I wish to thank Chris for his helpful comments. I accept them in the playful spirit in which they were offered. This sort of feedback is essential to people who are learning. LESSON #1: If it looks as if a product is no longer maintained then ask the maintainer of the product if he has any uncommitted changes in his version control system. LESSON #2: If you want to produce a new product/component, learn Zope 3 and use that for the new work, unless Zope 2 compatibility is for some reason required. LESSON #3: "A Zope 2 product should have no reliance on external methods..." LESSON #4: If a competent programmer provides Zope bindings then make a reasonable effort to get them to work instead of giving up and using external methods. LESSON #5: """My recommendation would be to buy Philipp's Zope 3 book and read it from cover to cover before you start work...""" LESSON #6: """If you ever ever ever use eval, then you definitely are nuts ;-)"""