Richard Jones' Log: New Roundup release delayed, but now back on track

Wed, 22 Feb 2006

There's some bug fixes and feature requests I'd like to get out soon but I've been distracted by getting the python-dev project tracker imported on one of the python.org machines. They're not so powerful, and over the weekend (and to a lesser extent yesterday) www.python.org was being hammered by nasty search engines*. I finally got it imported yesterday (the import took about 24 hours -- it takes about 20 minutes on my desktop), and it's mostly ok (I stuffed up and didn't notice that the sf.net XML export has issue messages in reverse chronological order, also I accidentally nuked the full-text index).

This morning I see a message in my inbox that pretty much kills Roundup-for-python-dev as an idea though. I don't think I can say much more, but I'm competing against a company, with extended resources in hosting, so my volunteer efforts seem pretty feeble really. If this other thing comes through, it'll be good for Python, but I think I'm justified in feeling a little bummed by it :)

Well, the sf.net import stuff was kinda interesting. I like working with ElementTree. And, you know, it was a problem to solve and I like that.

*: no, really, the engine creators actually have the gall to require us to put a special "Crawl-Delay" line in our robots.txt file so they won't just hammer us with a bazillion requests per second. Don't bother looking it up - "Crawl-Delay" is not a part of the robots.txt spec, and may in fact break the robots.txt file for other robots.

Comment by Mark Rees on Thu, 23 Feb 2006

Even if Roundup is not used by the python-dev, there are plenty of individuals and companies that know what a great application it is, and appreciate all your efforts. I am using 3 three roundup trackers at work myself.

Just hope if they pick another tracker, it's at least written in python. I had heard a rumour that some one was pushing a java based one.

Comment by Richard Jones on Thu, 23 Feb 2006

Thanks Mark. I make solid use of it myself, and this is my third employer who's using it. I just wish I could sort out some (low cost ;) hosting for the Roundup project so I could move it off of sf.net too.

Comment by Mark Rees on Thu, 23 Feb 2006

The guys at python-hosting.com (http://www.python-hosting.com/freetrac) will host open source python projects for free. You get a Trac and Subversion instance as part of the deal. That's where I host my isapi-wsgi stuff. Also reminds me that I need finish testing my wsgi wrapper for roundup and get it to you.

Comment by Richard Jones on Thu, 23 Feb 2006

Yeah, I have a small project hosted with them (Bruce, the Presentation Tool), but Trac... well, best I say nothing here :) Suffice to say I'd rather use Roundup :)

Comment by Fredrik on Tue, 28 Feb 2006

"If this other thing comes through, it'll be good for Python"

Well, I think it'll hurt Python. The PSF should support Python projects, and python.org should be a showcase for what you can do with Python, not a marketing channel for some random company. The more "best of breed" python tools we can use on python.org, the better. Roundup definitely qualifies.

Comment by Richard Jones on Tue, 28 Feb 2006

Sadly it doesn't come down to the tools, it comes down to the hosting. The proposed feature set that they are offering is the bare minimum I was offering from the Roundup side.

What they are offering that I can't dream of is hosting.

Comment by Fredrik on Tue, 28 Feb 2006

Why would the current XS4ALL hosting be a problem? From what I can tell, they're not offering any admin resources, and I'm sure the PSF can afford another machine, if CPU power is the problem...

Comment by Fredrik on Tue, 28 Feb 2006

(where "they" refers to the people behind the potential roundup killer, not XS4ALL)

Comment by David M. Besonen on Wed, 05 Apr 2006

On 2006/02/28 17:58:30.794 GMT+1100 Richard Jones wrote:

> Sadly it doesn't come down to the
> tools, it comes down to the hosting.
> The proposed feature set that they are
> offering is the bare minimum I was
> offering from the Roundup side.
>
> What they are offering that I can't
> dream of is hosting.

wish i had seen this thread earlier.

is this already a done deal?

i can think of two hosts that may be willing to offer hosting.


ciao,
david