Thread: Vote on Windows installer links
There has been some discussion about the point that the PostgreSQL web site leads people directly to the EDB web site. I have been prompted to provide a count of people that find this objectionable, so let's call a vote. Please reply to the following questions with either a +1 or a -1 (only). Any other reply will not be counted, i.e. black-or-white answers only. You may ignore either question if you find them off-topic. "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL 8.4, and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." "Do you believe that I am acting vindictively by asking for this? +1 means yes, -1 means no." You can reply to this mail, or reply to me offlist if you wish to remain anonymous. Your vote *will* be counted whether you reply on or offlist. Any emails sent to me privately will not be used for marketing purposes. I will identify the number of people on either side of the vote with whom I have any form of commercial or personal relationship. Thanks, -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
On 08/07/2009 18:34, Simon Riggs wrote: > "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL 8.4, > and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial > company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do > Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable > alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." +1 I've no problem with EDB maintaining the installer, but I'd rather see it hosted on postgresql.org. > "Do you believe that I am acting vindictively by asking for this? +1 > means yes, -1 means no." -1 Ray. ------------------------------------------------------------------ Raymond O'Donnell, Director of Music, Galway Cathedral, Ireland rod@iol.ie Galway Cathedral Recitals: http://www.galwaycathedral.org/recitals ------------------------------------------------------------------
Simon Riggs wrote: > "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL 8.4, > and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial > company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do > Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable > alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." > +1 I didn't see the relevance of the second question. -- Chander Ganesan Open Technology Group, Inc. One Copley Parkway, Suite 210 Morrisville, NC 27560 919-463-0999/877-258-8987 http://www.otg-nc.com
On Wed, 2009-07-08 at 18:34 +0100, Simon Riggs wrote: > You can reply to this mail, or reply to me offlist if you wish to remain > anonymous. Your vote *will* be counted whether you reply on or offlist. > Any emails sent to me privately will not be used for marketing purposes. > I will identify the number of people on either side of the vote with > whom I have any form of commercial or personal relationship. Or alternatively to Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> It doesn't matter which of us you reply to. -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
On Wed, Jul 08, 2009 at 06:34:19PM +0100, Simon Riggs wrote: > "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL 8.4, > and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial > company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do > Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable > alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." +1. EnterpriseDB contributes a great deal to the community, and deserves commensurate recognition within the community. But it always makes me worry about the real open-source-ness of a project when I have to get pieces of it -- even for free -- from a clearly commercial source. Thanking EnterpriseDB for the installer on a PostgreSQL.org page that hosts it seems entirely reasonable. > "Do you believe that I am acting vindictively by asking for this? +1 > means yes, -1 means no." -1. -- Joshua Tolley / eggyknap End Point Corporation http://www.endpoint.com
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On Wed, 8 Jul 2009, Simon Riggs wrote: > "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL 8.4, > and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial > company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do > Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable > alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." +1 > > "Do you believe that I am acting vindictively by asking for this? +1 > means yes, -1 means no." -1 -- Guillaume (ioguix) de Rorthais
2009/7/8 Simon Riggs <simon@2ndquadrant.com>: > There has been some discussion about the point that the PostgreSQL web > site leads people directly to the EDB web site. I have been prompted to > provide a count of people that find this objectionable, so let's call a > vote. > > Please reply to the following questions with either a +1 or a -1 (only). > Any other reply will not be counted, i.e. black-or-white answers only. > You may ignore either question if you find them off-topic. > > "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL 8.4, > and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial > company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do > Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable > alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." > +1 download from foreign site is little bit strange. > "Do you believe that I am acting vindictively by asking for this? +1 > means yes, -1 means no." -1 > > You can reply to this mail, or reply to me offlist if you wish to remain > anonymous. Your vote *will* be counted whether you reply on or offlist. > Any emails sent to me privately will not be used for marketing purposes. > I will identify the number of people on either side of the vote with > whom I have any form of commercial or personal relationship. > > Thanks, > > -- > Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com > PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support > > > -- > Sent via pgsql-advocacy mailing list (pgsql-advocacy@postgresql.org) > To make changes to your subscription: > http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-advocacy >
On Wed, Jul 8, 2009 at 6:34 PM, Simon Riggs<simon@2ndquadrant.com> wrote: > "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL 8.4, > and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial > company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do > Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable > alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." > > "Do you believe that I am acting vindictively by asking for this? +1 > means yes, -1 means no." You keep talking about our installer, but as I've pointed out, most of the packages linked to from postgresql.org come from third party websites, some of which are also commercial. I assume your desire is for *all* of those off-site links to be removed, and that you aren't singling out EnterpriseDB? -- Dave Page EnterpriseDB UK: http://www.enterprisedb.com
Simon Riggs wrote: > > On Wed, 2009-07-08 at 18:34 +0100, Simon Riggs wrote: > > > You can reply to this mail, or reply to me offlist if you wish to remain > > anonymous. Your vote *will* be counted whether you reply on or offlist. > > Any emails sent to me privately will not be used for marketing purposes. > > I will identify the number of people on either side of the vote with > > whom I have any form of commercial or personal relationship. > > Or alternatively to Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> > It doesn't matter which of us you reply to. Uh, I work for EnterpriseDB, and have not agreed to be involved in this, so please don't email me. FYI, I have one +1, one -1 for the first question, one +1, one -1 for the second. -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
Dave Page wrote: > You keep talking about our installer, but as I've pointed out, most of > the packages linked to from postgresql.org come from third party > websites, some of which are also commercial. > > I assume your desire is for *all* of those off-site links to be > removed, and that you aren't singling out EnterpriseDB? The only one I can see that is not the operating system vendor's own site is Devrim's pgsqlrpms.org, which I knew was a bad idea when I first saw it. And now I realize that it even redirects to a commandprompt.com site, which is even worse :-( -- Alvaro Herrera Not his employer's opinion
On Wed, Jul 8, 2009 at 8:28 PM, Alvaro Herrera<alvherre@alvh.no-ip.org> wrote: > Dave Page wrote: > >> You keep talking about our installer, but as I've pointed out, most of >> the packages linked to from postgresql.org come from third party >> websites, some of which are also commercial. >> >> I assume your desire is for *all* of those off-site links to be >> removed, and that you aren't singling out EnterpriseDB? > > The only one I can see that is not the operating system vendor's own > site is Devrim's pgsqlrpms.org, which I knew was a bad idea when I first > saw it. And now I realize that it even redirects to a commandprompt.com > site, which is even worse :-( Vendor or not, they're still third party. The Ubuntu site for example, has links to their store, and Canonical's support services. If this isn't a case of Simon being vindictive towards his ex-employer (which I would like to think it is not), surely this survey should address all of those third party site equally, and not single out EnterpriseDB? -- Dave Page EnterpriseDB UK: http://www.enterprisedb.com
Simon, I understand your concern. However, a popularity vote on the -advocacy list, which hardly represents the majority of the community, is not a way to decide it -- you're basically taking a straw poll of a tiny minority of the community. If we were serious about this, we'd need to put a poll up on a polling site and do a substantial job of publicizing it. For that matter, *any* opinions about whether to change the download page or not need to be informed by the question of what resources we'd lose if it's not hosted at EDB.com. People need to know what they're voting on, and right now they don't. Heck, *I* don't, so I wouldn't take a vote. -- Josh Berkus PostgreSQL Experts Inc. www.pgexperts.com
Simon Riggs wrote: > There has been some discussion about the point that the PostgreSQL web > site leads people directly to the EDB web site. I have been prompted to > provide a count of people that find this objectionable, so let's call a > vote. > > Please reply to the following questions with either a +1 or a -1 (only). > Any other reply will not be counted, i.e. black-or-white answers only. > You may ignore either question if you find them off-topic. > > "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL 8.4, > and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial > company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do > Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable > alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." > > "Do you believe that I am acting vindictively by asking for this? +1 > means yes, -1 means no." > > You can reply to this mail, or reply to me offlist if you wish to remain > anonymous. Your vote *will* be counted whether you reply on or offlist. > Any emails sent to me privately will not be used for marketing purposes. > I will identify the number of people on either side of the vote with > whom I have any form of commercial or personal relationship. > > Thanks, > I don't see the issue here. Postgresql.org is not directly supporting Enterprise DB or telling Users buy this product. I would agree with you if another company decided to come up with another installer of equl quality then Postgresql.org refused to offer a link next to OneClick installer. As long as postgresql.org continues to be impartial then I see no problem. This seems to be biting one of the hands that feeds the community. Enterprise DB is doing it for FREE wheres the problem ???? Where's Postgresql inducement of Enterprise DB??? If you say by mire fact there's a link then i would point out that logic leads to every link is an inducement to everyone.
Le 8 juil. 09 à 19:34, Simon Riggs a écrit : > "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL > 8.4, > and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial > company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do > Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable > alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." +1, BUT It's hard to find a reasonable alternative it seems. I'd like the windows installer to be hosted on our website and mirrors, but we certainly can't do this with each and every binary distribution of PostgreSQL, which is the job of packagers. It seems we have the necessary infrastructure to host the installer. The problem with generalizing to every binary package or installers out there is to offer a simple way to update the stuff, or to have community members (or scripts) to go check for new material at each minor or major release and update accordingly. Linking to OpenSource packaging efforts should remain accepted for sake of simplicity, as long as the offering site isn't a commercial one. Now packages.ubuntu.com isn't the canonical website, should it be in the commercial or Open Source category? And the following page tells "pgInstaller is maintained by Dave Page and Magnus Hagander.", and does not tell where the sources are (see second link) and does even forget to mention the installer's licence. http://www.postgresql.org/download/windows http://git.postgresql.org/gitweb?p=edb-installers.git;a=summary On the same vein, Devrim's work is payed by CommandPrompt, but I fail to see the licence. But there's a difference with Tom maintaining the RedHat packages which are a viable Open Source alternative. But on a commercial website will you say? It's a mess. The source is available under BSD licence, which encourages this diversity and the commercial redistributions. The project would prefer to offer at least the more visible and popular installers under its own name, if possible... Well I guess the pragmatic answer is: EnterpriseDB is maintaining pginstaller, which happens to be the only installer for windows. It's open source. If you want a project hosted installer, have a project community member fork it and maintain it and distribute it under the project's name and infrastructure. Good luck with that. -- dim PS: I'm lost.
On Wed, 8 Jul 2009, Simon Riggs wrote: > Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable > alternative can be found? I think a more productive use of everyone's time would be discussing what that reasonable alternative might look like. The way this discussion has wandered into a non-technical popularity contest makes it really moot as far as I'm concerned. I do the Windows packaging of Truviso's PostgreSQL release, and just had a talk recently with Dave Page and some other community members about how much work goes into the packaging they do there for the Windows PG releases. (I'd like to duplicate some of that eventually for our own product, that's why I'm interested in this topic) It's a big chunk of time they're basically sponsoring in return for the associated PR. Given that some of that is using shared resources also building EDB's product, they're in a better spot to do that efficiently than anybody else too. Unless you've got a plan for how to handle that work via other community members not associated with EDB, I fail to see what there is to talk or vote on here. Do that, and then it's possible to have an opinion on other options. -- * Greg Smith gsmith@gregsmith.com http://www.gregsmith.com Baltimore, MD
Dimitri Fontaine wrote: > Le 8 juil. 09 ? 19:34, Simon Riggs a ?crit : > > "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL > > 8.4, > > and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial > > company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do > > Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable > > alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." > > +1, BUT > > It's hard to find a reasonable alternative it seems. I'd like the > windows installer to be hosted on our website and mirrors, but we > certainly can't do this with each and every binary distribution of > PostgreSQL, which is the job of packagers. > > It seems we have the necessary infrastructure to host the installer. > The problem with generalizing to every binary package or installers > out there is to offer a simple way to update the stuff, or to have > community members (or scripts) to go check for new material at each > minor or major release and update accordingly. > Linking to OpenSource packaging efforts should remain accepted for > sake of simplicity, as long as the offering site isn't a commercial > one. Now packages.ubuntu.com isn't the canonical website, should it be > in the commercial or Open Source category? [ license issues removed] > Well I guess the pragmatic answer is: EnterpriseDB is maintaining > pginstaller, which happens to be the only installer for windows. It's > open source. If you want a project hosted installer, have a project > community member fork it and maintain it and distribute it under the > project's name and infrastructure. Good luck with that. Yep, that's pretty much it. Ideally we would have binary installers created with zero effort by the community, but that isn't realistic. We originally had a Windows installer, but that was a pain to create, (I remember the complaints from Dave and Magnus), and it never supported Linux or OS/X. I think the big question is whether reducing EDB's association with the community is worth losing the one-click installers for Windows, Linux, and OS/X. Someone might come along and create those without wanting some kind of association with the community, but as Dimitri said, "Good luck with that." Removing the EDB download links would also involve removing content from all other externally linked distributions if they don't want to give them to the community for hosting. You might as well say we want MySQL to again be easier to quickly install than PostgreSQL. From an organizational perspective, trying to keep companies from being too associated with Postgres is a defensive move to reduce the threat that the company's influence might become uncontrollable in the future. I don't think that is possible as long as our community is healthy. I actually thought we had a good system where we were using the strengths of companies to move our community forward. If specific things are causing confusion, like the installer banner, we can adjust those, and Dave and my son Matthew have already done that (posted as a separate thread). -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
Jussi Mikkola wrote: > Hi, > > Ok, I think the original question was that does EDB get too much > visibility versus other contributors, because they happen to > work on the installer and their logo is seen there. Is that too > much compared to people/companies that work on something else > that is not so visible. For example parallel restore. > > Now, in my opinion the approach has been that should EDB visibility > be reduced so that it is on the same level that others are. But, > as I see it, there are two separate issues. One is, that is EDB > visibility fair compared to others, and the other point is that > how much that visibility should be. > > Sofar, it seems that people have the idea that commercial support > is bad and that we should limit the visibility of companies on > PostgreSQL website or sites related to it. In my opinion there > is also another possibility, to increase the visibility of > others. Isn't it good for the community, if there are many > companies working on PostgreSQL? If that is good, then why don't > we show that? And if we get more companies involved by showing > that they have done something for the project, isn't that a good > thing? > > Now, the installer is visible. What if we would give there credit > to more companies that have helped the project, rather than > removing any? And, yes, if the commercial alternative costs x > k?, I think you can look 10 secs of adds when installing an open > source one. Wow, that is interesting. I think you are right that the visibility of the installer is asymetric with the visibility of some other community contributions. I think that is related to the general issue that _edge_ features get more visibility than core stuff --- we do major stuff with the optimizer in every release but it rarely gets much release note mention --- it just works better. (In fact sometimes I add it and Tom removes it.) pgadmin, which is much simpler than the core code, gets more flash attention than the backend. I think this is happening because we _don't_ try to get involved in balancing visibility stuff. The external stuff is by its very nature external and gets more visibility. I think it is admirable if we can get backend stuff more company visibility, if we can figure out a clean way to do it. Right now it works because we _don't_ inject ourselves into that. Let me also add that I get more visibility in the release notes than is warranted because I tend to do more user-facing, edge stuff, which is unfair, but when we try to be fair we end up with release notes that seem distored. We did talk about this a while ago. -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
On Wednesday 08 July 2009 22:52:53 Josh Berkus wrote: > For that matter, any opinions about whether to change the download > page or not need to be informed by the question of what resources we'd > lose if it's not hosted at EDB.com. People need to know what they're > voting on, and right now they don't. Heck, I don't, so I wouldn't > take a vote. All of this could clearly be solved if someone just took the EDB installer, remastered it without the offending logos, and hosted it on a *.postgresql.org server. And then you will be able to see which variant the users prefer.
On Wed, 2009-07-08 at 12:52 -0700, Josh Berkus wrote: > I understand your concern. However, a popularity vote on the -advocacy > list, which hardly represents the majority of the community, is not a > way to decide it -- you're basically taking a straw poll of a tiny > minority of the community. > If we were serious about this, we'd need to put a poll up on a polling > site and do a substantial job of publicizing it. The popularity of the motion is precisely the thing we wish to vote on. The decision to create the current setup was done privately in a very small group, including people that work for the company that benefits from taking this decision. I have said that a decision in such circumstances is wrong, and was asked by Bruce to provide evidence that anybody cares. I requested we find evidence as a formal poll for the reasons you suggest, and others. I would still be happier if this was a formal poll rather than as an email from me, but if you would like me to raise this on other lists, please confirm that. The vote was requested on the advocacy list (which is where concerns were originally raised by Andreas) so that I am not accused of grandstanding. ISTM a valid list for this vote. Hackers and General have specific subsets of the community also. I'm happy to take this to any forum you request. (I would note that the group that took the original decision is an even tinier minority of the community than this list). > For that matter, *any* opinions about whether to change the download > page or not need to be informed by the question of what resources we'd > lose if it's not hosted at EDB.com. Chicken and egg. It was suggested that I was the only person that held the view as stated in the motion and was challenged to prove otherwise. Once we have established that people care we can then look for possible solutions. > People need to know what they're > voting on, and right now they don't. Heck, *I* don't, so I wouldn't > take a vote. You are the only person to mention that the ballot seems unclear, out of more than 20 people responding so far, so there is no evidence to support your view. If you choose not to vote, that is up to you. -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
On Wed, 2009-07-08 at 16:41 -0400, Greg Smith wrote: > The way this discussion has > wandered into a non-technical popularity contest makes it really moot > as far as I'm concerned. This is a non-technical list. Originally, I was told that my view was unpopular, so was not valid. After the motion seems popular you say it is a popularity contest and again not valid. But what means is it possible to raise a concern and establish the validity of that concern? -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
On Wed, 8 Jul 2009, Simon Riggs wrote: > There has been some discussion about the point that the PostgreSQL web > site leads people directly to the EDB web site. I have been prompted to > provide a count of people that find this objectionable, so let's call a > vote. > > Please reply to the following questions with either a +1 or a -1 (only). > Any other reply will not be counted, i.e. black-or-white answers only. > You may ignore either question if you find them off-topic. > > "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL 8.4, > and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial > company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do > Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable > alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." +1 (since you did qualify that with "a reasonable alternative") > "Do you believe that I am acting vindictively by asking for this? +1 > means yes, -1 means no." -1 ---- Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Networking Services (http://www.hub.org) Email . scrappy@hub.org MSN . scrappy@hub.org Yahoo . yscrappy Skype: hub.org ICQ . 7615664
On Wed, 8 Jul 2009, Dave Page wrote: > On Wed, Jul 8, 2009 at 6:34 PM, Simon Riggs<simon@2ndquadrant.com> wrote: > >> "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL 8.4, >> and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial >> company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do >> Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable >> alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." >> >> "Do you believe that I am acting vindictively by asking for this? +1 >> means yes, -1 means no." > > You keep talking about our installer, but as I've pointed out, most of > the packages linked to from postgresql.org come from third party > websites, some of which are also commercial. > > I assume your desire is for *all* of those off-site links to be > removed, and that you aren't singling out EnterpriseDB? IMHO ... yes ... but, I think his qualifying things as "if a raonable alternative can be found" applies here ... if someone is willing ot step up and contribute a 'none labelled' version, that is in our ftp server, then the link should be changed ... but I'm not sure how likely that will be to happen ... ? Not sure how much work it is to make an installer ... ---- Marc G. Fournier Hub.Org Networking Services (http://www.hub.org) Email . scrappy@hub.org MSN . scrappy@hub.org Yahoo . yscrappy Skype: hub.org ICQ . 7615664
On Thu, 9 Jul 2009, Marc G. Fournier wrote: > Not sure how much work it is to make an installer ... Building the installer isn't that much work, so it's important not to think of what's involved as being just that. It's keeping all the VMs for every supported Windows platform going, then testing the resulting product to make sure it still works on all of them after each packaging, that takes up most of the time every time I do one of these. Much harder to get the whole process automated on Windows too. -- * Greg Smith gsmith@gregsmith.com http://www.gregsmith.com Baltimore, MD
On Jul 9, 2009, at 5:01 AM, Greg Smith <gsmith@gregsmith.com> wrote: > On Thu, 9 Jul 2009, Marc G. Fournier wrote: > >> Not sure how much work it is to make an installer ... > > Building the installer isn't that much work, so it's important not > to think of what's involved as being just that. It's keeping all > the VMs for every supported Windows platform going, then testing the > resulting product to make sure it still works on all of them after > each packaging, that takes up most of the time every time I do one > of these. Much harder to get the whole process automated on Windows > too. One option I have pursued is getting a developer network license from Microsoft donated to PostgreSQL. The idea is that a Windows dev would get access to all versions of windows and all updates going forward. Unfortunately, it hasn't worked out yet. I pursued this more for core development, rather than installers, but I can see that it would be useful for both. I will pursue this more vigorously when I get back to the US. I agree with Greg that the effort required to do this installer work should not be underestimated. Also do not underestimate the importance of simply *having* a windows version which is released on the same day as a new version of the source code. That is a huge marketing benefit for Postgresql itself. Those that voted in favor of a change, please consider who might make the effort of creating another installer, and how you can support that person or group. Discussion of this in terms of tasks, specific people and resources is welcome. Losing out on an up-to-date windows installer is an important concern. In the developing world, windows *is* the dominant server *and* client platform. While that may change over the next decade, we need to keep these (huge) emerging database markets in mind when discussing what services we support and provide as a community. From a purely competitive stand point, we must continue to offer up- to-date and easy to use windows installers so that we are not overlooked simply because our "window dressing" is missing or bad. I am glad this discussion is happening. Please everyone understand that Dave Page has contributed so much to Postgres over many years. Simon of course knows this, and has also made many important contributions. I am happy that we can have difficult conversations like this with each other without devolving into personal attacks. -selena -- http://chesnok.com/daily http://enpoint.com
Simon, > The popularity of the motion is precisely the thing we wish to vote on. The popularity is completely irrelevant. Bruce may have suggested that it was, but if so he's wrong. Parallel query is extremely popular. Built-in replication is extremely popular. Infinitely scalable replication is extremely popular. However, popularity isn't going to get any of those things built, or for that matter make the last one possible. So unless someone organizes an installer team which isn't funded by EnterpriseDB, then the far more appropriate path is to call up Larry Allston at EDB and work something out. Please take note that the MSI installer was dropped *precisely* because of lack of maintainers, so we're not exactly hip-deep in Windows packagers. > I requested we find evidence as a formal poll for the reasons you > suggest, and others. I would still be happier if this was a formal poll > rather than as an email from me, but if you would like me to raise this > on other lists, please confirm that. Not really. Again, without an alternate installer team, there's no point. It doesn't matter how much anyone wants the moon in a box. > The vote was requested on the advocacy list (which is where concerns > were originally raised by Andreas) so that I am not accused of > grandstanding. ISTM a valid list for this vote. I agree that this is the right list to discuss this concern. I just repeat that there is no point in voting. > Chicken and egg. It was suggested that I was the only person that held > the view as stated in the motion and was challenged to prove otherwise. I think that Bruce wasn't being helpful and has contributed to this thread spinning out of control. You've established that several other people think that the current installer setup is not ideal, which is sufficient for discussion of alternative methods of producing an installer. Beyond this, the only useful further discussion would involve a discussion of how to produce an alternate installer. > You are the only person to mention that the ballot seems unclear, out of > more than 20 people responding so far, so there is no evidence to > support your view. If you choose not to vote, that is up to you. Just because people vote on something doesn't mean that their +1 means what you think it means. In any case, we have absolutely no ability to take a deciding vote on any mailing list, except may be core, because nowhere does PostgreSQL have a defined electorate. We operate by discussion, clack, volunteerism and consensus. The most you can have is a straw poll. -- Josh Berkus PostgreSQL Experts Inc. www.pgexperts.com
On Thursday 09 July 2009 08:06:34 Josh Berkus wrote: > Just because people vote on something doesn't mean that their +1 means > what you think it means. But it should be pretty obvious from this thread and similar previous ones that a significant number of people are not happy with the current situation. Make of that what you will.
On Thu, Jul 9, 2009 at 4:32 AM, Marc G. Fournier<scrappy@hub.org> wrote: > IMHO ... yes ... but, I think his qualifying things as "if a raonable > alternative can be found" applies here ... if someone is willing ot step up > and contribute a 'none labelled' version, that is in our ftp server, then > the link should be changed ... but I'm not sure how likely that will be to > happen ... ? Not sure how much work it is to make an installer ... Well, to put this into perspective, not including ongoing development time, in the lead up to 8.4, we had 3 people working full time for a month or so on QA and subsequent development work. They tested the installers in depth on somewhere between 20 and 30 different OSs. We also have to test in multiple scenarios - for example, on Windows, installing on a domain controller may have certain issues, as may installing on a domain member. On some Linux distros, we may need to ensure things work as they should under Gnome, KDE and XFCE. Do not underestimate how much work building these installers actually is. FWIW, in addition to monitoring the lists for any reported issues with the PG installers (and fixing anything that crops up) that team is now working flat out QAing updates to a bunch of the add-on components that are offered through StackBuilder, such as Npgsql, PostGIS, Slony and the ApachePHP bundle that sits below phpPgAdmin. -- Dave Page EnterpriseDB UK: http://www.enterprisedb.com
On Thu, Jul 9, 2009 at 6:01 AM, Selena Deckelmann<selenamarie@gmail.com> wrote: > One option I have pursued is getting a developer network license from > Microsoft donated to PostgreSQL. The idea is that a Windows dev would get > access to all versions of windows and all updates going forward. > Unfortunately, it hasn't worked out yet. I already have that, provided by EDB specifically for my community work. I use it for buildfarm members, testing, debugging and more. Some may remember a nasty process permissions bug that cropped up a while back which was solved after a great deal of back and forth between me and one of Microsoft's development support people, to whom we wouldn't have had access without the MSDN subscription or paying through the nose for a one-off incident. -- Dave Page EnterpriseDB UK: http://www.enterprisedb.com
On Thu, Jul 9, 2009 at 8:34 AM, Dave Page<dpage@pgadmin.org> wrote: > Well, to put this into perspective, not including ongoing development > time, in the lead up to 8.4, we had 3 people working full time for a > month or so on QA and subsequent development work. They tested the > installers in depth on somewhere between 20 and 30 different OSs. We > also have to test in multiple scenarios - for example, on Windows, > installing on a domain controller may have certain issues, as may > installing on a domain member. On some Linux distros, we may need to > ensure things work as they should under Gnome, KDE and XFCE. > > Do not underestimate how much work building these installers actually is. Correction: the current test schedule has 32 different OSs on it at present. -- Dave Page EnterpriseDB UK: http://www.enterprisedb.com
Just to be clear: On Wed, 2009-07-08 at 15:28 -0400, Alvaro Herrera wrote: > The only one I can see that is not the operating system vendor's own > site is Devrim's pgsqlrpms.org, which I knew was a bad idea when I > first saw it. (Per whois records, that domain is owned by CMD, not me). Yeah, I'm maintaining packages -- but it is *payed* by Command Prompt, for the community. I don't know what happens if one of the parts decide not to support the project anymore. (All: Please don't include my name in this thread, but I'm ok if you talk about pgsqlrpms project in this thread.) -- Devrim GÜNDÜZ, RHCE Command Prompt - http://www.CommandPrompt.com devrim~gunduz.org, devrim~PostgreSQL.org, devrim.gunduz~linux.org.tr http://www.gunduz.org
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On Thu, 2009-07-09 at 02:03 +0300, Peter Eisentraut wrote: > On Wednesday 08 July 2009 22:52:53 Josh Berkus wrote: > > For that matter, any opinions about whether to change the download > > page or not need to be informed by the question of what resources we'd > > lose if it's not hosted at EDB.com. People need to know what they're > > voting on, and right now they don't. Heck, I don't, so I wouldn't > > take a vote. > > All of this could clearly be solved if someone just took the EDB installer, > remastered it without the offending logos, and hosted it on a *.postgresql.org > server. That sounds very reasonable to me. Now that the feelings of many people have been expressed this should be achievable. Surely we are not in a position where a sponsoring company will refuse to make reasonable changes when requested by a significant number of people? -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
On Thu, 2009-07-09 at 09:15 -0400, Bruce Momjian wrote: > Simon Riggs wrote: > > > > On Thu, 2009-07-09 at 02:03 +0300, Peter Eisentraut wrote: > > > On Wednesday 08 July 2009 22:52:53 Josh Berkus wrote: > > > > For that matter, any opinions about whether to change the download > > > > page or not need to be informed by the question of what resources we'd > > > > lose if it's not hosted at EDB.com. People need to know what they're > > > > voting on, and right now they don't. Heck, I don't, so I wouldn't > > > > take a vote. > > > > > > All of this could clearly be solved if someone just took the EDB installer, > > > remastered it without the offending logos, and hosted it on a *.postgresql.org > > > server. > > > > That sounds very reasonable to me. Now that the feelings of many people > > have been expressed this should be achievable. > > > > Surely we are not in a position where a sponsoring company will refuse > > to make reasonable changes when requested by a significant number of > > people? > > I have a better idea. Simon why don't you create new multi-platform > installers, from scratch, and contribute them to the community with no > recognition to yourself or your company; then EDB can reassign the > three staff members they have working on the installers to something > that more-directly generates revenue for EDB. > > Assuming that EDB will continue funding 3+ people to create community > installers with no PR payback is unrealistic, similar to Josh Berkus's > comment of wanting "the moon in a box". (See my recent posting about PR > payback.) Are we really in a position where we are forced to accept advertising from a company because they run what we consider to be a critical part of the project? Is that the only alternative? So you are confirming that EDB has said that it will pull the installers if we remove the link? I think there is likely to be a reasonable alternative, if we seek it. If you do not wish to seek it personally, then we should arrange for somebody else to enquire after the options and find a solution. -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
On Thu, 2009-07-09 at 08:54 -0400, Bruce Momjian wrote: > Josh Berkus wrote: > > > I requested we find evidence as a formal poll for the reasons you > > > suggest, and others. I would still be happier if this was a formal poll > > > rather than as an email from me, but if you would like me to raise this > > > on other lists, please confirm that. > > > > Not really. Again, without an alternate installer team, there's no > > point. It doesn't matter how much anyone wants the moon in a box. > > Agreed. This is not just a download issue, but a larger question of > whether we use company resources to help the community if the help has > some PR payback for the company. You asked for evidence that a significant number of people had issues with what has been done. You have that now, or do you still dispute that? We must now seek a reasonable solution. I see no reason to characterise the situation as black/white with all possible alternatives as unreachable. -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
On Thursday 09 July 2009 16:34:18 Simon Riggs wrote: > Are we really in a position where we are forced to accept advertising > from a company because they run what we consider to be a critical part > of the project? Is that the only alternative? By the way, a quick look around shows that there are a few other instances of advertisement on PostgreSQL sites. On www.p.o you have a link to the "server sponsors" and to tinysofa (not sure if they are a commercial entity). archives.p.o and buildfarm.p.o have "hosted by Command Prompt" or some variant. (Plus the buildfarm is sure to repeat that on just about every page.) There is some imbalance here. Because these web sites (and the installer) are the frontends that are exposed to the user, as opposed to code, letting those who create and manage these aspects stick their name there could give them an amount of exposure that is not proportional to the amount of contribution to the overall project effort. That is further skewed because we have a fairly restrictive policy on the extent to which individuals and companies are credited in code and release notes. (Yes, there is a list of project sponsors, but that isn't really easy to find, let alone stumble upon. Plus I think it's pretty bogus.) This is an uneasy peace. If I wanted to, for example, I could stick my name or the name of my sponsors on a lot of things in PostgreSQL, because I technically host or manage them or have the ability to edit the relevant HTML or text files. Or if you want to get easy exposure, I think the easiest way is to just start hosting things. There isn't a good way out of this except requiring that all PostgreSQL things be hosted on postgresql.org servers and are not branded or otherwise decorated with third party labels, and that everything else is explicitly marked as "third party". This could be done, but will this degrade the user experience? In the meantime, I suggest you follow the revised version of the old saying: "If you can't beat them, join them, then beat them." ;-)
On Thursday 09 July 2009 6:34:18 am Simon Riggs wrote: > > Are we really in a position where we are forced to accept advertising > from a company because they run what we consider to be a critical part > of the project? Is that the only alternative? > > So you are confirming that EDB has said that it will pull the installers > if we remove the link? > > I think there is likely to be a reasonable alternative, if we seek it. > If you do not wish to seek it personally, then we should arrange for > somebody else to enquire after the options and find a solution. > > -- > Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com > PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support I am failing to see the issue here. There is a need for an installer, it was not being met, so EDB stepped up and fulfilled the need. Obviously that has not been greeted with universal approval, but Postgres is an Open Source project so the means exist to create an alternative. Instead of expending time and effort on arguing purity of thought, would it not be better to redirect that energy into an actual project. Set up a project on pgfoundry and create the reasonable alternative. If advertising is the concern I would find the argument more compelling without company names in the signature. -- Adrian Klaver aklaver@comcast.net
On Thu, 2009-07-09 at 07:49 -0700, Adrian Klaver wrote: > On Thursday 09 July 2009 6:34:18 am Simon Riggs wrote: > > > > > Are we really in a position where we are forced to accept advertising > > from a company because they run what we consider to be a critical part > > of the project? Is that the only alternative? > > > > So you are confirming that EDB has said that it will pull the installers > > if we remove the link? > > > > I think there is likely to be a reasonable alternative, if we seek it. > > If you do not wish to seek it personally, then we should arrange for > > somebody else to enquire after the options and find a solution. > > > I am failing to see the issue here. There is a need for an installer, it was not > being met, so EDB stepped up and fulfilled the need. There was an installer and it was quietly discontinued. If EDB stepped up, many people were unaware of it. Most people thought that Dave was working on the installers on behalf of the project, as he used to do, and were unaware that advertising deals had been agreed to as conditions of further work. I have no particular objection to the existence of an installer and haven't asked for it to be discontinued. There is a strong majority in favour of removing the link to an external website, which doesn't seem to be too big a deal to me. Why does that imply that a whole new installer needs to be written? I'll assume you're voting -1. -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
Dave Page wrote:
> Well, to put this into perspective, not including ongoing development
> time, in the lead up to 8.4, we had 3 people working full time for a
> month or so on QA and subsequent development work. They tested the
> installers in depth on somewhere between 20 and 30 different OSs. We
> also have to test in multiple scenarios - for example, on Windows,
> installing on a domain controller may have certain issues, as may
> installing on a domain member. On some Linux distros, we may need to
> ensure things work as they should under Gnome, KDE and XFCE.
>
> Do not underestimate how much work building these installers actually is.
But ISTM you're counting the effort to build on Linux and Mac OS X too.
We already have perfectly good packages for those in at least several
Linux distributions (Debian, Ubuntu, Redhat, Suse, Gentoo, at least);
and for Mac OS X there are Fink packages too. I am sure that there is a
point for EDB to release the one-click installers for those operating
systems, but what we ("the community") are concerned with here is the
Windows installers, no?
Now, you can legitimely say that 1) you're supporting Linux distros that
we currently don't have other packages for, and 2) you support way more
packages through the StackBuilder thingy. But surely these are problems
that could be attacked in a different way?
For instance I notice we're not linking to Martin Pitt's package page
which has 8.4 packages for Debian. Is that only because Martin is not a
regular around here?
--
Alvaro Herrera http://www.CommandPrompt.com/
The PostgreSQL Company - Command Prompt, Inc.
Simon Riggs wrote: > > On Thu, 2009-07-09 at 08:54 -0400, Bruce Momjian wrote: > > Josh Berkus wrote: > > > > I requested we find evidence as a formal poll for the reasons you > > > > suggest, and others. I would still be happier if this was a formal poll > > > > rather than as an email from me, but if you would like me to raise this > > > > on other lists, please confirm that. > > > > > > Not really. Again, without an alternate installer team, there's no > > > point. It doesn't matter how much anyone wants the moon in a box. > > > > Agreed. This is not just a download issue, but a larger question of > > whether we use company resources to help the community if the help has > > some PR payback for the company. > > You asked for evidence that a significant number of people had issues > with what has been done. You have that now, or do you still dispute > that? Your poll was "do you want the moon in a box". Of course we would like to have installers that appear with no PR at zero cost to us, but that is not an option, so no, I don't consider your poll valid. Your poll has confirmed that there is a PR cost for these installers and RPMs, and that some folks would like a zero-PR-cost option, but I think we all would like that, so there is little need for a poll to prove it. > We must now seek a reasonable solution. I see no reason to characterise > the situation as black/white with all possible alternatives as > unreachable. OK, I am trying to move to the grey area by showing that there is not a "no PR at zero cost" option for us right now. -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
Peter Eisentraut wrote: > By the way, a quick look around shows that there are a few other instances of > advertisement on PostgreSQL sites. > > On www.p.o you have a link to the "server sponsors" and to tinysofa (not sure > if they are a commercial entity). > > archives.p.o and buildfarm.p.o have "hosted by Command Prompt" or some > variant. (Plus the buildfarm is sure to repeat that on just about every > page.) > > There is some imbalance here. Because these web sites (and the installer) are > the frontends that are exposed to the user, as opposed to code, letting those > who create and manage these aspects stick their name there could give them an > amount of exposure that is not proportional to the amount of contribution to > the overall project effort. That is further skewed because we have a fairly > restrictive policy on the extent to which individuals and companies are > credited in code and release notes. Yep. > (Yes, there is a list of project sponsors, but that isn't really easy to find, > let alone stumble upon. Plus I think it's pretty bogus.) > > This is an uneasy peace. If I wanted to, for example, I could stick my name > or the name of my sponsors on a lot of things in PostgreSQL, because I > technically host or manage them or have the ability to edit the relevant HTML > or text files. Or if you want to get easy exposure, I think the easiest way > is to just start hosting things. > > There isn't a good way out of this except requiring that all PostgreSQL things > be hosted on postgresql.org servers and are not branded or otherwise decorated > with third party labels, and that everything else is explicitly marked as > "third party". This could be done, but will this degrade the user experience? > > In the meantime, I suggest you follow the revised version of the old saying: > "If you can't beat them, join them, then beat them." ;-) Excellent analysis. No question it is imbalanced, as I mentioned in my "edge" email earlier, and yea, I don't see a good way to balance it either. Perhaps the only maxim I can think of is if you want PR, do edge stuff, which in a way is the opposite message we want to send, but in a way the edge stuff is easier for external entities to manage. -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
Simon Riggs wrote: > > On Thu, 2009-07-09 at 02:03 +0300, Peter Eisentraut wrote: > > On Wednesday 08 July 2009 22:52:53 Josh Berkus wrote: > > > For that matter, any opinions about whether to change the download > > > page or not need to be informed by the question of what resources we'd > > > lose if it's not hosted at EDB.com. People need to know what they're > > > voting on, and right now they don't. Heck, I don't, so I wouldn't > > > take a vote. > > > > All of this could clearly be solved if someone just took the EDB installer, > > remastered it without the offending logos, and hosted it on a *.postgresql.org > > server. > > That sounds very reasonable to me. Now that the feelings of many people > have been expressed this should be achievable. > > Surely we are not in a position where a sponsoring company will refuse > to make reasonable changes when requested by a significant number of > people? I have a better idea. Simon why don't you create new multi-platform installers, from scratch, and contribute them to the community with no recognition to yourself or your company; then EDB can reassign the three staff members they have working on the installers to something that more-directly generates revenue for EDB. Assuming that EDB will continue funding 3+ people to create community installers with no PR payback is unrealistic, similar to Josh Berkus's comment of wanting "the moon in a box". (See my recent posting about PR payback.) Greenplum used to work with us, and now they are mostly on their own; is that what we want to happen with EDB? Does that benefit the community? -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
Josh Berkus wrote: > > I requested we find evidence as a formal poll for the reasons you > > suggest, and others. I would still be happier if this was a formal poll > > rather than as an email from me, but if you would like me to raise this > > on other lists, please confirm that. > > Not really. Again, without an alternate installer team, there's no > point. It doesn't matter how much anyone wants the moon in a box. Agreed. This is not just a download issue, but a larger question of whether we use company resources to help the community if the help has some PR payback for the company. Some day we might have a large enough community that we can create quality multi-platform installers without needing company assistance with PR payback, but at that point there will be other things companies will want to help us with, like flashy conferences, advertising, or something else. Heck, even my time teaching at Drexel was partly justified by the PR value to the company and community. We can say no to all that, and avoid the PR tie-in, but that will most certainly slow us down. To me it is a cost/benefit analysis: Is the PR tie-in worth the benefit to the community? Sometimes it isn't --- if someone wanted their company name to appear every time someone used the SQL feature they added, that isn't worth it. If someone wanted to contribute a huge SQL feature and wanted a PR quote from me --- no problem. The bottom line is that companies need some PR payback to compensate for expenditures over a certain amount, and we as a community have to decide if it is valuable enough to us to accept the PR tie-in. -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
Simon Riggs wrote: > > I have a better idea. Simon why don't you create new multi-platform > > installers, from scratch, and contribute them to the community with no > > recognition to yourself or your company; then EDB can reassign the > > three staff members they have working on the installers to something > > that more-directly generates revenue for EDB. > > > > Assuming that EDB will continue funding 3+ people to create community > > installers with no PR payback is unrealistic, similar to Josh Berkus's > > comment of wanting "the moon in a box". (See my recent posting about PR > > payback.) > > Are we really in a position where we are forced to accept advertising > from a company because they run what we consider to be a critical part > of the project? Is that the only alternative? No, we have other alternatives, and it is possible we can ask EDB for a change. All I am saying is I like the benefit we receive from installers and PRMs (from Command Prompt), and consider the PR cost small compared to the benefit we receive. > So you are confirming that EDB has said that it will pull the installers > if we remove the link? No, I am not speaking for EDB at all but as a community member. > I think there is likely to be a reasonable alternative, if we seek it. > If you do not wish to seek it personally, then we should arrange for > somebody else to enquire after the options and find a solution. Uh, I can ask them once we figure out what we want to ask them. ;-) I think we are still trying to figure out what PR cost is acceptable to us, if any, and once we know that, we can ask them. -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
> I am failing to see the issue here. There is a need for an installer, it was not +1 what Adrian said. At first I thought that there was a minor problem (I actually preferred the PGDG installer vs. the EDB one) but it seems we've beaten this dead horse for far too long. The installer, as it is, is not a problem. Having EDB host the downloads of the community PG installer gives the installer a "funny code smell". Community installers ought to be hosted from the mirror network, and IMHO EDB ought to have recognized this before investing in an Akamai mirror. Truth be told, if I had to distribute PG to external clients, given htat there is no community installer I'd probably modify the installer I wrote for xTuple (for versions prior to current) to just include PG. I just don't have time to test every Windows OS under the Sun if I did so. BTW if anyone wants a no-frills, bare-bones, untested PG installer let me know and I'll turn over the scripts to create a NSI install out of a PG directory tree. Should take 1-3 hours + testing time to create a PG install from scratch. -- ----- http://www.globalherald.net/jb01 GlobalHerald.NET, the Smarter Social Network! (tm)
On Thursday 09 July 2009 8:17:32 am Simon Riggs wrote: > On Thu, 2009-07-09 at 07:49 -0700, Adrian Klaver wrote: > > On Thursday 09 July 2009 6:34:18 am Simon Riggs wrote: > > > Are we really in a position where we are forced to accept advertising > > > from a company because they run what we consider to be a critical part > > > of the project? Is that the only alternative? > > > > > > So you are confirming that EDB has said that it will pull the > > > installers if we remove the link? > > > > > > I think there is likely to be a reasonable alternative, if we seek it. > > > If you do not wish to seek it personally, then we should arrange for > > > somebody else to enquire after the options and find a solution. > > > > I am failing to see the issue here. There is a need for an installer, it > > was not being met, so EDB stepped up and fulfilled the need. > > There was an installer and it was quietly discontinued. If EDB stepped > up, many people were unaware of it. Most people thought that Dave was > working on the installers on behalf of the project, as he used to do, > and were unaware that advertising deals had been agreed to as conditions > of further work. In either case EDB was picking up the tab. > > I have no particular objection to the existence of an installer and > haven't asked for it to be discontinued. There is a strong majority in > favour of removing the link to an external website, which doesn't seem > to be too big a deal to me. Why does that imply that a whole new > installer needs to be written? Did you include in your votes all the people that have downloaded the installers and not complained where they got it? > > I'll assume you're voting -1. -- Adrian Klaver aklaver@comcast.net
Bruce Momjian wrote: > Perhaps the only maxim I can think of is if you want PR, do edge stuff, > which in a way is the opposite message we want to send, but in a way the > edge stuff is easier for external entities to manage. Excellent message. I'll go plaster the archives.postgresql.org site with Command Prompt advertising then. -- Alvaro Herrera http://www.CommandPrompt.com/ PostgreSQL Replication, Consulting, Custom Development, 24x7 support
On Thu, Jul 9, 2009 at 4:17 PM, Simon Riggs<simon@2ndquadrant.com> wrote: > > There was an installer and it was quietly discontinued. If EDB stepped > up, many people were unaware of it. Most people thought that Dave was > working on the installers on behalf of the project, as he used to do, > and were unaware that advertising deals had been agreed to as conditions > of further work. Please make sure your facts are correct before accusing me of anything. There have been *no* advertising deals agreed. * There was a need for multi-platform installers identified. * EnterpriseDB decided to fulfill that need for the community and produced some installers. * After some discussion on mailing lists and in person at pgCon last year, it was decided they should be hosted by EnterpriseDB and linked from the postgresql.org website, based on comments made by various community members. * I personally decided I was not going to maintain the MSI installer for 8.4, after discussion with a bunch of people. It took a significant amount of my personal time and was extremely hard to debug if it went wrong. If you do not like the installers that we now provide the community, you're welcome to take the code and make a long term commitment to the community to build and maintain releases yourself as you see fit. -- Dave Page EnterpriseDB UK: http://www.enterprisedb.com
On Thu, Jul 9, 2009 at 4:42 PM, Alvaro Herrera<alvherre@commandprompt.com> wrote: > Bruce Momjian wrote: > >> Perhaps the only maxim I can think of is if you want PR, do edge stuff, >> which in a way is the opposite message we want to send, but in a way the >> edge stuff is easier for external entities to manage. > > Excellent message. I'll go plaster the archives.postgresql.org site > with Command Prompt advertising then. It's already on every page of the archives, complete with link: "PostgreSQL Archives hosted by Command Prompt, Inc." I don't have a problem with that. -- Dave Page EnterpriseDB UK: http://www.enterprisedb.com
Bruce Momjian wrote: > Some day we might have a large enough community that we can create > quality multi-platform installers without needing company assistance > with PR payback, As Alvaro already pointed out, we don't need a multi-platform installer, just a Windows installer. The distros have their own, and even compiling from source on other systems is very easy and straight forward on *ix systems. For me, the 1-Click installer is a regression; everything that somebody thinks would be helpful is installed (hopefully, my bug report about that is still unanswered...), instead of presenting a choice if desired. Regards, Andreas
Alvaro Herrera wrote:
> Bruce Momjian wrote:
>
> > Perhaps the only maxim I can think of is if you want PR, do edge stuff,
> > which in a way is the opposite message we want to send, but in a way the
> > edge stuff is easier for external entities to manage.
>
> Excellent message. I'll go plaster the archives.postgresql.org site
> with Command Prompt advertising then.
Have you looked at the archives footer:
http://archives.postgresql.org/
Privacy Policy | PostgreSQL Archives hosted by Command Prompt, Inc. |
Designed by tinysofa
--
Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us
EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com
+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
Bruce Momjian wrote: > Alvaro Herrera wrote: > > Bruce Momjian wrote: > > > > > Perhaps the only maxim I can think of is if you want PR, do edge stuff, > > > which in a way is the opposite message we want to send, but in a way the > > > edge stuff is easier for external entities to manage. > > > > Excellent message. I'll go plaster the archives.postgresql.org site > > with Command Prompt advertising then. > > Have you looked at the archives footer: > > http://archives.postgresql.org/ > > Privacy Policy | PostgreSQL Archives hosted by Command Prompt, Inc. | > Designed by tinysofa The company logo is missing, as well as the pointer to the commercial support page. -- Alvaro Herrera http://www.CommandPrompt.com/ PostgreSQL Replication, Consulting, Custom Development, 24x7 support
Alvaro Herrera wrote: > Bruce Momjian wrote: > > Alvaro Herrera wrote: > > > Bruce Momjian wrote: > > > > > > > Perhaps the only maxim I can think of is if you want PR, do edge stuff, > > > > which in a way is the opposite message we want to send, but in a way the > > > > edge stuff is easier for external entities to manage. > > > > > > Excellent message. I'll go plaster the archives.postgresql.org site > > > with Command Prompt advertising then. > > > > Have you looked at the archives footer: > > > > http://archives.postgresql.org/ > > > > Privacy Policy | PostgreSQL Archives hosted by Command Prompt, Inc. | > > Designed by tinysofa > > The company logo is missing, as well as the pointer to the commercial > support page. You mentioned "Command Prompt advertising", not logos or links. -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
Bruce Momjian wrote: > Alvaro Herrera wrote: > > Bruce Momjian wrote: > > > Have you looked at the archives footer: > > > > > > http://archives.postgresql.org/ > > > > > > Privacy Policy | PostgreSQL Archives hosted by Command Prompt, Inc. | > > > Designed by tinysofa > > > > The company logo is missing, as well as the pointer to the commercial > > support page. > > You mentioned "Command Prompt advertising", not logos or links. Yes, but the discussion is about EDB involvement in the installer, which has the logos, no? -- Alvaro Herrera http://www.CommandPrompt.com/ PostgreSQL Replication, Consulting, Custom Development, 24x7 support
Alvaro Herrera wrote: > Bruce Momjian wrote: > > Alvaro Herrera wrote: > > > Bruce Momjian wrote: > > > > > Have you looked at the archives footer: > > > > > > > > http://archives.postgresql.org/ > > > > > > > > Privacy Policy | PostgreSQL Archives hosted by Command Prompt, Inc. | > > > > Designed by tinysofa > > > > > > The company logo is missing, as well as the pointer to the commercial > > > support page. > > > > You mentioned "Command Prompt advertising", not logos or links. > > Yes, but the discussion is about EDB involvement in the installer, which > has the logos, no? Right, EDB has much more stuff on the installer than Command Prompt has on the archives, and if EDB is asking for too much PR, we can say no and not use them, or ask them to do it with less PR, and see if they agree. Not sure what CP does for the RPMs because I never used them, but they do link to their web site. My point was that this is a difference of _degree_, not of _kind_. -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
On Wed, 2009-07-08 at 18:34 +0100, Simon Riggs wrote: > > There has been some discussion about the point that the PostgreSQL web > site leads people directly to the EDB web site. I have been prompted > to provide a count of people that find this objectionable, so let's > call a vote. I could not understand which problem are you trying to *actually* solve. EDB is spending bucks for the installers (they have a core member for maintaining it, if nothing). I have no problem with downloading an installer which is linked from main page, since I know that I can trust any link which is in pg.org. Also, as mentioned before by people in this thread, if we are going to remove all external links, then you will only have Solaris binaries, very limited number of RPMs and source code, which are hosted at our ftp site. I must say that each month we have ~100-200 (sometimes 400-500) *new* PostgreSQL installations that are performed using yum repository, which is maintained by a community member, but whose pay check is signed by a commercial company for doing that work (+ many other company work, of course). By removing that link along with EDB's installer and others, companies *may* lose their interest in supporting such projects. So, please let's stop voting and let's spend our PostgreSQL time on moving the project to the future, not to the past. Sincerely, (JD is on holiday), -- Devrim GÜNDÜZ, RHCE Command Prompt - http://www.CommandPrompt.com devrim~gunduz.org, devrim~PostgreSQL.org, devrim.gunduz~linux.org.tr http://www.gunduz.org
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Devrim GÜNDÜZ escribió:
> On Wed, 2009-07-08 at 18:34 +0100, Simon Riggs wrote:
>> There has been some discussion about the point that the PostgreSQL web
>> site leads people directly to the EDB web site. I have been prompted
>> to provide a count of people that find this objectionable, so let's
>> call a vote.
>
> I could not understand which problem are you trying to *actually* solve.
Me neither... i'm not still sure if he's talking about too many links to
EDB website and none to the company he works for (balance?)... or if he
wants to see how many of the people at -advocacy is Ok with the links to
EDB (i guess he should have done this _survey_ on -general or -*)...
I wont say anything that hasnt been said here already... but i would
like to point this out:
I went to browse the website... to find direct links to EDB's website
found these facts:
The main Website leads directly to:
* Designed By: http://www.tinysofa.com/
* Featured User: http://wcca.wicourts.gov/
* PgFoundry: http://www.pgfoundry.org/
But no EDB links... not at least there... (Took me a while to figure out
where... seriously... i though he was saying about links somewhere
else...) but there are some... at the downloads page... and even more at
the /downloads/windows and a link there saying:
««pgInstaller
pgInstaller is a Windows Installer package that offers advanced
configuration options. pgInstaller packages are only being maintained
for PostgreSQL 8.2 and 8.3.»»
So i went to the ftp directory thing and found this:
««The pgInstaller distribution of PostgreSQL for Windows is not being
maintained
for PostgreSQL 8.4 and above»»
That means, noone from pgsql has done this work... but there's a link
for the 8.4 release... at EDB :/ what a problem... what to do?... is
there anyone from the community who would like to take in charge of all
this?... for people who only have other os's than windows... having to
develop something they wont just use... its annoying... i can tell
myself... so i doubt someone will just step in and say "I will". I have
few histories i can tell of this kind... from the Venezuelan LoCo
Team... So if EDB can give someone a nice check for doing the work...
why so much complaining... the links?... Then you should also complain
by the "Designed By Tynisofa" link which is shown 1000 times more than
anything else...
so i went to download the edb one click installer... and no registration
needed... (can't install it, so i can't tell at all... no windows
here..) so what's the deal? They can't track the users who download
their installers...
I saw also live cd's that come with a nice pgsql install and so on... (i
would have saved myself some work... if i went there before creating a
cdbs... :/)
Man, developers in general... companies in general, like to have their
stuff done... if they work on windows... they want productivity instead
of anything else... if you want more potential users, give them what
they _do_ want... for example... the debian packages, should ask, if it
should create a new user, ask what it should put in the pg_hba
(conection, databases to use, user, auth method, etc...) but it
doesnt... <hint>we could fill a bug in the debian bug tracker and/or
ubuntu's launchpad for example... if its done, that would give a good
advantage :D over other databases... (i have a ugly script to do that
btw...) </hint>
> EDB is spending bucks for the installers (they have a core member for
> maintaining it, if nothing). I have no problem with downloading an
> installer which is linked from main page, since I know that I can trust
> any link which is in pg.org.
>
> Also, as mentioned before by people in this thread, if we are going to
> remove all external links, then you will only have Solaris binaries,
> very limited number of RPMs and source code, which are hosted at our ftp
> site.
>
> I must say that each month we have ~100-200 (sometimes 400-500) *new*
> PostgreSQL installations that are performed using yum repository, which
> is maintained by a community member, but whose pay check is signed by a
> commercial company for doing that work (+ many other company work, of
> course). By removing that link along with EDB's installer and others,
> companies *may* lose their interest in supporting such projects.
>
> So, please let's stop voting and let's spend our PostgreSQL time on
> moving the project to the future, not to the past.
+1 :)
Also... there was an interesting topic besides this one, and that's the
comunity survey... why we dont stop just losing time with this
conversation... since obviously... there are not enough -1 to tell "hey
let's remove those links" or i havent seen any -1 yet (besides josh's +1
and -1)... and go ahead with other things... like the website redesign,
having POP stuff ready at the website... so <hint>PUGS can do a better
job at events (We're having a pgsql booth at the 5th CNSL in
Venezuela)</hint>...
This is just my point of view...
On Thu, 2009-07-09 at 15:33 -0400, Bruce Momjian wrote: > My point was that this is a difference of _degree_, not of _kind_. I agree. Personally, I would ban it all, but total bans require more policing than allowing some minor cases. We need to be reasonable. We must find a place to draw the line and then stick to it. It's clear to me and many others that the case of the Windows installer link is a step over the line and we (the project) must react. If the fair way to react is to set the line lower so that more than one company is effected, that's fine by me, even if it effects me directly. I don't think it is appropriate for relations with a company to be handled by project members that are also employees of that company, whatever the individual involved says. Objectivity is important and we as a project don't wish to endanger the employee-employer relationship. Again, this applies to all companies. So I would not ask Alvaro to speak to his employer, any more than I expect Bruce to be able to deal effectively with his; neither case is a comment on the individual. -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
I might agree with some of what Simon wrote if he would begin by removing his company contact details from his posts.
"People in glass houses shouldn't ..."
Also, I need someone to help me resolve my confusion:
Since when did organisations cease to be part of the community? If so, I better exit now. My business is, as far as I am concerned, a member of the community. I am its representative. We try to behave responsibly by not taking advantage through our involvement. On the contrary, we try to make contributions within the limited resources that we have available. From what I have seen, this is generally the case with all members organisations.
But let's not lose sight of the fact that businesses must be fed with sales. They are not charities. If a business invests (in sponsorship or any other activity) it is done with the profit motive as the primary driver. If they don't, they die. If they die, it impacts on the the community as a whole. Can the community exist without businesses participation. Probably, but at a much lower level of success.
This is not a club. If I'd wanted to join a club, I'd have joined the bloody Boy Scouts! Yet so much of what is written seems to focus on a 'them and us principle'; that there is 'the community' and the 'scabs in business'. I just can't believe that this idea is being given any credence.
The question, it seems to me, is not whether organisations are members of the community, rather I'd ask how to ensure that ALL members of the community (individual and organisation alike) does not receive an unfair advantage or apply unfair influence on the goals and activities of the community as a whole.
Now that is the question I'd like to see addressed!
Rob Napier
(company name and address omitted)
(mission statement omitted)
Personal philosophy/religion omitted
Flagrant website self-promotion omitted
P.S. Apologies if my use of sarcasm to make a point has offended anyone.
On 10/7/09 6:48 PM, "Simon Riggs" <simon@2ndQuadrant.com> wrote:
>
> On Thu, 2009-07-09 at 15:33 -0400, Bruce Momjian wrote:
>
>> My point was that this is a difference of _degree_, not of _kind_.
>
> I agree.
>
> Personally, I would ban it all, but total bans require more policing
> than allowing some minor cases. We need to be reasonable.
>
> We must find a place to draw the line and then stick to it.
>
> It's clear to me and many others that the case of the Windows installer
> link is a step over the line and we (the project) must react. If the
> fair way to react is to set the line lower so that more than one company
> is effected, that's fine by me, even if it effects me directly.
>
> I don't think it is appropriate for relations with a company to be
> handled by project members that are also employees of that company,
> whatever the individual involved says. Objectivity is important and we
> as a project don't wish to endanger the employee-employer relationship.
> Again, this applies to all companies. So I would not ask Alvaro to speak
> to his employer, any more than I expect Bruce to be able to deal
> effectively with his; neither case is a comment on the individual.
"People in glass houses shouldn't ..."
Also, I need someone to help me resolve my confusion:
Since when did organisations cease to be part of the community? If so, I better exit now. My business is, as far as I am concerned, a member of the community. I am its representative. We try to behave responsibly by not taking advantage through our involvement. On the contrary, we try to make contributions within the limited resources that we have available. From what I have seen, this is generally the case with all members organisations.
But let's not lose sight of the fact that businesses must be fed with sales. They are not charities. If a business invests (in sponsorship or any other activity) it is done with the profit motive as the primary driver. If they don't, they die. If they die, it impacts on the the community as a whole. Can the community exist without businesses participation. Probably, but at a much lower level of success.
This is not a club. If I'd wanted to join a club, I'd have joined the bloody Boy Scouts! Yet so much of what is written seems to focus on a 'them and us principle'; that there is 'the community' and the 'scabs in business'. I just can't believe that this idea is being given any credence.
The question, it seems to me, is not whether organisations are members of the community, rather I'd ask how to ensure that ALL members of the community (individual and organisation alike) does not receive an unfair advantage or apply unfair influence on the goals and activities of the community as a whole.
Now that is the question I'd like to see addressed!
Rob Napier
(company name and address omitted)
(mission statement omitted)
Personal philosophy/religion omitted
Flagrant website self-promotion omitted
P.S. Apologies if my use of sarcasm to make a point has offended anyone.
On 10/7/09 6:48 PM, "Simon Riggs" <simon@2ndQuadrant.com> wrote:
>
> On Thu, 2009-07-09 at 15:33 -0400, Bruce Momjian wrote:
>
>> My point was that this is a difference of _degree_, not of _kind_.
>
> I agree.
>
> Personally, I would ban it all, but total bans require more policing
> than allowing some minor cases. We need to be reasonable.
>
> We must find a place to draw the line and then stick to it.
>
> It's clear to me and many others that the case of the Windows installer
> link is a step over the line and we (the project) must react. If the
> fair way to react is to set the line lower so that more than one company
> is effected, that's fine by me, even if it effects me directly.
>
> I don't think it is appropriate for relations with a company to be
> handled by project members that are also employees of that company,
> whatever the individual involved says. Objectivity is important and we
> as a project don't wish to endanger the employee-employer relationship.
> Again, this applies to all companies. So I would not ask Alvaro to speak
> to his employer, any more than I expect Bruce to be able to deal
> effectively with his; neither case is a comment on the individual.
Rob Napier wrote: > I might agree with some of what Simon wrote if he would begin by > removing his company contact details from his posts. Well denying posting on this list with personal signatures really seems a little over the top... How about the mail address, should business addresses be disallowed too? Regards, Andreas
Devrim G�ND�Z wrote: > I could not understand which problem are you trying to *actually* solve. > > EDB is spending bucks for the installers (they have a core member for > maintaining it, if nothing). I have no problem with downloading an > installer which is linked from main page, since I know that I can trust > any link which is in pg.org. > > Also, as mentioned before by people in this thread, if we are going to > remove all external links, then you will only have Solaris binaries, > very limited number of RPMs and source code, which are hosted at our ftp > site. Funny thing is those Solaris binaries might soon be produced by Oracle. ;-) -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
IMHO This discussion has gone on far too long with no clear policy objectives.
My comments were intended to highlight what, in my view, has been a complete waste of time and effort.
Read the apology at the bottom of my original post. I was using sarcasm to emphasise the futility of this discussion.
I’ve made the point before: What we need are policy and guidelines. Then this sort of counterproductive discussion could be avoided by the simple instruction:
“Please refer to our sponsorship guidelines.”
And it will help planners decide if/how they can/should commit to supporting the community.
For my part, my business does what it can but we don’t EXPECT anything in return. But if we had more to gain, would we do more? That is the sort of decision that Marketing Managers and bean counters have to ask themselves.
Rob
On 10/7/09 10:49 PM, "Andreas Pflug" <pgadmin@pse-consulting.de> wrote:
> Rob Napier wrote:
>> I might agree with some of what Simon wrote if he would begin by
>> removing his company contact details from his posts.
>
> Well denying posting on this list with personal signatures really seems
> a little over the top... How about the mail address, should business
> addresses be disallowed too?
>
>
> Regards, Andreas
>
My comments were intended to highlight what, in my view, has been a complete waste of time and effort.
Read the apology at the bottom of my original post. I was using sarcasm to emphasise the futility of this discussion.
I’ve made the point before: What we need are policy and guidelines. Then this sort of counterproductive discussion could be avoided by the simple instruction:
“Please refer to our sponsorship guidelines.”
And it will help planners decide if/how they can/should commit to supporting the community.
For my part, my business does what it can but we don’t EXPECT anything in return. But if we had more to gain, would we do more? That is the sort of decision that Marketing Managers and bean counters have to ask themselves.
Rob
On 10/7/09 10:49 PM, "Andreas Pflug" <pgadmin@pse-consulting.de> wrote:
> Rob Napier wrote:
>> I might agree with some of what Simon wrote if he would begin by
>> removing his company contact details from his posts.
>
> Well denying posting on this list with personal signatures really seems
> a little over the top... How about the mail address, should business
> addresses be disallowed too?
>
>
> Regards, Andreas
>
OK, so it seems we have gotten some good feedback from this thread.
Not surprising, some people don't like company advertising being
associated with the project, whether it be installers, web pages, or
maybe email signatures. (No one has said they _like_ advertising.)
Many believe it is a necessary evil, but exactly what is too much
advertising seems subjective.
We have to craft some kind of policy for this, and the good news is that
we already have been operating with such a policy for a while, and it is
very simple. If a majority consensus (our normal decision-making model)
don't like the advertising used by a company, we disassociate with that
company by removing links to them.
When have we ever done that, you might ask? Well, we did it two weeks
ago to CertFirst:
http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-www/2009-06/msg00241.php
You will read in that thread that the content vs. advertising ratio from
CertFirst was unacceptable and the decision was made to reject any
future training links from them as part of the moderators normal quality
control job:
http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-www/2009-06/msg00251.php
There was not a huge discussion like we had here --- everyone on that
thread pretty much agreed, and we acted swiftly and decisively.
(However, it seems inappropriate CertFirst training events might have
crept into the training calendar again so I have to ask www about that
now, http://www.postgresql.org/about/eventarchive).
Anyway, do we have consensus that we should remove links to the EDB
installer because of excessive advertising? If we do remove links to
their installers, EDB could come back with more limited advertising and
try again to get listed, or they might not.
There are other approaches, like negotiating with them on minimum
advertising, but then we have to do that for Command Prompt, TinySofa,
and everyone else, and it would take lots of time, and would be a new
policy.
--
Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us
EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com
+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
On Fri, 2009-07-10 at 08:50 -0400, Bruce Momjian wrote: > Devrim GNDZ wrote: > > I could not understand which problem are you trying to *actually* solve. > > > > EDB is spending bucks for the installers (they have a core member for > > maintaining it, if nothing). I have no problem with downloading an > > installer which is linked from main page, since I know that I can trust > > any link which is in pg.org. > > > > Also, as mentioned before by people in this thread, if we are going to > > remove all external links, then you will only have Solaris binaries, > > very limited number of RPMs and source code, which are hosted at our ftp > > site. So two companies that support PostgreSQL are refusing to supply installation files without this link? An interesting definition of support. Surely we can remove the links and ask for the files also. If everybody plays to the same rules, all is good, no? > Funny thing is those Solaris binaries might soon be produced by Oracle. ;-) What would happen if Sun demanded this boon also, and then the link to a page that contained an advert for pay-for closed source software (I would guess it would be Oracle-compatible software...). Would that be OK? IBM and Microsoft, take note also, if you're listening. -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
Bruce Excellent rationalizing. Only thing I am not sure I agree with is that there is a consensus of opinion on EDB's level of advertising in this case. The only thing I am sure of is that there are at least two points of view on this. You mention a policy on advertising, self-promotion etc. Is it in a document? Where can I get a copy of that? Rob On 10/7/09 11:27 PM, "Bruce Momjian" <bruce@momjian.us> wrote: > > We have to craft some kind of policy for this, and the good news is that > we already have been operating with such a policy for a while, and it is > very simple. If a majority consensus (our normal decision-making model) > don't like the advertising used by a company, we disassociate with that > company by removing links to them. > - - - - > > There are other approaches, like negotiating with them on minimum > advertising, but then we have to do that for Command Prompt, TinySofa, > and everyone else, and it would take lots of time, and would be a new > policy.
Rob Napier wrote: > Bruce > > Excellent rationalizing. Only thing I am not sure I agree with is that there > is a consensus of opinion on EDB's level of advertising in this case. I was not saying there was a "consensus of opinion", only that we normally need that to take action. There is a consensus that no one likes advertising, but when it costs us to remove it, it becomes a more complex issue. > The only thing I am sure of is that there are at least two points of view on > this. > > You mention a policy on advertising, self-promotion etc. Is it in a > document? Where can I get a copy of that? No, there is no policy. We kind of just all agreed in the CertFirst case, and I assume future actions will use a similar procedure. We have dealt with far more complex cases in the past, and everything seems to come out fine. -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
On Fri, 2009-07-10 at 14:31 +0100, Simon Riggs wrote: > So two companies that support PostgreSQL are refusing to supply > installation files without this link? An interesting definition of > support. I could not understand how you got that point from what I wrote. I am not in the point of saying any word in the name of EDB or CMD. > Surely we can remove the links and ask for the files also. If > everybody plays to the same rules, all is good, no? Please stop Simon, please. -- Devrim GÜNDÜZ, RHCE Command Prompt - http://www.CommandPrompt.com devrim~gunduz.org, devrim~PostgreSQL.org, devrim.gunduz~linux.org.tr http://www.gunduz.org
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On Friday 10 July 2009 6:58:15 am Rob Napier wrote: > Bruce > > Excellent rationalizing. Only thing I am not sure I agree with is that > there is a consensus of opinion on EDB's level of advertising in this case. > > The only thing I am sure of is that there are at least two points of view > on this. > > You mention a policy on advertising, self-promotion etc. Is it in a > document? Where can I get a copy of that? > > Rob I am with Rob on this, I don't recall a consensus being reached. I also agree with his other post on the whole business != community bias. Trying to maintain the distinction between businesses and individuals is what created this mess. As far as I can see we are battling the Open Source Community Myth. This is that any given project is run by altruistic code monks who produce reams of code sustained only by home brewed beer and home baked bread, with their only reward being the warm fuzzy feeling that comes from knowing they are doing the 'right' thing. Reality is somewhat different. I dare say that there are few to no major contributors to Postgres who are not financially supported by some company for their work on the project. This is not bad, just a fact of life. To not acknowledge or reward the companies that are supporting the contributors is wrong. If that means creating a policy that is more then some arbitrary consensus then so be it. The bottom line is that EDB is part of the Postgres community and they are helping spread it to previously untapped users. This is good. Singling them out for punishment because they are good at it, is bad. -- Adrian Klaver aklaver@comcast.net
On Fri, 2009-07-10 at 17:07 +0300, Devrim GÜNDÜZ wrote: > On Fri, 2009-07-10 at 14:31 +0100, Simon Riggs wrote: > > > So two companies that support PostgreSQL are refusing to supply > > installation files without this link? An interesting definition of > > support. > > I could not understand how you got that point from what I wrote. I am > not in the point of saying any word in the name of EDB or CMD. Removing links does not imply that the companies concerned will stop providing the files to PostgreSQL does it? > > Surely we can remove the links and ask for the files also. If > > everybody plays to the same rules, all is good, no? > > Please stop Simon, please. Stop what? Stop asking for something that a significant number and a clear majority of people have agreed is desirable? Why would I? I think the companies concerned should consider stopping. -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
Simon Riggs wrote:
>
> On Fri, 2009-07-10 at 17:07 +0300, Devrim G?ND?Z wrote:
> > On Fri, 2009-07-10 at 14:31 +0100, Simon Riggs wrote:
> >
> > > So two companies that support PostgreSQL are refusing to supply
> > > installation files without this link? An interesting definition of
> > > support.
> >
> > I could not understand how you got that point from what I wrote. I am
> > not in the point of saying any word in the name of EDB or CMD.
>
> Removing links does not imply that the companies concerned will stop
> providing the files to PostgreSQL does it?
>
> > > Surely we can remove the links and ask for the files also. If
> > > everybody plays to the same rules, all is good, no?
> >
> > Please stop Simon, please.
>
> Stop what? Stop asking for something that a significant number and a
> clear majority of people have agreed is desirable? Why would I? I think
> the companies concerned should consider stopping.
I think this is an idealism vs. reality issue. I could ask for the
"moon in a box", but I am not going to get it, so there isn't much point
in my asking. I could ask for all companies to contribute to the
community with no advertising, but it isn't going to happen, or it
certainly is going to decrease company contributions.
Simon, what is odd is that you certainly must understand this because
your email signature has advertising:
> Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com
> PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
Mine does too, but less than yours because I don't list specific
offerings. (I am not criticizing your additional email advertising, just
trying to highlight a point.)
I assume you added advertising to your signature because it helps to
justify the many emails you send to community email lists. I am fine
with that, and I assume everyone else is too, but to assume that somehow
this motivation applies to you and not to all other companies is to deny
reality.
Many of us in the community are idealists, but when idealism is not
tempered by reality, it becomes ineffective.
Peter's quote seems apropos here:
> In the meantime, I suggest you follow the revised version of the old saying:
> "If you can't beat them, join them, then beat them." ;-)
That's realism.
--
Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us
EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com
+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +
2009/7/10 Simon Riggs <simon@2ndquadrant.com>: > > Stop what? Stop asking for something that a significant number and a > clear majority of people have agreed is desirable? Why would I? I think > the companies concerned should consider stopping. A clear majority of those that answered +/-1 perhaps. If you look at the people that decided to express themselves more fully, you will see an entirely different picture, though I note that you said from the outset you weren't going to count those that recognised this isn't a black and white issue. Even putting that aside, your question on which people voted was so open-ended that you cannot possibly infer anything useful from it. People were voting on whether they would like to see something change, if a reasonable alternative could be found. Do you have an alternative you believe to be reasonable to all concerned, *and* is feasible? I suspect you will say remove the 'Packaged by' logo from the installers and host them on postgresql.org, but like 2ndQuadrant, EnterpriseDB is not a charity. Asking the management to provide packages that all told, almost certainly cost well in excess of $100K+ per year to maintain in terms of hardware, people and supporting infrastructure without any benefit is simply insane. It's no different from me demanding you spend your time developing code without seeking sponsorship. It's one thing to do so as a hobbyist on your own time, but another thing entirely to do so as part of a successful business model. And for the record, I have no idea if our management share my view above. To me, it just seems like common sense. -- Dave Page EnterpriseDB UK: http://www.enterprisedb.com
2009/7/10 Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us>: > Simon Riggs wrote: >> >> On Fri, 2009-07-10 at 17:07 +0300, Devrim G?ND?Z wrote: >> > On Fri, 2009-07-10 at 14:31 +0100, Simon Riggs wrote: >> > >> > > So two companies that support PostgreSQL are refusing to supply >> > > installation files without this link? An interesting definition of >> > > support. >> > >> > I could not understand how you got that point from what I wrote. I am >> > not in the point of saying any word in the name of EDB or CMD. >> >> Removing links does not imply that the companies concerned will stop >> providing the files to PostgreSQL does it? >> >> > > Surely we can remove the links and ask for the files also. If >> > > everybody plays to the same rules, all is good, no? >> > >> > Please stop Simon, please. >> >> Stop what? Stop asking for something that a significant number and a >> clear majority of people have agreed is desirable? Why would I? I think >> the companies concerned should consider stopping. > > I think this is an idealism vs. reality issue. I could ask for the > "moon in a box", but I am not going to get it, so there isn't much point > in my asking. I could ask for all companies to contribute to the > community with no advertising, but it isn't going to happen, or it > certainly is going to decrease company contributions. I thing, so we should to have own "neutral" win installer. An community installer should by simply and should install just PostgreSQL server, ODBC and .NET driver and maybe pgAdmin. Nothing more. Rich installers, that's need lot of work and support should live in company space. Primary on our pages should be link on our simply installer, but on same page should be links on company installers. So people should select and they reside, what they need. I believe so people from EDB do lot of work, but Simon do it too, and others from non EDB space and if we don't need some collision, then primary space should be neutral. Regards Pavel Stehule > > Simon, what is odd is that you certainly must understand this because > your email signature has advertising: > > > Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com > > PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support > > Mine does too, but less than yours because I don't list specific > offerings. (I am not criticizing your additional email advertising, just > trying to highlight a point.) > > I assume you added advertising to your signature because it helps to > justify the many emails you send to community email lists. I am fine > with that, and I assume everyone else is too, but to assume that somehow > this motivation applies to you and not to all other companies is to deny > reality. > > Many of us in the community are idealists, but when idealism is not > tempered by reality, it becomes ineffective. > > Peter's quote seems apropos here: >> In the meantime, I suggest you follow the revised version of the old saying: >> "If you can't beat them, join them, then beat them." ;-) > > That's realism. > > -- > Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us > EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com > > + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. + > > -- > Sent via pgsql-advocacy mailing list (pgsql-advocacy@postgresql.org) > To make changes to your subscription: > http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-advocacy >
> I thing, so we should to have own "neutral" win installer. An > community installer should by simply and should install just > PostgreSQL server, ODBC and .NET driver and maybe pgAdmin. Nothing > more. Rich installers, that's need lot of work and support should live +1. Next week I'll create a PGFoundry with a project that will (with some work) install PG and PGAdmin. It should be a simple matter to add ODBC and .NET drivers. I already have this installer as I designed it for xTuple last year. -- ----- http://www.globalherald.net/jb01 GlobalHerald.NET, the Smarter Social Network! (tm)
Simon, > Removing links does not imply that the companies concerned will stop > providing the files to PostgreSQL does it? It very well might. In the case of EDB, it probably would. It's certainly what I'd advise them to do. > Stop what? Stop asking for something that a significant number and a > clear majority of people have agreed is desirable? Why would I? I think > the companies concerned should consider stopping. Funny that you should have accused me of forum manipulation in the earlier discussion about surveys. First you structured a poll question so vague as to be meaningless to give it universal appeal (and refused to count anyone who took issue with the terms of the question), then are claiming a majority mandate to require something equally vague. As I said, the *only* thing you've established is that a substantial group of people feel that the current One-Click installer advertising/hosting setup is not completely ideal. Beyond that, you've determined *nothing*. So the next steps, *if* you actually wanted to improve things and not pursue a single-minded vendetta against EDB, would be to work with members of the community *and* EDB marketing staff to determine what specific changes need to be made to make people happier with the marketing side of their community contribution. Several other people have raised several practical ideas around improvements, but I'll note that you've ignored those, as you deliberately ignored my commentary on the importance of One-Click for adoption (which I'll note was *also* widely supported). Overall: your posts on this list for the last few days (frankly, the last few weeks) have taken on the appearance of a vendetta. If that's not what you intended, it's time for some *concrete* suggestions as to what would be improvements *which take into consideration the importance of the One-Click Installer to users*. Otherwise, please stop dragging the advocacy forum through the mud. Just so everyone knows: I am once again getting private e-mails from people who are *unsubscribing* from this mailing list because of this discussion. If it continues in its current tone for another day, I'll request permission to moderate this list again. -- Josh Berkus PostgreSQL Experts Inc. www.pgexperts.com
On Fri, 2009-07-10 at 11:41 -0700, Josh Berkus wrote: > Overall: your posts on this list for the last few days (frankly, the > last few weeks) have taken on the appearance of a vendetta. Almost every single person that voted also voted that they did *not* consider me to be acting vindictively. An objection along those lines was foreseen long in advance and is categorically disproved. Arguing such a thing after clear evidence is misguided, at best. Please re-read the thread to ensure you summarise things correctly. I have objected to a number of situations in recent years and those were not limited in any way to EDB. Previous objections that I have taken part in have resulted in changes to the EDB web site, CMD web site, removal of blog posts and removal of links by training companies. If you look at the archives you'll see I didn't even start the majority of those threads. My points on these issues has however been impartial and consistent, with clearly explained reasons for any objection. I would ask you now why it is that we should act to remove a company's links on the training pages, yet do nothing to remove EDB's links on the installer pages? Why is complaining about a training company acceptable, yet saying anything involving EDB a vendetta? -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
Folks, Not to divert, subvert or otherwise vert, but maybe the time has arrived where squeezing this lemon could be productive. On Sat, Jul 11, 2009 at 11:30 AM, Simon Riggs<simon@2ndquadrant.com> wrote: > > On Fri, 2009-07-10 at 11:41 -0700, Josh Berkus wrote: > >> Overall: your posts on this list for the last few days (frankly, the >> last few weeks) have taken on the appearance of a vendetta. > > I would ask you now why it is that we should act to remove a company's > links on the training pages, yet do nothing to remove EDB's links on the > installer pages? Why is complaining about a training company acceptable, > yet saying anything involving EDB a vendetta? > 1) I'll make a monetary contribution to the general coffers. 2) Find a wikigeek 3) Rearrange, make cool the home page of the wiki: http://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/Main_Page so that it is a more effective 'start page', as with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page 4) Make sure there are direct listings for categories such as Commercial/Businesses/Developers. 5) Make a few Info boxes and Templates that can be easily adapted or included. Now, it is a pain & requires more effort than necessary to create new wiki pages that are not butt-ugly. This will level the playing field for small vs 'big', which I believe will help promote the cause. Like it or not, marketing needs to be part of the mix - but - it could be done off the main site while giving significant exposure to the project & those entrepreneurial vendors that are willing to assume the risks of building a business around PostgreSQL. Make the wiki more accessible and easier to use - and over time (not immediately), the general discussion about "fair vs unfair" will become moot. My $.02, with an additional $499.98 available. Mike Ellsworth
On Sat, 2009-07-11 at 16:30 +0100, Simon Riggs wrote: > On Fri, 2009-07-10 at 11:41 -0700, Josh Berkus wrote: > I would ask you now why it is that we should act to remove a company's > links on the training pages, yet do nothing to remove EDB's links on the > installer pages? Why is complaining about a training company acceptable, > yet saying anything involving EDB a vendetta? Guys can we take this off list please? This is not productive. Joshua D. Drake -- PostgreSQL - XMPP: jdrake@jabber.postgresql.org Consulting, Development, Support, Training 503-667-4564 - http://www.commandprompt.com/ The PostgreSQL Company, serving since 1997
On 7/11/09 8:30 AM, Simon Riggs wrote: > I would ask you now why it is that we should act to remove a company's > links on the training pages, yet do nothing to remove EDB's links on the > installer pages? If CertFirst comes back to us with "clean" training announcements, we may accept them again (discussion currently on WWW). Further, several of us have talked to CertFirst more than once; the issues with their announcements currently aren't the first time. Further, I would argue that the CertFirst training announcements supply very little, if anything, of value to the community (there are plenty of other trainers, and CertFirst's training is reportedly the lowest quality) where the One-Click Installer is of tremendously high value to the community. CMD's advertising on the archives is of a similar nature; it might be excessive, but the number of servers CMD hosts is clearly of large value to the community. For that matter, *I* do a lot of speaking at conferences on behalf of the PostgreSQL community where I plug PostgreSQL Experts (or in the past Sun), because PGX pays my travel expenses. Where's the line on this? How much is too much? Rob Napier is correct in pointing out that we don't have clear standards for this. They'd be very hard to write due to the need to balance value provided because of the above. -- Josh Berkus PostgreSQL Experts Inc. www.pgexperts.com
On Sat, 2009-07-11 at 11:20 -0700, Josh Berkus wrote: > Rob Napier is correct in pointing out that we don't have clear standards > for this. They'd be very hard to write due to the need to balance value > provided because of the above. Again, why is it very hard to write standards that concern installers, yet 2 weeks ago you yourself proposed (on the www list) that we write a new policy for training companies? Both Dave and yourself are clearly arguing there for policies and controls. Let's have a policy (or group or other mechanism) that includes *everybody* and lets's ensure that people closely associated with the companies involved are not the ones making the decisions that their companies benefit from. (Would you expect CertFirst to be the moderator of the new training policy?) Perhaps there *is* a need to "balance value", perhaps not. If there is, it cannot be left up to the people providing things to decide the value of them. We cannot ignore the significant majority of people that have voted that they want to see an alternative to the current links. There are many people watching and waiting for some action, not reasons why nothing can be done. (I personally would not stand for election to any policy group.) -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
So literally... we're going to have another annoying thread... with interesting (and important) stuff... But i guess there should be a list -policy or so... so all stuff related... is redirected there... would make it easier for people interested (or not) read (or not) what's of their interest. Simon Riggs escribió: > On Sat, 2009-07-11 at 11:20 -0700, Josh Berkus wrote: > >> Rob Napier is correct in pointing out that we don't have clear standards >> for this. They'd be very hard to write due to the need to balance value >> provided because of the above. > > Again, why is it very hard to write standards that concern installers, > yet 2 weeks ago you yourself proposed (on the www list) that we write a > new policy for training companies? Both Dave and yourself are clearly > arguing there for policies and controls. > > Let's have a policy (or group or other mechanism) that includes > *everybody* and lets's ensure that people closely associated with the > companies involved are not the ones making the decisions that their > companies benefit from. (Would you expect CertFirst to be the moderator > of the new training policy?) > > Perhaps there *is* a need to "balance value", perhaps not. If there is, > it cannot be left up to the people providing things to decide the value > of them. > > We cannot ignore the significant majority of people that have voted that > they want to see an alternative to the current links. There are many > people watching and waiting for some action, not reasons why nothing can > be done. > > (I personally would not stand for election to any policy group.) >
On Sat, 2009-07-11 at 11:20 -0700, Josh Berkus wrote: > On 7/11/09 8:30 AM, Simon Riggs wrote: > > I would ask you now why it is that we should act to remove a company's > > links on the training pages, yet do nothing to remove EDB's links on the > > installer pages? > > If CertFirst comes back to us with "clean" training announcements, we > may accept them again (discussion currently on WWW). Further, several > of us have talked to CertFirst more than once; the issues with their > announcements currently aren't the first time. ENOUGH! I have had it with this ridiculous round about. The EDB links on installer pages have been vetted through the web team. Dave made specific efforts to ensure that they were reasonable. I for one do not have a problem with the EDB links and frankly my company is the *one* company which could have the most problem with them and have a reason to whine. (no disrespect to any other Postgres company, just being realistic) *IF* the community builds a team to build a better installer than the EDB one, we will change the links. Until then, deal. So, ENOUGH. Policies are great and we have them where they are *required*, the rest is vetted on a case by case basis due to the meritocracy. Let's leave it at that and stop looking like a bunch of in-fighting teenage girls in the gossip hall. Joshua D. Drake -- PostgreSQL - XMPP: jdrake@jabber.postgresql.org Consulting, Development, Support, Training 503-667-4564 - http://www.commandprompt.com/ The PostgreSQL Company, serving since 1997
On Mon, 2009-07-13 at 09:50 -0700, Joshua D. Drake wrote: > I for one do not have a problem with the EDB links Your vote is noted, thank you. -- Simon Riggs www.2ndQuadrant.com PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support
Hi, Ok, I think the original question was that does EDB get too much visibility versus other contributors, because they happento work on the installer and their logo is seen there. Is that too much compared to people/companies that work on somethingelse that is not so visible. For example parallel restore. Now, in my opinion the approach has been that should EDB visibility be reduced so that it is on the same level that othersare. But, as I see it, there are two separate issues. One is, that is EDB visibility fair compared to others, and theother point is that how much that visibility should be. Sofar, it seems that people have the idea that commercial support is bad and that we should limit the visibility of companieson PostgreSQL website or sites related to it. In my opinion there is also another possibility, to increase the visibilityof others. Isn't it good for the community, if there are many companies working on PostgreSQL? If that is good,then why don't we show that? And if we get more companies involved by showing that they have done something for theproject, isn't that a good thing? Now, the installer is visible. What if we would give there credit to more companies that have helped the project, ratherthan removing any? And, yes, if the commercial alternative costs x k€, I think you can look 10 secs of adds when installingan open source one. Rgs, Jussi ----- Alkuperäinen viesti ----- Lähettäjä: "Bruce Momjian" <bruce@momjian.us> Vastaanottaja: "Dimitri Fontaine" <dfontaine@hi-media.com> Kopio: "Simon Riggs" <simon@2ndquadrant.com>, "pgsql-advocacy" <pgsql-advocacy@postgresql.org> Lähetetty: 9. heinäkuuta 2009 00:20:43 GMT +02:00 Athens, Beirut, Bucharest, Istanbul Aihe: Re: [pgsql-advocacy] Vote on Windows installer links Dimitri Fontaine wrote: > Le 8 juil. 09 ? 19:34, Simon Riggs a ?crit : > > "There is only one currently known Windows installer for PostgreSQL > > 8.4, > > and that can only be obtained by visiting an external commercial > > company's website: http://www.enterprisedb.com/products/pgdownload.do > > Do you think this situation should be changed, if a reasonable > > alternative can be found? +1 means change, -1 means no change." > > +1, BUT > > It's hard to find a reasonable alternative it seems. I'd like the > windows installer to be hosted on our website and mirrors, but we > certainly can't do this with each and every binary distribution of > PostgreSQL, which is the job of packagers. > > It seems we have the necessary infrastructure to host the installer. > The problem with generalizing to every binary package or installers > out there is to offer a simple way to update the stuff, or to have > community members (or scripts) to go check for new material at each > minor or major release and update accordingly. > Linking to OpenSource packaging efforts should remain accepted for > sake of simplicity, as long as the offering site isn't a commercial > one. Now packages.ubuntu.com isn't the canonical website, should it be > in the commercial or Open Source category? [ license issues removed] > Well I guess the pragmatic answer is: EnterpriseDB is maintaining > pginstaller, which happens to be the only installer for windows. It's > open source. If you want a project hosted installer, have a project > community member fork it and maintain it and distribute it under the > project's name and infrastructure. Good luck with that. Yep, that's pretty much it. Ideally we would have binary installers created with zero effort by the community, but that isn't realistic. We originally had a Windows installer, but that was a pain to create, (I remember the complaints from Dave and Magnus), and it never supported Linux or OS/X. I think the big question is whether reducing EDB's association with the community is worth losing the one-click installers for Windows, Linux, and OS/X. Someone might come along and create those without wanting some kind of association with the community, but as Dimitri said, "Good luck with that." Removing the EDB download links would also involve removing content from all other externally linked distributions if they don't want to give them to the community for hosting. You might as well say we want MySQL to again be easier to quickly install than PostgreSQL. From an organizational perspective, trying to keep companies from being too associated with Postgres is a defensive move to reduce the threat that the company's influence might become uncontrollable in the future. I don't think that is possible as long as our community is healthy. I actually thought we had a good system where we were using the strengths of companies to move our community forward. If specific things are causing confusion, like the installer banner, we can adjust those, and Dave and my son Matthew have already done that (posted as a separate thread). -- Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> http://momjian.us EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com + If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. + -- Sent via pgsql-advocacy mailing list (pgsql-advocacy@postgresql.org) To make changes to your subscription: http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-advocacy