Re: posting stuff on the web

[the next to last of the red-hot fakirs <wil@langford.net>]

On Tue, 5 Jan 1999, Doug Loss wrote:

>I'm not sure _all_ of that should be in the central repository.  I doubt
>that my Alterra stuff really should be there at this point, as it's
>clearly way on the back burner.  Bruno's XML stuff probably ought to be,
>though.  I think the users ought to have a say on when their stuff is
>ready for the big time, and that we ought to have guidelines to help
>them make those decisions.  Wil, let's you and me try to figure out
>those guidelines, OK?

How about this:

-----

Ok, so you have a seul-edu project, and you think it's ready for
prime-time.

Here are a few good indications of a project's ripeness:

1.  You have a codebase.
	If you have a good, healthy percentage of the
project done, even if it is bug-ridden and sloppy, that's a good thing.  
If enough features work, people will see that you are serious, they will
download the source, and they will tell you what's broken.

2.  You're excited about the release and the subsequent flurry of activity
this will generate.
	If you've spent the last 6 weeks hammering out code for a project
and you are completely sick of it, try waiting a week before you announce
it.  Take a breather.  Nobody is going to be bothering you with bug-fixes
for something they don't know about yet.

3.  Do other people need it right now?
	You'll meet with the most success in the bazaar model by making
something that people need to use.  If it scratches a particular itch that
a person has, they're certainly going to use it more and find more bugs
for you.

If your project seems to fit into these guidelines, we hope you'll
consider allowing us to post it on the seul site.  If you like, you can
get an account on the seul server and enter your work into the CVS
repository.  Alternately, you could create a web page on or off of the
seul server and we could link to it from our projects page.

In either case, you should post a note to the seul-edu mailing list to let
us know that your project needs users and reviewers.

If you're interested in hosting your project in the repository, please
drop a note to Wil or Doug regarding an account.

-----

It's a shot in the twilight, as I've never managed a project before, but
I've read a lot about it by authors who know what they're talking about.

-- -.-- -... .- .-.. --- -. . -.-- .... .- ... .- ..-. .. .-. ... - -. .- -- .
"So, rather than appear foolish afterward, I renounce seeming clever now."
		- William of Baskerville, The Name of the Rose