Upcoming changes

[andydreisch]

Folks, this announcement will be updated from time to time. Over the next month or so we'll be updating our infrastructure. A consequence of this is to move project downloads directly to SugarForge. This will leave the "Downloads" forums for smaller items, like bug fixes, etc.

We'll also planning to establish a separate forum for each project in SugarForge (actually a sub-forum under a new forum called "SugarForge Projects") and to link the sub-forum to the SugarForge project space, and vice versa.

The overall idea is to tie the two properties together (SF.org projects and forums threads regarding those projects) and to allow our download accelerators (Akamai, etc.) to handle downloads more efficiently.

Thoughts on this?

Andy

[longreach]

There may be some aspect of a perceived tighter control by SugarCRM of the whole process.

At the moment anyone can put up a post in Downloads and it can become popular or ignored.

But not anyone can put up a SugarForge project - one has to ask permission, and it has to be done for you - and permission may be denied.

No question it would likely be preferable to have individual forums under each project, for coherence of the subject material. But scanning downloads can be a nice way to discover something new that someone is doing. And I like the totally democratic feel of the current download forum, and suspect that the proposed new system may not enjoy that same feel.

[andydreisch]

Hi longreach, we've considered these points. Yes, a project must be approved but I can't think of a project we've rejected!!

We don't want to prevent the utility of the DL mechanism, that's for sure. Maybe we can create an auto-approve project?

Let me take this input and bounce it around a little.

Our overall goal is to better enable the DL mechanisms available through SugarForge (with the associated infrastructure tuned to this process) ... and to have the forums be forums.

No matter what happens, you'll be sure to know in advance.

Anyway, thanks for the feedback.

Andy

[longreach]

Actually - my concern likely stems from the fact that we did have a project rejected initially once - then accepted later on once we discussed some things with Julian. And it was a little frustrating at the time - we were trying to publish the Company Directory. Just some miscommunication - but a control point all the same. The anarchist in me has an issue with that I appreciate that it is not good for anyone to have a SugarForge full of empty projects with silly names - but we have not seen this sort of thing happen in the downloads forum - other than the odd person selling cell phones now and then . So maybe self-approved projects might be OK?

[andydreisch]

OK. Good stuff. Thanks.

And those cell phone pushers really should get a life!!

Andy