project: blogging software

[Scott Elcomb]

On Sun, Oct 26, 2008 at 10:45 PM, Christopher Browne <cbbrowne-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> On Sun, Oct 26, 2008 at 10:10 PM, Scott Elcomb <psema4-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org> wrote:
>> I've tried Wordpress and a number of other blogging and found them a
>> little lacking.  Recently however I started playing around with
>> b2evolution and have to admit I'm quite impressed.
>
> I'm a little curious as to what could be "lacking" in such systems.

I'm not (and wasn't) sure that lacking was the right word so I tried
qualifying it with "a little."  Basically none of the blogging tools
really sat well with me for one reason or another.

> The essentials to a blogging application ought to be eminently simple:
Agreed; for the longest time my favorite was blosxom (perl country ;-)

I like b2e because the administrators interface feels intuitive and
having trend reporting (charts/graphs) built-in to the product means
one less thing to install or reconfigure.

> Furthermore, it seems to me that the whole set of blogging technology
> falls afoul of Tom Pierce's article, "Read This Before You Write a
> Newsreader, News Transport System, etc."
> http://www.newsreaders.com/misc/twpierce/news/newsreader-manifesto.html

Thanks for sharing that.  I look forward to reading it more fully -
after a bit of sleep tho.

> I'm quite sure that *enormous* portions of the functionality that
> keeps getting re-implemented in platforms like WordPress, Slashcode,
> Drupal, PostNuke, and such did NOT get thought through in the fashion
> that Pierce suggested *BACK IN 1995!*

When getting started as a web developer (~'04), I ran directly into
code-reuse problems.  Particularly since I didn't know anything beyond
simple HTML.  Now, after "jumping ship" from systems and applications
programming to web development, I wish I had systems-like RIA
libraries.  I think they're the way to go.

It's my hope that, by being familiar to other GNU and *nix products,
Atomic OS might help systems programmers apply their skills to web
design by reducing the learning curve of
HTML+DOM+XML+JavaScript+CSS+Browser Quirks+Standards.

AJAX/Web 2.0/{insert-label-here} is helping RIA developers, but good
"web systems" are still hard to come by.  I'd rate webmin high on my
good-web-systems-o-meter for it's technical simplicity and
thoroughness.  (gmane, gmail, zimbra would be some other examples of
mine.)

> These systems *are*, in effect, news readers, with HORRIBLY kludgy
> aspects of news transport (e.g. - in that, in the absence of
> intentional interoperability standards such as NNTP, they present
> Guantanamo-like imprisoning captive interfaces).

When implemented, Atomic OS may provide a path-to-a-fix for the UI and
client/server (networking) portions of the kludginess...  Server-side
processes should be scriptable...

I dunno - might be a better mousetrap, might not.  lol.

-- 
  Scott Elcomb
  http://www.psema4.com/
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