[Zope] Allaire Spectra

[chas]

>That said, are there other particular lessons that you think we
>should learn from CF/Spectra? 

Let me go off on a tangent for a moment :

I got up to speed on CF instantaneously because I knew what it was
supposed to do (and what I intended to do) before installing the 
software. 

So, perhaps that's part of the reason people have so much trouble.
Zope is a new 'product category' for many.  Here's part of an email 
somebody sent me privately after I mentioned zope on another 
mailing list  :

[snip]
>Can you explain to me what Zope does for you and what the advantage to using
>it is? I just don't get it. I've read all of the docs, the web site,
installed
>it and poked at the admin interface, but I just don't understand why it's
>better to use zope than to just use apache and a few hand-hacked HTML files.
>Perhaps my difficulty arises from the fact that I don't have any particular
>problem to solve with zope. I'm just wondering that it is good for.
[/snip]

I have 6 other emails like this - people wondering why they just don't
get it, whether it's worth sticking it out or whom have just given up,
and feel pathetic about it. And I did exactly the same 6 months ago. 

And therein lies a problem. When I installed CF I knew I wanted to query
and update relational databases. And I now know exactly what I want to do 
with Zope.... BUT most people don't.

How to solve this ? Well, this reminded me a lot of the first time 
I got on Domino/Notes... I was like "What a waste of space. What's 
the point ? I just don't get it". It was only upon seeing professional 
apps built by people who truly knew what they were doing that I finally
went 'aaaah' and it sunk in. But that took months. (I still maintain
it's a waste of space though <g>)

OK, so we've got the products that people are uploading and Kevin's
KmNews has been a lifesaver. But that still doesn't make a complete 
application - a complete application for all of us must be a finished
website. And so I guess we're just paying the price for being the 
trailblazers. Maybe a year from now, with decent docs and lots of 
different apps to check out, the learning curve will be greatly reduced.

Also judge your target audience (or at least their expectations). Going 
back to the Notes/Domino analogy : in a Notes environment, you have the 
application designers and the system administrators and the end users.. 
and each has it's own software (the Notes Designer, Notes Administrator
and the standard Notes client respectively).  At the moment we seem to be
throwing everybody into the same funnel which is causing some grief...
splitting the lists may well help in that respect.  
This is one place where you can see Allaire were really good - they 
understood their target audience and wrote documentation accordingly : 
assuming no knowledge, step-by-step, foolproof. 

By comparison, have you noticed the number of people who post to this 
list saying "I'm sorry, I feel incredibly stupid, I just don't get it". 
Very rarely are these unintelligent people...  zope really has an amazing 
way of making intelligent people feel dim. (whereas CF could be said to
cause the reverse <g>).  This is a real shame. 
Most common reason is that the docs don't contain EVERYTHING. We'll be 
trying to solve a problem and can't find a solution. We post a question 
to the list. Somebody tells us the solution. But the solution can't be 
found in the docs anywhere. 
It's trying to do a jigsaw puzzle but failing, throwing your hands in 
the air and saying "i give in, i can't do it" then your friend pulls a 
missing piece out of his pocket and saying "is this what you're looking for ?"

Unfortunately, I can't put my finger on the exact solutions to these
symptoms -

work to do,

chas