[Encore] Encore version 5 release ?

[Daniel K. Schneider]

Kevin Jepson wrote:
> Hi Guys
>  
> Nice to see some emails on this list, it was getting lonely :-)
>  
> WRT hosting issues I do not think that is the problem for people with 
> *existing* installations.
>  
> Hosting isn't a problem really because a system that can host enCore 3 
> or 4 can also host V5.  External hosting using a commercial server 
> provider, however, is an issue but only because we use multiple ports.
>  
> If anything is slowing the adoption of V5 amongst existing enCore 
> worlds I think it is that the code changes needed to  migrate an 
> enCore 3 or 4 MOO, with any amount of object/code customization, are 
> just too labour intensive.
>
Hmm how about releasing a new V5 beta without an upgrade path from V4? I 
believe that there are people out there who don't mind starting
a new server, e.g. just to get some online class going.
I once migrated about 70% of XPress to our MOO 
(http://tecfamoo.unige.ch:7000) and that was quite difficult (we have 
quite a different
core). No way I will do it again. On the other hand I can't put newbies 
on our old MOO, since learning command line is not something
you can achieve with modern users, so yes I would need a new V5 despite 
the fact I already got another MOO. Ideally with
an upgrade path from V5 beta, since I have one of these running
 
> Just for fun I started to look at what would be needed to resurrect my 
> v4 MOO as a V5 one and the amount of coding changes was huge.
>  
> Admittedly my MOO was heavily customized with many homebrew objects 
> and systems but that would be the case in any MOO with a reasonably 
> long history of development.
>  
> How many full blown conversions have been done?
>  
> Are there any V5 MOOs out there open for business, so to speak?
Well I have one running for a desperate french foreign language teacher 
who used to be on some V4 (maybe
Lingua). She uses it for real during a few weeks / once / year. Other 
than that I don't know of any,
http://tecfax.unige.ch:7000/

But I feel that one might want to attract NEW people to MOO. Most MOO 
wizards from old times now have other
jobs like designing databases or doing XSLT. BUT, foreign language 
teachers, for example, still may
be attracted by a user-definable interactive story and dialog space and 
some of these may find the local
resources to install a MOO. It's not that difficult. It's got more to do 
with being able to deal with administration.

I mean there are fairly recent publications about mooing and some people 
*are* curious about this tech.
E.g. http://www.koenraad.info/MOO/MOOlit (about mooing in foreign 
language teaching)
or Dede's articles on design-based research, e.g. 
http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1149144
>  
> Is anybody collecting the stats on what kinds of issues people are 
> having and how they are being solved?
Pff I forgot what little I did on the V5. If I remember correctly, I had 
to put guest somewhere in a closet and make them
disconnect. Also the who menu had a bug. Then, some properties were missing.
Really, it would be nice to have a bug management tool like on source forge.
>  
> I would be happy put a link to that info at the Barn for people to 
> read while they evaluate making such a big change.
>  
>  
> Oh and Daniel
>  
> I second Barbara's comment re programming.
>  
> It get's better the more we do it, age doesn't matter.
The trouble with MOO coding is that it needs time *and* memory. I did 
learn a bit of Moo coding once (even wrote a little tutorial):
http://tecfa.unige.ch//moo/book2/tm2.html
BUT, I really have trouble finding things and then remember what does 
what in the object hierarchy. Then there are the permission
issues. What I referred to regarding my "age" is that:
- I don't have enough time to learn MOO programming for real (i.e. to 
work on the core of a distribution).
- There is an issue with documentation. Some very important stuff (e.g. 
the login sequence) is just not documented. Young people
may remember things, but after a few month of not looking at Moo code 
can't remember anything .... Have to use grep and open 10 different 
emacs windows in parallel just to figure out where something is done 
before I even can start thinking about fixing or creating something.

Given basically time constraints I can't help for real. However I can 
provide feedback for bugs and even suggest fixes
in some cases. I also can do a little work on documentation. But to do 
this there should be a place to report bugs.

For documentation there is my wiki (you can use too if you like - just 
vaguely stick to editing rules).
http://edutechwiki.unige.ch/en/

- Daniel

-- 
Dr Daniel K.Schneider, TECFA (Educational Technologies and Learning)

TECFA    (TEchnologies de Formation et Apprentissage)
FPSE     (Faculté de Psychologie et des Sciences de l'Education)
Université de Genève
54 Route des Acacias, CH-1227 Carouge

email: Daniel.Schneider at tecfa.unige.ch
www:   http://tecfa.unige.ch/tecfa-people/schneider.html

Tel: 41 22 379 9377 - Fax: 41 22 379 9379