[Web-SIG] Shameless self promotion, and serious question.

[Paul Boddie]

Lucid Drake [mailto:lucid at escex.com] wrote:
> 
> Less talk, more action.

Ahem!

> At the risk of putting myself out there as all talk and no action, I 
> think it would be useful for those on this list that have a strong idea 
> about what should be added to the Python standard library, to post 
> something that people can play around with.

Yes, that was my intention.

> I am by no means an expert in the world of web programming, but I am 
> learning, and I do feel the need to have a better set of standard tools 
> in Python for developing web applications. I just don't have the 
> knowledge or expertise to develop something myself.

But that's alright. You're in a good position to give the more experienced
developers a reality check, to tell them what makes sense and what could be
made easier or more obvious.

> But what I've noticed is that there are spurts of activity on this 
> list, but no progress. Perhaps if someone actually coded something and 
> allowed others to play with it, some progress would be made.

Well, my contribution was really just letting people in on what I've been
playing with - something I find useful for my own purposes and which might
possibly be useful for others.

> I recall hearing the argument that whatever is developed shouldn't 
> break current frameworks, or force them into a model they don't want to 
> use. My question is, why would a new module break or force anything? 
> Won't the original modules still exist?

That's why I've taken the approach to build on top of existing frameworks,
at least for the time being. Persuading the developers of existing
frameworks is likely to be quite hard because it involves them taking in
code that will lead to more maintenance for them, and since many people who
are up close to any given framework are likely to favour the particular
development styles and practices of that framework, they aren't likely to be
so interested in standardised, framework-neutral APIs that don't expose the
fancy features that they've been promoting.

> In addition, even if the new proposed way of doing things breaks a 
> framework, how long would it REALLY take for the framework to 
> accommodate the changes?

With WebStack it wouldn't matter - just bundle it with your application and
deploy on top of a supported framework.

> All this talk is going no where, what ever happened to experimentation? 
> Create something, test it, use it, stress it, and learn by doing. Less 
> abstract design and more progress through action please.
>
> Am I right? Wrong? Not seeing the entire picture? Please, more 
> experienced developers/politicians chime in.

If you want something to play with and have some frameworks installed (or
even just have the standard library, since BaseHTTPServer counts as a
framework), try out WebStack:

  http://www.python.org/pypi?:action=display&name=WebStack&version=0.2

I'm not suggesting that it's the right way or the best way, or even that the
API it uses could eventually be directly implemented by some framework or
other, as the layer of "translating" functionality between WebStack and such
a framework just melts away, but I think it does count as a possible
reference point that people can either identify with or distance themselves
from.

Paul