Developers of Sympa

[IKEDA Soji <address@concealed>]

Hi folks,

Sorry for delay.  This is the follow up I have promised.

> * Periodical releases of Sympa 6.2 have been done. Recently they
>   were done by quarters[1] (if it is hard, releases may be done by
>   half a year).

Ongoing.  After the last post, 3 stable versions were released
periodically (preceded by 5 beta) in this half year.

In addition, 1 irregular release was made for purpose of urgent fix.

The next stable release is planned at 20th March (probably).

> * Refactoring:
> 
>   - Many functions were refactored to be moved to "request" modules.
>     This sort of refactoring will continue in the next year.
>     The goal of this is making wwsympa, sympasoap and sympa.pl be
>     thin wrappers of "request" modules.

I feel most of "request" modules have been implemented, if
corresponding functions suit for this framework (see also below
about datasource synchronization).

There are some issues:

- Implementation on delayed requests.

  With web interface, bulk approval of requests (such as
  DISTRIBUTE, SUBSCRIBE) can take long time and might cause
  browser timeout.

  One solution is to add a new spool to keep requests already
  approved (not requests to be approved -- it is there), and
  maybe another daemon process simultaneously flushes them.
  I'm not sure this solution is the best.

- On web interface (described in below).

>   - Refactoring datasources.  I want to start it in the end of this
>     year and probably may be done in the first half of next year. 
>     The goal is to define simple interface between datasource and
>     GUI (vue and so on).

I started working on this point (with delay of a year).
A PR is submitted (See PR #516 https://git.io/fhOfR ), and I wish it
being closed before the next stable in March.

In the next step, I hope we will be able to start thinking about new
GUI.


>   - Refactoring task manager and task spool. It will be done in the
>     next year.
>     The purpose is to rewrite fossilized code.

It has basically been done.  See PR #394 https://git.io/fNbVH .

>   - OO-based robots and configuration mechanism.
>     It would be better to be done on separate branch and be merged
>     into Sympa 7.

It has not been done.


### The other refactorings

I think code for these things should be refactored:

  - Scenarios

  - Families

Progress about these will be reported after more half year, around
June.


### About web interface

Web interface has several problems, such as:

- Configuration editor.

  Functions to edit configuration (templates, scenarios, ...)
  looks not suit for requiest framework described above.  However,
  they are generally poor.  It would be better to be reconstructed.

- Web interface itself.

  It is a chunk of older codes, and on the whole a reinventing of
  the web application framework.

  Moreover it obviously has several problems giving raise to
  security risk (Note that all of CVE reports on Sympa in the past
  were related to web interface).

IMO we were happy if we could throw older codes away and start
implementing the new thing just now.  At least latter can be done.

I personally don't want to improve current web interface, but
only will close flaws and bugs (Of course I won't disturb the
others adding new features to it).

                                  *

That's all on my last half year.  Comments and suggestions are
very appreciated.


Regards,
-- Soji

On Fri, 1 Jun 2018 13:44:25 +0900
IKEDA Soji <address@concealed> wrote:

> Hi folks,
> 
> Half a year passed.  I want to follow up the last post in December.
> 
> On Fri, 1 Dec 2017 11:43:33 +0900
> IKEDA Soji <address@concealed> wrote:
> 
> > Hi folks,
> > 
> > I want to describe what I have done in this half year, and what I
> > want to do in the future.
> > 
> > * Periodical releases of Sympa 6.2 have been done. Recently they
> >   were done by quarters[1] (if it is hard, releases may be done by
> >   half a year).
> > 
> >   I can do it at least for more one year.
> 
> Ongoing.  Made 2 stable releases as planned (another 1 withdrawn),
> 1 patch release and 1 security fix.
> 
> The next stable release is planned at 21st June.
> 
> > * Refactoring:
> > 
> >   - Many functions were refactored to be moved to "request" modules.
> >     This sort of refactoring will continue in the next year.
> >     The goal of this is making wwsympa, sympasoap and sympa.pl be
> >     thin wrappers of "request" modules.
> 
> I hardly could put it forward for this half year.  I spent time
> moving documentation from older site, fixing some bugs (especially
> things related to issue #11) and coping with security flaw.
> 
> Thus, my planned works described in below will evenly delay for
> half a year.
> 
> >   - Refactoring datasources.  I want to start it in the end of this
> >     year and probably may be done in the first half of next year. 
> >     The goal is to define simple interface between datasource and
> >     GUI (vue and so on).
> > 
> >   - Refactoring task manager and task spool. It will be done in the
> >     next year.
> >     The purpose is to rewrite fossilized code.
> > 
> >   - OO-based robots and configuration mechanism.
> >     It would be better to be done on separate branch and be merged
> >     into Sympa 7.
> > 
> > Regards,
> > 
> > -- Soji
> > 
> > [1] https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mod%C3%A8le:Solstice-%C3%A9quinoxe
> 
> Regards,
> -- Soji
> 
> -- 
> 株式会社 コンバージョン
> ITソリューション部 システムソリューション1グループ 池田荘児
> 〒140-0014 東京都品川区大井1-49-15 アクセス大井町ビル4F
> e-mail address@concealed  TEL 03-6429-2880
> https://www.conversion.co.jp/


-- 
株式会社 コンバージョン
ITソリューション部 システムソリューション1グループ 池田荘児
〒140-0014 東京都品川区大井1-49-15 アクセス大井町ビル4F
e-mail address@concealed  TEL 03-6429-2880
https://www.conversion.co.jp/