Is Vanilla Dead?

steelejones

The community seems to be leaving and shrinking? Is the development of Vanilla coming to a sad close?

Minisweeper

I wouldnt say the community was shrinking - we're still getting plenty of new applicants. Things are maybe a little quieter around here right now but in my experience it ebbs and flows - sometimes i come on an evening and there are 15 unread discussions, sometimes 2. Regardless of the community the development is most certainly not coming to a close as Vanilla 2 is just around the corner..

SubJunk

I think it's normal for the community to become a little less active when it is expecting a new release. People are probably just waiting to use Vanilla 2
Personally I'm still working on Vanilla 1 in my spare time, so I for one don't think it's dead.

sjeeps

I agree with the guys, things maybe a little less active around here and I can't wait to start theming Vanilla 2.

TomTester

Do you think it's the recession kicking in? People stopped wasting time on forums, and got on with their work instead?!? ;-) All kidding aside, I also noticed things had slowed down a bit (there was a time that posting one question would get you 20 results overnight and people were more eager to help each other). I turned into a lurker myself... (there isn't enough time in the day) but I'm back for a bit and very happy with what I see (especially Spode's/Subjunks work to be exact, which fit my needs). I definitely see issues with add-ons that broke with the release of a new vanilla-version, which are then 'version-corrected' in follow-up comments, but somehow never updated properly. Not sure how this would work legally, but I'd propose some kind of adjustment of the terms of use/submission, where prolonged absence or non-reaction to add-on related questions is considered a form of 'child abandonment' and would implicitly allow others to use the code from the original author, make it common/open source (i.e. multi-author, shared ownership stuff), correct it, and upload a newer version.

SubJunk

I think all extensions can be worked on by everyone anyway. Well that's what I did with Notifi, I just took Notify and kept developing it. This is open source software so I don't see why the extensions shouldn't be open source as well. If you wanna pick up an inactive extension and make it better go ahead, I don't see who would complain about it

teecee

I hope not. Despite it being a little challenging to get the extensions working sometimes, Vanilla is the best forum software available by a long way.

TomTester

@Sub: I totally agree, but there is no (required) checkbox that says "by uploading your extension to the add-on pages, you're implicitly agreeing to 'open-source' your code" to give this some legal basis. That's all I suggest really. It would prevent a lot of the "can someone update the add-on please" questions all over this forum.

SubJunk

True that's a good idea. Maybe dino or Mark can add that or even just a disclaimer, would only take a sec. I have access to the Vanilla code to change it but not this website's code, so I can't edit it myself.

jan-willem

are there any significant changes in vanilla 2 and now the community aint shrinking (i am new here (already luv it)) busy with implementign vanilla 1.1.5a in elgg 1.2

SubJunk

Vanilla 2 is completely different, there is no shared code. So not only are there significant changes, it is 100% significant changes

Dinoboff

Vanilla 1 is 3 years old, it is normal the community has lost some enthusiasm about it. It will all come back with the release of Garden and of a new design for Vanilla 2. @Subjunk: Lussumo is mark's. I am just taking care of releasing new versions of Vanilla 1.x (and it is because the build process I put in place doesn't seem to please the other developers lol). The last release was mostly wallphone work plus squirrel security fix that I helped to implement; the next one will be mostly Reed Loden's and yours.

TomTester

Just out of curiosity, does the "no shared code" also mean everything has changed and thus all old add-ons and themes become useless? (scary thought, IMHO)

kherge

I would think that addons and themes would break. It's not necessarily a bad thing. Especially if the new version of Vanilla is so feature rich that any current add-on or theme could become useless anyway. Wishful thinking, I know, since it isn't out yet. In any case, I'm new to Vanilla and the Garden framework but I'm lurking.

R8rPhan

When is vanilla 2 expected to be released?

sirlancelot

No release date for Garden or Vanilla yet. Keep up-to-date on Mark's Blog

SubJunk

Open beta within the month is the plan

R8rPhan

Will we be able to use the existing vanilla database on our servers? If not, and we run the beta, will anything stored on the new DB still work with updates and final versions of V2? I'm thinking that I'd like to go ahead and build the beta into my website, and just replace it with the actual version when it's released.. but of course this would require that the same DB could be used...

Dinoboff

Mark at http://twitter.com/navvywavvyFirst Vanilla 1 to Vanilla 2 import completed successfully. Bring on the CSS!