[Zope3-Users] Re: Attn Jim Fulton: Buildout builder

[Malthe Borch]

Derek Richardson wrote:
> A third category of user (in addition to buildout-mavens and 
> installer-people), perhaps specific to Plone, are systems integrators. 
> These folks may have considerable knowledge of Plone and technical 
> skills in some areas, but may not be buildout-mavens or even know (or 
> want to know) Python. They may be text-averse, not wanting to manipulate 
> a buildout.cfg. They may not want to root through the Python code of 
> less-documented recipes to figure out configuration options. They may 
> simply want a less-steep learning curve. They may have complex needs 
> that they understand from a system-administration viewpoint, but may not 
> want to learn Plone behind-the-scenes, which includes buildout. I am not 
> defending these people's choices to not learn buildout (or Python). The 
> simple fact is that these people exist in sizable numbers in the Plone 
> community and their needs are important. We heard from them loudly after 
> the 3.0 release and at the PSPS. We need to address their concerns.

That was a lot of may's.

> That is the value in general. I, personally, have a more specific itch 
> to scratch. I'm interested in what I call Plone-on-Demand, the ability 
> to host Plone sites as a service. I want people who don't know Python or 
> Zope or Plone, who simply want a website, to be able to go to a web 
> page, fill in some options about what they would like in their website 
> (skin, functionality, etc), and, 20 minutes later, get an email saying 
> 'Here's the url of your new website - enjoy!'. This competes with 
> similar services built on PHP at providers like godaddy. I want this for 
> my university, which has a need for a web hosting solution and I think 
> Python/Zope/Plone is appropriate. The buildout builder is a step in this 
> direction. If I write the infrastructure for Plone-on-Demand, I intend 
> to open-source it. It could be used by other service providers who 
> currently shy away from Zope and Plone. It can also be used to provide 
> demo sites for evaluation, perhaps deployed on a public grid.

You're not alone here; there are a lot of people in the community that 
are trying to provide Plone on-demand much like you describe (and maybe 
profit!), but so far I haven't seen any services being launched.

The technical aspect can be overcome. I think the primary difficulty is 
upgrades, extensions and migrations. Some are trying to tackle this by 
supporting a software bundle and taking the steps to properly maintain 
this bundle.

\malthe