[Zope] Allaire Spectra

[Jay, Dylan]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Brian Lloyd [mailto:Brian@digicool.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, September 29, 1999 00:03
> To: 'chas'; Zope Mailing List (E-mail); 'Jay, Dylan'
> Subject: RE: [Zope] Allaire Spectra
> 

> I think that this is an important thread - while we do not
> necessarily want to compete with every other product in the
> marketplace on a feature-by-feature basis, it _is_ important 
> to keep an eye on the competition and to learn from both their
> successes and failures.
> 
> Zopistas with significant experience using other systems are 
> invaluable in this process - you have enough of a foot in both
> worlds to give informed feedback as to what we can learn from
> the other guys out there.
> 
> The main general points I see above:
> 
>   o short learning curve, quick tutorials and productivity
> 
>   o very good docs/organization/presentation
> 
> ...are things that (believe me) we have been hearing loud and
> clear for a while now. We (and the Zopista community) have been
> focusing a lot of effort on HowTos, better documentation and 
> improving zope.org as a learning resource to make progress on 
> these concerns. That doesn't mean that the problem is solved,
> of course, but the community as a whole is certainly aware of
> it and taking action.
> 
> That said, are there other particular lessons that you think we
> should learn from CF/Spectra? 

I think one big thing you missed was marketing. Have a look at the spectra
web-site. It says in very clear terms what it will give you from a buisiness
point of view. Zope may have some description of its technical archetecture
(which is great for those that want to cut through the BS) but this makes it
a lot harder to gleam the the direct benifits of using Zope are. Things like
collaborative editing, robustness from intergrated transactions etc. 

I'm going to give a seminar on Zope to the lucent web community (not a small
thing) in a month and this what I'm going to have to do. I realized that
rattling of what it is is only half effective, I have to say what it can do
for people and then say how.

Also, I think a good analysis of the buisness case for using Zope, esp
comparing it to what the spectre rhetoric says, will hopefully make clear
where Zope is falling down. For all the patting on the back everyone does
Zope still has problems. It has fantastic promise and in most areas does a
great job, but I think it has a long way to go before it can be said to be
way ahead of the competition. Anyway, my point is that we should examine
Zope from the point of view of what it offers to non technical people who
can't afford to experiment.

At the moment my particular headache is ZClasses. Great idea just to
complicated and hard to get working.