compile the documentation by
asking questions, and people who know the answers could pop in to

answer

them?

Cheers,

Chris

On Wed, 2007-04-11 at 00:38 -0600, David E. Jones wrote:

Christopher,

It's really great to see people interested in working on
documentation, especially interested enough to actually put

something

together like this.

I'd like to make a small suggestion, for you and for anyone else
interested in a documentation effort: just as with source code, the
most effective way to work on documentation is to start with what
exists and work on improving it incrementally. There is a lot of
documentation on the docs.ofbiz.org site, and room for many

thousands

of hours of work to improve and flesh out that documentation.

The great thing about helping with incremental improvements on
existing documents (even if the incremental improvement means a
reorganization or refacturing or the like; though that is obviously
dangerous when just starting out) is that your efforts become part

of

something bigger, and with enough people doing this eventually the
combined effort will result in something great.

-David

On Apr 10, 2007, at 11:42 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:

For the past few months, I have been trying to put together some
technical documentation on ofbiz. I wanted the book to be

detailed

and accurate, but I have found it difficult to get answers to a

lot

of my questions on the mailing lists. I have found the whole
process very tiring, and wasteful of time as I am having to spend

a

lot of effort working things out by looking through code. Maybe
my emails are too rude? Maybe the mailing lists aren't working
(what about lists for tech-user, functional-user, dev, docs)?

Eclipse BIRT have got it right. They have provided an excellent
users manual (field guide) and an excellent developers guide
(integrating and extending BIRT). That really ramps up your
knowledge of BIRT before looking at the code. With ofbiz, I've

had

to pretty much dive straight into the code (and spend time weaving
my way through classpath loaders, container loaders, etc, before
getting to find what I needed).

Anyway, I've uploaded my scribbles if anyone finds it useful but

an

awful lot of work is needed to finish it off.

http://docs.ofbiz.org/download/attachments/1218/ofbiz_tech.pdf

See you in a few months ...

--
This message has been scanned for viruses and
dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
believed to be clean.

smime.p7s (3K) Download Attachment

David E Jones

Re: leaving ofbiz for a while

In reply to this post by snowch

This is more of an Undersun specific issue (ie not much to do with
OFBiz), so sorry for everyone seeing this on the mailing list.

We announced the new packaged on the OFBiz mailing lists in early
August 2006, and it looks like I sent you an email personally Chris
(to [hidden email]) on 7 Aug 2006, 4:01:33 PM MDT.

It sounds like you didn't get that, and it has a promo code for a
discount (basically a full credit for the previous version), so I'll
forward that message to you again.

Sorry about the confusion!

-David

On Apr 11, 2007, at 2:08 PM, Christopher Snow wrote:

> Undersun,
>
> Is it worth a mailshot to all the other customers who bought the old
> videos to let them know there is much better training material
> available? Is there an upgrade path?
>
> Many thanks,
>
> Chris

smime.p7s (3K) Download Attachment

Jacopo Cappellato

Re: Leaving OFBiz for a while

In reply to this post by Cameron Smith-6

Cameron,

I think you are speaking about this:

https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/OFBIZ-528

Well, that is a particular contribution that, as you wrote in the notes
of the issue, was not intended for the trunk, but for a general review
of the community.
So, for this issue, I'd say that the lack of response is from the
users/developers community (about 400 guys) and not from the committers.

I'd say that taking the time to prepare good clean patches and
submitting them to Jira is always worth the effort because it benefits
the project, the community, and your custom project as well (less
maintenance costs, maybe more tests/reviews on your work etc.)

Jacopo

Cameron Smith wrote:

> I agree that there are many more issues than contributors.
>
> But I also agree about the shortage of contributors who have time to review. When I first started using OFBiz, I submitted two very small patches and they were quickly included. But the third thing, which was a lot more complex, is still sitting in JIRA unassigned, and my last post on it never received a reply.
>
> We have used the patch locally for many months now without problems, but I am not going to waste more time hassling a commiter (all of them naturally very busy people) to look at it.
>
> So now, when I have several other things I might contribute, creating a JIRA for them always stays at the bottom of my pile.
>
> cameron
>

Jacques Le Roux

Re: Leaving OFBiz for a while

Administrator

Yes this is the only issue from muriwo still opens.

Thanks Jacopo for this one I looked for "Cameron Smith" but was not able
to quickly find Muriwo before having your link.

Jacques

> Cameron,
>
> I think you are speaking about this:
>
> https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/OFBIZ-528
>
> Well, that is a particular contribution that, as you wrote in the
notes
> of the issue, was not intended for the trunk, but for a general review
> of the community.
> So, for this issue, I'd say that the lack of response is from the
> users/developers community (about 400 guys) and not from the
committers.

>
> I'd say that taking the time to prepare good clean patches and
> submitting them to Jira is always worth the effort because it benefits
> the project, the community, and your custom project as well (less
> maintenance costs, maybe more tests/reviews on your work etc.)
>
> Jacopo
>
>
> Cameron Smith wrote:
> > I agree that there are many more issues than contributors.
> >
> > But I also agree about the shortage of contributors who have time to

review. When I first started using OFBiz, I submitted two very small
patches and they were quickly included. But the third thing, which was
a lot more complex, is still sitting in JIRA unassigned, and my last
post on it never received a reply.
> >
> > We have used the patch locally for many months now without problems,
but I am not going to waste more time hassling a commiter (all of them
naturally very busy people) to look at it.
> >
> > So now, when I have several other things I might contribute,
creating a JIRA for them always stays at the bottom of my pile.
> >
> > cameron
> >
>