[board] Minutes from today's meeting

Tue Feb 12 19:45:52 UTC 2008

Hi all-

Attached are text and html format minutes from today's meeting. I know  
a few people were planning on following up here with ideas or  
questions, about conferences and more. I'm looking forward to hearing  
from all of you.

Regards,
-chuck
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[11:02] <cjh> Good morning/evening/afternoon all.
[11:02] <yunosh> yes, let's start. hi from me again too
[11:03] * cjh bangs a gavel
[11:03] <cjh> (just because)
[11:03] <yunosh> :)
[11:03] <yunosh> how about a short introduction from everyone?
[11:03] <liamrUmich> introductions?
[11:03] <liamrUmich> yeah
[11:03] <cjh> If folks would go in alpha order, just for simplicity
[11:03] <kevinUofA> good plan
[11:03] <yunosh> bklang: ping?
[11:03] <cjh> If you'd share your name and organization, if you're representing one
[11:04] <bklang> yunosh: pong
[11:04] <yunosh> you're first :)
[11:04] <mnaberez> Minutes: Ben Klang, representing pong. Next introduction, please.
[11:04] <bklang> Actually I was going to let Chuck moderate but since I called it
[11:04] <cjh> no, you're first alphabetically to do introductions :)
[11:04] <yunosh> no, you are the first, alphabetically
[11:04] <bklang> Hi all, I'm Ben Klang and I'm a Horde developr
[11:04] <bklang> ah
[11:05] <yunosh> blc
[11:05] <blc> Ben Chavet, Horde developer that has been somewhat dormant for a while, but hoping to get back into it
[11:05] <cjh> I'm Chuck Hagenbuch, I'm one of the core devs and the instigator of this board idea
[11:06] <duckslo> I am Jakob Munih, from Slovenia, a programmer running my own company, developing our solutuons on horde for the last year.
[11:07] <yunosh> (and a steady horde contributor)
[11:08] <cjh> johnmorr?
[11:08] <johnmorr> i'm john morrissey, a sporadic horde developer, and i work for (but am not representing) citizens communications, where we have several large horde installations
[11:09] <kevinUofA> I'm Kevin Konowalec, sysadmin from the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Been running Horde/Imp for about 5 years.
[11:10] <kevinUofA> (and if you read the lists... perpetual pain in the butt ;) )
[11:10] wrobel joined the channel.
[11:10] <liamrUmich> I'm Liam Hoekenga, sysadmin from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, MI. We been running horde for five or six years as well.
[11:10] <mnaberez> I am Mike Naberezny and I work for Maintainable Software. I contribute mostly to Rampage, which will (hopefully) be the foundation components of Horde 4.
[11:11] <mp_> I'm Michael Place, sysadmin at XMission Internet in Salt Lake City
[11:11] <mrubinsk> Michael Rubinsky - one of the core devs, and pleased to meet everybody :)
[11:12] <cjh> MrVi is Nuno Loureiro, from Portugal Telecom - he mentioned he might be a bit late, so I'm not sure he's here yet
[11:12] <cjh> pete_b?
[11:12] <pete_b> Peter Baldwin -- head tech guy for Point Clark Networks. We develop ClarkConnect -- a small business server for 10-50 users(ish)
[11:12] <wrobel> Gunnar Wrobel - Kolab developer and responsible for the Kolab code within Horde
[11:12] <Shpoon> I am Michael Slusarz. limited Horde developer (mail mostly these days) and going skiing in a few minutes :)
[11:13] <yunosh> Jan Schneider, horde core dev
[11:13] <yunosh> Shpoon: nice :)
[11:13] <bklang> Alright next on the agenda: Chuck would you say a bit about the purpose of this board?
[11:13] <cjh> Sure
[11:14] <cjh> My core goal for the board is pretty simple: to make sure that we as a project focus on the right things, by getting more feedback and hopefully participation from our core users.
[11:15] <cjh> With a volunteer project, it's challenging to allocate developer time between projects that scratch itches, and projects that get us more users, or benefit existing users.
[11:15] <cjh> I also, quite frankly, am hoping to get some of our larger users more involved in the project by means of the board
[11:15] b0ha joined the channel.
[11:16] <b0ha> hello
[11:16] b0ha is now known as _saw.
[11:16] <yunosh> _saw: can you give a short introduction who you are?
[11:16] <bklang> Hello _saw, would you please give your name and the organization you represent?
[11:16] selsky joined the channel.
[11:16] liamrUmich is now known as liamr.
[11:17] <cjh> In exchange for more influence on decision making, I see the larger Horde installations helping us out with optimization (and core devs being able to work directly with large installs on those issues), and hopefully being able to contribute some resources, whether development, support, documentation, or other, back to Horde.
[11:17] <_saw> yunosh, i helped duck at oscar and whatson
[11:17] <yunosh> i know who you are :) but the others might not
[11:18] <cjh> selsky: can you introduce yourself to everyone?
[11:20] <selsky> Sure. I'm Matt Selsky. I work for Columbia University as a systems programmer and I'm on the Horde Core Team
[11:20] <cjh> Thanks
[11:21] <cjh> I also hope that the board might provide a way, either directly, or through another large users group, to help large installs coordinate on things like documentation.
[11:21] <_saw> ok, I'm Jan Å½agar and i helped duck at some horde applications. He will tell more details about his compay.
[11:21] <_saw> Im still student
[11:21] <cjh> I know that UMich has a pretty good set of user docs, but not the resources to convert them to docbook in a way that they'd be a general manual
[11:22] <cjh> I think it'd benefit everyone if we could get people from large installs working together on things like that.
[11:22] <cjh> So, to summarize:
[11:22] <cjh> - I hope to encourage participation in Horde from large users
[11:22] <cjh> - I hope to get feedback from our large installs about where Horde is lacking and where we should focus our time
[11:23] <bklang> Alright, I don't know if anyone has questions on the mission, but if so please hold them until we get to the Open Floor part
[11:24] <bklang> Next on the agenda, I'm going to swap places here, Horde 3.2 release goals
[11:24] <bklang> Jan and Chuck, this is yours I think
[11:25] <yunosh> i wonder if you folks are rather intersted in the main new features of 3.2, or the current state, or...?
[11:25] <kevinUofA> All of the above, I'd image
[11:26] <kevinUofA> er imagine
[11:26] <duckslo> I don't know in which format UMich documents are stored. But if they can be opened from openoffice they can be directly saved to wiki pages.
[11:26] <liamr> the UMich docs are available in PDF and Word (I believe)
[11:27] <liamr> and HTML
[11:28] <yunosh> main new features, that are especially of interested for larger installs are: split (read and write) database access, a lot of perfomance improvements (better caching, fewer bottlenecks), fallback mode if database goes down, stable (more or less) kolab support, improved memcache support
[11:28] <yunosh> vhost based configuration, a central alarm system, DIMP, the ajax webmail
[11:29] <yunosh> a few ajax features in imp like autocompletion, spell checking etc
[11:29] <yunosh> calendar client support (sunbird, iCal, etc.)
[11:30] <yunosh> and overall a lot of ui and code improvements, more drivers, more features, etc
[11:30] <yunosh> ah, maybe not to forget: user limits in imp, to limit number of messages per user etc.
[11:30] <yunosh> and finally synchronization support
[11:30] <yunosh> for mobile phones, pdas, outlook etc
[11:31] <yunosh> i think that's it, mostly
[11:31] <cjh> It's a pretty big release :)
[11:31] <yunosh> bklang mentioned webdav interface
[11:32] <cjh> We also have some decisions to make about Share support; Duck has written some non-DataTree drivers for Shares, Permissions, and Groups
[11:32] <yunosh> you can browse all horde data with any webdav capable client
[11:32] <yunosh> so, where are we at the moment?
[11:32] <cjh> As I know some of you are aware, the datatree, which was a nice idea 6 years ago, can be a bottleneck for sites with a lot of calendars or other groupware apps
[11:32] <bklang> Do you want to talk about timelines or criteria for H3.2 release?
[11:32] <cjh> I'm inclined to include the SQL drivers as "beta" in the release, assuming we can do some preliminary testing on them before the final release
[11:33] <cjh> but it is pretty well along in the process.
[11:33] <Shpoon> (Just a quick sell for the usefulness of the board...) Improvements like the memcache support, performance improvments, and DIMP in general, are the types of things that we especially need feedback/support from large installations since these are the things that we (as devs) don't see when on our development machines. These are the kind of issues that don't manifest themselves until you get to a larger install. So that's my big r
[11:33] <yunosh> we currently have RC2s out. and as far i am concerned, we just need to find some time to fix the final bugs a go releasing
[11:33] <cjh> I agree with Jan, aside from the possibility of the SQL drivers.
[11:34] <yunosh> yeah, but i could also see them being added in 3.2.1 releases
[11:34] <yunosh> Shpoon: your message got cut off at "So that's my big r"
[11:34] <Shpoon> Sorry: my last sentence was "So that's my big rah-rah speech before I have to run :)"
[11:35] <cjh> enjoy skiiing :)
[11:35] <yunosh> Shpoon: have fun, and come back in one piece
[11:35] <bklang> Alright, let's talk then about Horde 4. It's probably too big a topic but I wanted to touch on it, especially to highlight the resources we already have (ie. the Wiki page) and broad objectives
[11:35] <cjh> I'll take this one.
[11:36] <cjh> While I've wanted to get 3.2 out as well, I'm really looking forward to 4.0 and have been trying to play with components for it.
[11:37] <cjh> Obviously one of the main changes will be upping the minimum PHP version to 5.2.x, and possibly even to 5.3.x
[11:37] <cjh> If we go to 5.3, then Horde 4 can utilize namespaces, one of the major architectural changes in 5.3
[11:38] <cjh> I'm also hoping that the new internationalization extension (Jan - idn?) will be merged to 5.3, letting us do much better with utf-8
[11:38] <yunosh> intl
[11:38] <cjh> We already have some PHP 5 libraries that some of you know about - Rdo, Routes, etc.
[11:38] <duckslo> My drivers will help a lot, as don't need applications changes. But are not a complete solutions. Even application must be changed. Objective approach is cool, but we should minimize the data processed as much as possible. Like not loading objects when we need only a list. As was added in Ansel this days, but still remains other applications.
[11:38] <yunosh> (based on the ICU library)
[11:39] <cjh> I'm very happy with http://dev.horde.org/routes/ as an example of where I'd like us to go for developer components in the future
[11:39] <cjh> examples, documentation, a good web presence, a really nice lib.
[11:40] <cjh> I don't know what a "horde 4" application will look like yet, but it'll probably utilize Routes for url generation, it'll utilize Horde_View for views (templates), and Horde_Template and DataTree will definitely go away.
[11:41] <cjh> This is all framework/architecture level stuff; how all of it affects the core applications is yet to be seen, I think.
[11:41] <yunosh> i'd like to add that i see horde 4 being both a component library (like ezComponents or Zend Framework) and an application framework (like Horde 3 or Symphony) to get the best of both worlds
[11:41] <cjh> That's an overview for now - I'm happy to talk more about this during open floor or in another forum
[11:41] <cjh> yes, good point Jan
[11:41] <cjh> I want Horde 4 to do a better job of promoting Horde as a programming platform
[11:42] <cjh> not just as a massive application
[11:42] <bklang> and not just groupware
[11:42] <cjh> (with the idea that more people programming with Horde will get more people using Horde, helping all of us)
[11:43] <mnaberez> I would agree with Jan on this also. If you look at what has been going on in Rampage as a whole, we actually have a fair number of quality PHP 5 components in there already (like Routes and Argv recently). The biggest issue here is nobody knows what we have in there.
[11:43] <mrubinsk> To that end, I think perhaps some articles on various development-related websites (zend dev zone?) demonstrating the "modular" use woulld go a long way.
[11:43] <yunosh> but I'm the one rather feeling responsible for the application stack, so don't worry about your groupware apps if chuck is going to develop some esoteric libraries :)
[11:43] <cjh> I'm not going to ignore the groupware stack - my family would kill me :)
[11:44] b0ha_ joined the channel.
[11:44] <bklang> Alright let's move on to the open floor
[11:44] <yunosh> to summarize, we'll keep developing horde as both a framework and application stack, but the additional benefit of providing single libaray component which can be used separate from the framework
[11:44] <bklang> I'm sure some questions have collected
[11:45] <cjh> The first open floor item is a suggested agenda bit: conference!
[11:45] <duckslo> We all now that social communities are now trendy. So moving something in this direction it will help to promote Horde. We miss an application for user profiles, but we have all others to do an community release like was done with groupware.
[11:45] <cjh> Several people have mentioned the possibility of having an in-person get together, either for the board, the developers, users/admins, or both.
[11:46] <cjh> I'm intimidated by the finances/logistics of a conference (I don't know that my current employer would pay for me to go, for example), but it's otherwise a very appealing idea.
[11:46] <yunosh> duckslo: i agree, i also plan to release more bundles (e.g. for developers, like trac)
[11:46] <cjh> yes, I think we could do a small business bundle (time tracking, invoices, etc.) also
[11:46] <kevinUofA> Well the logistics can be daunting but initially it wouldn't have to be a big thing
[11:47] <bklang> Is there a convenient conference we could piggy-back on?
[11:47] <cjh> Lisa was suggested
[11:47] <liamr> my instinct would be LISA or O'Reilly Open Source
[11:47] <cjh> OSCON is also nice; could try and get a talk or do on the main agenda and do several BOF sessions there
[11:47] <mp_> i'd vote for OSCON, personally
[11:47] <yunosh> o'reilly is oscon?
[11:47] <cjh> yunosh: yes
[11:48] <kevinUofA> I spoke with my team leader and he was saying that it's possible the University could help by sponsoring a meeting. If UMich or another institution could match we could possibly cover a lot of costs
[11:48] <yunosh> that would be awesome
[11:48] <liamr> what, something like the kerbeos cartel meetings?
[11:48] <duckslo> Something in Europe will be nice too :)
[11:49] pete_b left IRC. (Read error: 113 (No route to host))
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[11:49] <cjh> liamr: I'm not familiar with those
[11:49] <yunosh> duckslo: i fear we both would be alone there ;)
[11:50] <kevinUofA> I think LISA is a good choice personally
[11:50] <cjh> I get the impression that LISA is more admin focused, OSCON is more developer focused
[11:51] <liamr> the kerberos cartel meetings float from member institution to member institution.. and people basically talk about what they're doing with kerberos (authentication) at their institutions.
[11:51] <liamr> OSCON would probably be a good place to talk up horde as a development platform
[11:52] <bklang> The Horde Project might want a presence at both
[11:52] <bklang> I think the question to ask is, which conference is this group of people more likely to attend?
[11:52] <duckslo> Yunosh: then only a European horde dev meeting summer in front of a cup of beer can save us.
[11:53] <yunosh> :)
[11:53] <yunosh> so, people. what would you rather like to attend?
[11:54] <cjh> I would prefer OSCON, but I can definitely see the argument for getting in front of both audiences
[11:54] <bklang> I would lean toward OSCON personally
[11:54] <mp_> i can only speak for myself, but i'll be at OSCON and not LISA
[11:55] <johnmorr> i've been thinking of either oscon or lisa, but would lean toward oscon
[11:55] <mnaberez> I would also agree on OSCON, it's likely I will attend it regardless.
[11:55] <mrubinsk> OSCON seems like a good choice for a "first" to me...
[11:55] <yunosh> i don't mind, as long as my travel expenses are somehow covered :)
[11:55] <pete_1> oscon... lisa is not relevant to me. Regardless, I would go.
[11:55] <bklang> Sounds like OSCON is the winner
[11:56] <bklang> of course, it's mostly the developers that have spoken up :)
[11:56] <liamr> OSCON's call for participation is already closed. you could probably organize a few BOFS
[11:56] <duckslo> I think that the fist meeting should focus on admins as how to trick horde performance with current architecture. When we would have a new approaches we can focus on developers.
[11:56] <selsky> Aren't admins more likely to be at LISA?
[11:56] <liamr> i've been to both.
[11:56] <cjh> I think this group is pretty evenly split between people who are more admin focused and people who are more dev focused :)
[11:57] <liamr> I think admins are more likely to be at OSCON than developers at LISA
[11:57] <liamr> LISA is heavily admin focused
[11:57] <yunosh> probably makes more sense to have a booth at lisa, than doing the horde conf/meeting there
[11:58] <bklang> I tend to agree
[11:58] <mnaberez> I think that makes a lot of sense.
[11:58] <bklang> alright, we're just about to run out of time here
[11:59] <cjh> Let's take conference/meeting planning to the list - we can follow up there based on the minutes
[11:59] <cjh> Any other open floor questions/ideas?
[11:59] _saw left IRC. (Nick collision from services.)
[12:00] <liamr> how frequently should we "meet"?
[12:00] b0ha_ is now known as _saw.
[12:00] <bklang> I think quarterly is probably sufficient
[12:00] <cjh> If IRC works for people, I think once a month is good. I'd like to try and be more focused for future meetings; obviously this one was the first, so ...
[12:01] <cjh> I guess it depends on how much goes on with the board@ mailing list - if that is productive, then formal meetings seem less necessary
[12:01] <kevinUofA> sorry - got called away for a sec... I suggested LISA because the BoF sessions don't cost anything so any costs would just be the cost of admission... no real admin costs. Never been to OSCON so I dunno how things work there
[12:01] <cjh> BOFs are free at OSCON also
[12:01] <duckslo> I agree with Chuck, one a month and focus on one or two topics.
[12:02] <liamr> (OSCON is also very reasonable for those of us at educational institutions.)
[12:02] <mrubinsk> +1 for once per month depending on list activity
[12:02] <cjh> Mostly I'd like to hear from people like Liam, Pete, John, etc. whether the concept of this board makes sense to them.
[12:02] <yunosh> could even be limited to half an hour if we are more focused
[12:02] <kevinUofA> and also - lisa's an admin conference and they're the ones who would ultimately be running the Horde installations. Less developers, yes, but more adopters potentially
[12:03] <cjh> It can be the best idea in the world in my head, but I haven't gotten big sense one way or another if the goals that I outlined resonate with a lot of the big users we've invited here.
[12:03] <yunosh> kevinUofA: that's why i suggested a booth, to at least get into talking and showcasing to the admins
[12:03] <liamr> Chuck - the concept does make sense. We appreciate being asked for more input
[12:04] <cjh> liamr: Thank you, that's good to hear. :)
[12:04] <duckslo> lets say every first Tuesday?
[12:04] <johnmorr> cjh: nod, it does make sense. i have a few thoughts, but time is short, so i'll try to post to board@ in the next few days
[12:04] <liamr> we would also like to be able to commit more time to horde development. the team responsible for our IMAP back end has asked that we make webmail more of a priority than it's been for us in recent years
[12:04] <liamr> (due to internal politics)
[12:04] <cjh> johnmorr: that would be great, thanks
[12:05] <cjh> liamr: that's excellent news!
[12:05] <bklang> Yes, of course anything that we did not get a chance to cover here, or ran out of time to fully address, please send to board@
[12:05] <cjh> First Tuesdays work for me and are easy to remember (though this was a 2nd tuesday)
[12:05] <liamr> it'll be more excellent if it happens.
[12:05] <cjh> liamr: understood
[12:06] <cjh> Okay, I'm running out of time here myself - any last things?
[12:06] <liamr> so, first tuesday, about the same time?
[12:06] <bklang> Ok, I'll put it on the calendar and send out an invite for Tuesday March 4th at the same time
[12:06] <yunosh> any date works for me. we should keep the time, if that was fine for everyone?
[12:06] <liamr> k
[12:06] <pete_1> all good
[12:06] <kevinUofA> yup - just set a date and it's good for me
[12:06] <liamr> good here
[12:06] <mnaberez> Works for me.
[12:06] <cjh> And either way before I go: Thank you very much to everyone for taking the time for this. I really appreciate it, and while it's been a slow start, there are a lot of good ideas, and I look forward to moving forward.
[12:06] <yunosh> cool
[12:07] bklang changed the topic to The Horde Project Advisory Board - http://www.horde.org | Next Meeting: Tuesday, March 4th at 1600 UTC
[12:07] <yunosh> i concur :)
[12:07] <wrobel> thanks to you for organizing this. cu!
[12:07] wrobel left the channel. ("ERC Version 5.1.4 (IRC client for Emacs)")
[12:08] <cjh> Well that looks official then. Thanks again everyone, especially to Ben Klang for helping moderate and for taking the initiative on this first meeting.
[12:08] <yunosh> have a nice day everyone
[12:09] <bklang> Thanks all for coming out
[12:09] <mrubinsk> Good'ay
[12:09] <mnaberez> Thanks all.
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