from private mail out of discussion on building a community pythion website
from discussion on marketing python, re: some place where we could all contribute more, a place where we could all contribute python hints and help and whatever, plus links to our blogs, and something written for suits, and we get to use Tim Parkin's logo which python.org rejected... ------- Forwarded Message Replied: pobrien@orbtech.com (Patrick K. O'Brien) Replied: Laura Creighton <lac@strakt.com> Replied: Stephan Deibel <sdeibel@wingide.com> Replied: Tim Parkin <tim@pollenation.net> Return-Path: pobrien@orbtech.com Delivery-Date: Wed Nov 19 17:51:46 2003 Laura Creighton <lac@strakt.com> writes:
What I wanted was a set of basic templates, that establish a look. and then the abilty to edit what I want to say _in emacs_ using some sort of basic markup -- like ReST. And then, all you really have to do is type.
I agree completely with this sentiment. Here is what would be my ideal system: * text files written using reST conventions * text files stored in cvs or svn * style sheet to work with reST that ends up looking like Tim's design * the result is static html pages that are search engine friendly Here is how people would contribute website content: * read tutorial about reST and updating content * ask for privileges at the cvs or svn repository * check out the files from cvs or svn * make changes in preferred text editor, or * check out the templates and create a new document * run unit tests which make sure the html gets created properly * make sure the html results look good with the style sheets * check the changes into the cvs or svn repository * cvs or svn changes get emailed to anyone who wants to monitor them * someone can reverse the changes, just like code in cvs or svn * the website gets rebuilt from the cvs or svn reposity each day If the content is in reST, we can also produce XML, PDFs, latex, OpenOffice, etc. Thoughts? - -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien - ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." - ----------------------------------------------- ------- End of Forwarded Message My thought is that we have this already in PyPy. correct? things are moving right along. later we get this:
Stephan Deibel <sdeibel@wingide.com> writes:
FWIW, I have been working on redesigning how wingide.com and pythonology.org work and it's reST-based. If this comes to action, let me know and maybe some of my code will be useful (I plan to open source the framework... yea yea, yet another web framework, but it's unique in being reST-centric).
Whether I apply it to a Python-specific website or not, I do plan to use something like this for several other websites I'm developing right now. So I am *extremely* interested in your framework. Please tell me more. I'll help in any way I can. I'm on the reST developer team, have contributed a few additions to reST, and worked on the OpenOffice converter that Robin Dunn and Noel Rappin and I are using on the wxPython book for Manning. So I'm knee deep in this stuff already. ;-)
-- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien
----------- sounds to me as if this is something we want -- and we need to get Patrick to a Sprint .... now thigns are moving towards getting another sourceforge project. Patrick has several. but I think that we have lots of code to drop in. wanted to keep you all posted .... Laura
Project Information ------------------- 1. Submitter: pobrien 2. Project UNIX Name: restify 3. Project Descriptive Name: Restify 4. License: BSD License 5. Project Description: Restify is a lightweight content management system that uses reStructuredText documents to generate static web pages for an entire website. It is written in Python, and does not require any software on the server. ----- I wasn't sure what license we'd want, so I picked BSD as a liberal option. I'll gladly let someone else hash out which license we want as our final choice. I described the kind of tool that *I* want. If that isn't what everyone else wants, or what Stephen and Tim's code supports, just let me know. I just hope I'm not too far off in my description. I'll let everyone know when the project is approved by SF. In the mean time, anyone who wants developer access should send me their SourceForge user names. And feel free to forward this to anyone else who might have an interest. -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." -----------------------------------------------
On Wed, 19 Nov 2003, Patrick K. O'Brien wrote:
Project Information -------------------
1. Submitter: pobrien
2. Project UNIX Name: restify
3. Project Descriptive Name: Restify
4. License: BSD License
Sounds good. I strongly prefer less restrictive licenses like this to GPL, which would be a problem for me in this case.
5. Project Description: Restify is a lightweight content management system that uses reStructuredText documents to generate static web pages for an entire website. It is written in Python, and does not require any software on the server.
My current code base caches but still has Python code running to access the cache. This should be changed to allow static directly servable files as an option, but in fact I would like to retain a layered approach where there can be a mix of dynamic and static content (even down to different elements on the same browser page).
I described the kind of tool that *I* want. If that isn't what everyone else wants, or what Stephen and Tim's code supports, just let me know. I just hope I'm not too far off in my description.
It's fine as a start, anyway, as I'm sure we'll evolve what we want this thing to be and after we figure out how/if to merge the various initial code bases.
I'll let everyone know when the project is approved by SF. In the mean time, anyone who wants developer access should send me their SourceForge user names.
Please add sdeibel when it's approved. Thanks! Stephan Deibel -- Wing IDE for Python Archaeopteryx Software, Inc Take Flight! www.wingide.com
Sourceforge won't let you develop using subversion until subversion is 1.0, which is isn't, quite, yet. But once you have used subversion, the thought of using cvs is ... painful ... Plus, for the design I had in order, you really want to use subversion as part of your versioning system from inside the website. There is already a wiki based on subversion -- subwiki -- http://subwiki.tigris.org/ and kwiki and blosxom both support svn. These places might have code we want to look at and see ... Here is part of mail where Tim and I were discussing exactly what we might want in a new website ....
Laura, as for your concerns about community. The model we'd probably propose is a registration system (to stop bots from posting stuff) and a 'broadcast delay' moderation system.
I am not sure about the 'to stop bots from posting stuff' rule. Moshez Zadka has a really nice bot for logging irc conversations. I could see a case where somebody _wanted_ a bot to be able to post regular updates here. How much abuse do you get if you disallow this? Also, I really really hate the 'having to log in' rule. I have way, way, way too many sites, and I need to access them from all over the world. So, naturally, I use the same password everywhere. A few months ago, somebody who realised this, forged a bunch of articles flaming Microsoft claiming to be from me. Quite funny, actually. But whenever I see password protection, I think 'aha -- somebody has a clubhouse. And only members of _my gang_ can use the clubhouse. You need the magic password, to prove that you are in _my gang_ ...' Can't we do something else?
ie New posters content would be seen by other registered users but not by unregistered users. This could be combined in many ways to make very new people have to be fully moderated. People who have had one thing accepted only have a delay on publishing and more people can see the changes and finally trusted people can be published immediatly.
Just wondering what you would think to that?
On first glance, I like my version -- there is are 2 versions of the site, the official version, which is what everybody sees, and then the 'being hacked on' version, which you can see if you use a slightly different url -- which is the one that you get when you edit, or try to edit. Same structure underneath -- just if one were www.python.biz/frontpage the other would be www.python.bix/newchanges/frontpage and so on and so forth for every file on the website. Then, every 3 days or so, unless somebody/the readership/however we choose to devolve authority/ votes it down, the changed versions become the real versions. We would need a way for the changer to specify -- NOT DONE YET, don't make this live in 3 days! and -- READY TO GO according to me Care has to be taken so that two people can edit the same pages concurrently -- and that different levels of fixes can go on at the same time. Thus if I decide to replace all instances of 'PBF' with 'The Python Business Forum' on the website, then I should get to get my modifications in and out on the world globally, even if somebody was revising a document that referred to the PBF, and had the page out for editing. We want neither the 'last out overwrite behaviour' -- then my PBF global change would get rewritten by the revised document, which for argument sake would still refer to things as the PBF -- nor do we want the reviser to get to lock the file, thus making it impossible for me to make a global PBF change at all because always there will be a file locked and being edited. You need real file versioning a la svn for this to work properly. .... the other thing that I want, for a community website, is a way of doing the workflow which is more like raising exceptions, and less like testing your system calls to make sure they return the correct status. That is to say, what I want is a way that everybody can make all sort of changes, with the understanding that if we hate what they did, we can always yell about it and go back to the old version, as opposed to people needed the permission of a few overworked webadmins to get anything done. But if we want to do that, we need very precise control over how we can back out of things, and for that we need a real version control system, and for that I want subversion. Laura
Laura Creighton <lac@strakt.com> writes:
Sourceforge won't let you develop using subversion until subversion is 1.0, which is isn't, quite, yet. But once you have used subversion, the thought of using cvs is ... painful ...
So I've heard.
Plus, for the design I had in order, you really want to use subversion as part of your versioning system from inside the website.
Could Holger Krekel set us up with an svn repository on Codespeak? He once offered to host my PyPerSyst project there. Holger is on the pypy-dev list, isn't he? Er, aren't you, Holger? ;-) If so, could we also get a mailing list going? I kind of like the name I picked, which was "restify", but if someone can think of a better name they should speak up. If someone can get us an svn repository, I'll cancel the SourceForge project, which was just approved: http://sourceforge.net/projects/restify/ -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." -----------------------------------------------
[Patrick K. O'Brien Thu, Nov 20, 2003 at 08:18:43AM -0600]
Laura Creighton <lac@strakt.com> writes:
Sourceforge won't let you develop using subversion until subversion is 1.0, which is isn't, quite, yet. But once you have used subversion, the thought of using cvs is ... painful ...
So I've heard.
Plus, for the design I had in order, you really want to use subversion as part of your versioning system from inside the website.
Could Holger Krekel set us up with an svn repository on Codespeak? He once offered to host my PyPerSyst project there. Holger is on the pypy-dev list, isn't he? Er, aren't you, Holger? ;-)
Hey Patrick. Actually i am but i have been too busy to answer :-) Yes, i would be happy to setup you and your project members. But let me not forget to mention the codespeak-repository policy: All projects use the same repository and everyone with commit rights has - by default - full commit rights. In the unlikely case that somebody goes wild and does unwanted changes it's a) easy to reverse and b) easy to take action *then*. IOW the ACIDness of subversion allows to view the repo as a kind of a version-controled "code wiki".
If so, could we also get a mailing list going? I kind of like the name I picked, which was "restify", but if someone can think of a better name they should speak up.
Actually this is all possible and i may be interested to join as i have already done some coding along your lines see e.g. the pypy-doc page http://codespeak.net/pypy/index.cgi?doc/translation/annotation.html which is generated from a ReST-Source (see link on the same page). IMHO the engine should be dynamic but could be driven to statically enumerate and generate all pages from rest-sources. There are actually two very interesting ways in the future to edit such ReST-content: a) reuse the ExternalEditor-concept from Zope to dispatch native applications (via e.g. the ReST-link) which can also *save* back to the repo/web. b) reuse the Epoz-project which is a client-side WYSIWYG-editor for recent browsers (mozilla and IE mainly). Epoz is also going to move to the codespeak-repo, btw. But if possible i'd like to talk more/do something about this next week. I guess i am just too busy right now. cheers, holger
Hi, I quite like pyrite or pyurest headrest keeps appearing at the back of my mind too.... Restify sounds like a sort of wysywig front end to rest (which we have been thinking of doing also), as it's in use at the moment as a verb (google shows a few results). At the end of the day I don't mind as long as it's descriptive. What is it it's going to do anyway (whats it's 'USP' for want of a better acronym) Tim Patrick K. O'Brien wrote:
Laura Creighton <lac@strakt.com> writes:
Sourceforge won't let you develop using subversion until subversion is 1.0, which is isn't, quite, yet. But once you have used subversion, the thought of using cvs is ... painful ...
So I've heard.
Plus, for the design I had in order, you really want to use subversion as part of your versioning system from inside the website.
Could Holger Krekel set us up with an svn repository on Codespeak? He once offered to host my PyPerSyst project there. Holger is on the pypy-dev list, isn't he? Er, aren't you, Holger? ;-)
If so, could we also get a mailing list going? I kind of like the name I picked, which was "restify", but if someone can think of a better name they should speak up.
If someone can get us an svn repository, I'll cancel the SourceForge project, which was just approved:
-- Tim Parkin Managing Director Pollenation Internet Ltd www.pollenation.net m : 07980 59 47 68 t : 01132 25 25 00 --
Tim Parkin <tim@pollenation.net> writes:
I quite like
pyrite
I like it too, but we'd face competition: http://www.pyrite.org/
or
pyurest
Yuck! How do you even pronounce it? :-)
headrest keeps appearing at the back of my mind too....
Hmm. How about "sleepy" -- just kidding.
Restify sounds like a sort of wysywig front end to rest (which we have been thinking of doing also), as it's in use at the moment as a verb (google shows a few results).
It could mean just about anything.
At the end of the day I don't mind as long as it's descriptive. What is it it's going to do anyway (whats it's 'USP' for want of a better acronym)
I don't really care about the name either. I'll be happy with whatever the majority wants. -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." -----------------------------------------------
Hi, To get this discussion off this somewhat random list, and to get the ball rolling, I've created a new mailing list for discussion and development of an reStructuredText/docutils-based web/CMS framework: http://wingide.com/mailman/listinfo/restweb I've also packaged up and released the source code that I've been working on for reST-based web/CMS support: http://wingide.com/opensource/restweb Be warned, this is more for code reading than anything; it works quite well but there is not out-of-the-box example; see README.txt for details. My primary intention of dropping this out there is to get others to do the same so we can figure out how to proceed on joint design and development based on our collected ideas, code, and requirements. Finally, note http://lino.sourceforge.net/webman.html is a related project just announced on the docutils mailing list. Stephan Deibel -- Wing IDE for Python Archaeopteryx Software, Inc Take Flight! www.wingide.com
Stephan Deibel:
To get this discussion off this somewhat random list, and to get the ball rolling, I've created a new mailing list for discussion and development of an reStructuredText/docutils-based web/CMS framework:
Two last comments from my side, as this really doesn't entirely fit here...
Finally, note http://lino.sourceforge.net/webman.html is a related project just announced on the docutils mailing list.
It's interesting to add an exec directove to Docutils, but it's far more powerful to use a general template processor like EmPy as I did with HeyHeyWickie. ;-) Tim Parkin:
Restify sounds like a sort of wysywig front end to rest (which we have been thinking of doing also), as it's in use at the moment as a verb (google shows a few results).
Look also at http://python.net/~gherman/ReSTedit.html (on OS X). Dinu -- Dinu C. Gherman - http://python.net/~gherman ...................................................................... "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool." (Richard Feynman)
Laura Creighton:
from discussion on marketing python, re: some place where we could all contribute more, a place where we could all contribute python hints and help and whatever, plus links to our blogs, and something written for suits, and we get to use Tim Parkin's logo which python.org rejected...
Hi Laura and others, it's not entirely clear to me why this message pops up on this particular PyPy-list, but read on... Patrick K. O'Brien wrote:
Laura Creighton <lac@strakt.com> writes:
What I wanted was a set of basic templates, that establish a look. and then the abilty to edit what I want to say _in emacs_ using some sort of basic markup -- like ReST. And then, all you really have to do is type.
I agree completely with this sentiment. Here is what would be my ideal system:
* text files written using reST conventions * text files stored in cvs or svn * style sheet to work with reST that ends up looking like Tim's design * the result is static html pages that are search engine friendly
Here is how people would contribute website content:
* read tutorial about reST and updating content * ask for privileges at the cvs or svn repository * check out the files from cvs or svn * make changes in preferred text editor, or * check out the templates and create a new document * run unit tests which make sure the html gets created properly * make sure the html results look good with the style sheets * check the changes into the cvs or svn repository * cvs or svn changes get emailed to anyone who wants to monitor them * someone can reverse the changes, just like code in cvs or svn * the website gets rebuilt from the cvs or svn reposity each day
If the content is in reST, we can also produce XML, PDFs, latex, OpenOffice, etc.
Thoughts?
This is largely exactly what I'm doing for my own Starship pages, except for using CVS, see also: http://python.net/~gherman They are created from a homebrewn Wiki system, named HeyHeyWickie, which pipes ReST files through Docutils and EmPy to get dynamic pages locally, but I can also create static HTML snapshots which I'm transferring to the Starship. Right now I'm working on a PDF "take-away" version of such a snapshot. The main feature is that you can have arbitrary Python code on every page (which makes it dangerous, of course, to put it online, but it allows me to generate a whole lot of things very lazily, i.e. at the time when a page gets called, like miniature screen- shots, say), see some samples below: http://python.net/~gherman/HeyHeyWickie.html http://python.net/~gherman/UnreleasedStuff.html The version of HeyHeyWickie you can download right now is quite alpha and was quickly written for Linux Magazine. They kindly put it online as a PDF, see: http://python.net/~gherman/Publications.html But I hope by the end of the year a new version will be out. BTW, here's a preview of a PDF snapshot, not entirely up to date and with some hyperlink bugs: http://python.net/~gherman/index.pdf Regards, Dinu PS: Here's the code for the file UnreleasedStuff.txt: ------ 8< ------ 8< ------ 8< ------ 8< ------ 8< ------ 8< ------ These are some screenshots of things to come, things which are not finished yet or which I'm too busy to release... Some were converted from PDF files, which are available for `download <unreleased>`__, too. @{ import os, wickie, utils projectHome = "/Users/dinu/Developer/Starship/unreleased" imgFolder = wickie.getImageFolder(BASE) shots = utils.makeScreenshotIcons(projectHome, imgFolder) if imgFolder[0] == '/': shots = map(lambda (base,small): ("file://"+base, "file://"+small), shots) } .. raw:: html <table> <tr> @[for i in range(len(shots))] <td> <a href="@shots[i][0]"><img src="@shots[i][1]" alt="@shots[i][1]" /></a> </td> @[if i % 5 == 4] </tr></tr> @[end if] @[end for] </tr> </table> ------ 8< ------ 8< ------ 8< ------ 8< ------ 8< ------ 8< ------ -- Dinu C. Gherman - http://python.net/~gherman ...................................................................... "The best way to predict the future is to invent it." (Alan Kay)
Dinu Gherman <dinu@mac.com> writes:
Laura Creighton:
from discussion on marketing python, re: some place where we could all contribute more, a place where we could all contribute python hints and help and whatever, plus links to our blogs, and something written for suits, and we get to use Tim Parkin's logo which python.org rejected...
Hi Laura and others,
it's not entirely clear to me why this message pops up on this particular PyPy-list, but read on...
It's a long story. In short, several of us rebels were talking about setting up a website with Python content (using Tim's website design and logo, which we happen to like a lot). That lead to discussions about maintaining content in reST using cvs or svn. Stephen Deibel and Tim Parkin have code for doing such a thing that they want to open source. So we decided to start a project. Laura thought the PyPy folks also had similar needs, and similar code. Hence the post here. We'd love to have you involved as well. We've got a SourceForge project set up, but since SF doesn't support Subversion, we may take up Holger's offer to host it, when he has time to do so. Here is a very brief project description: "Restify is a lightweight content management system that uses reStructuredText documents to generate static (or dynamic) web pages for an entire website. It is written in Python, and does not require any software on the server (except for dynamic content). Source documents are stored in Subversion." At least, that's all *I* need to be a happy camper.[1] Others have cool ideas they would like to have. I imagine that if this project satisfies Laura, it should satisfy just about anyone. <big wink> [1] With a name of Restify, I would suggest that the developers call themselves Restifarians.[2] :-) [2] http://www.google.com/search?q=rastafarian -- Patrick K. O'Brien Orbtech http://www.orbtech.com/web/pobrien ----------------------------------------------- "Your source for Python programming expertise." -----------------------------------------------
participants (6)
-
Dinu Gherman -
holger krekel -
Laura Creighton -
pobrien＠orbtech.com -
Stephan Deibel -
Tim Parkin