Message-ID: <391C7DDA.D2A72502@mindspring.com>
Date: Fri, 12 May 2000 17:55:38 -0400
From: Chuck Esterbrook 
To: Titus Brown 
CC: pywx@idyll.org, jsliv@jslove.net
Subject: Re: [PyWX] Zope users?

Titus Brown wrote:

[ munch ]

> Dare I ask what you dislike about Zope?  (I strongly dislike the
> presentation of Zope, for no reason other than that it's a little
> bit too commercial.)
> 
> --titus

Had you asked me last fall I could have ranted for a very long time. Here's a
few things that I still remember:

* I don't want DTML. Instead I want something like ASP, PHP & JSP where I
  alternate between HTML and a full blown scripting language. Now that I've
  found Python, I frown heavily on the proliferation of so many mini-languages
  which inevitably end up having their dead ends.

* Zope protected me from Python too much. In a DTML expr, I couldn't even use
  the range() function. I could only use those symbols from Python that the
  Zope designers felt were safe and useful for me.

* Upon desiring to add a new "type" I found that the type code in Zope (at the
  time) was extremely procedural. I expected to create some kind of type class
  that overrode methods like name(), instantiate(), help(), etc. Instead I
  found a bunch of if-else statements. Yikes! (BTW I don't remember if "type"
  is the right name.)

* In order to use external Python funcs I had to declare their name, Zope name
  and at least one other thing in the web interface, each and every time. If I
  renamed the func I had to locate and change the declaration. This felt more
  like Pascal and less like Python. It was a burden during real work.

* Out of the box, I didn't even get things I expected like good session
  management. I had to scrounge through alternatives contributed by users and
  decide whose was best.

* I like the idea of working through the web when I need to (like emergency
  fixes to a production site), but 99% of the time I develop on my
  machine. Give me a kick ass dev env or the ability to use my favorite text
  editor. In fact, give me the latter first since the former takes a long time
  to create. (I know they initiated the former last fall. I don't know the
  current status.)

* I couldn't find a "project search" let alone a "project search and replace"
  when I wanted to rename something that was prolific. Names are very
  important to me. If the name is wrong, I want to change it quickly.

* My website was going to involve coding of some sort since all the pages are
  dynamic. Zope didn't contribute a lot in this area.

* I encountered _WAY_ too many people who said they didn't understand how to
  develop a site with Zope yet, but they were still trying.

* Documentation sucked ass.

Looks like I remembered quite a bit after all. :-)

There were a couple good things, but not enough to compare to the above.

All my own opinions, of course. I don't know how much has changed in the past
6-9 months. I know that I do want something that looks closer to Servlets,
PHP, etc. and I want something more Python-oriented and more grass
roots. Those kinds of technologies are easier (again IMO) to develop,
maintain, learn, deploy, fine tune, etc. You can always stack the fancier
stuff on later and make everyone happy.

Sometimes you reach that point where you decide to start from scratch rather
than fix something that feels fundamentally broke.


-Chuck

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