4 ms·

Anyone else feel like the fact XMPP needs this kind of signals that it's pretty... shit? (Excuse my language).

MattJ100 5y ago
Do you have constructive suggestions on introducing cohesive design into open ecosystems without a guiding documentation project? (disclaimer: I started this one)
- 0xdeadb00f 5y ago
  Firstly, to answer your question: No. There are other ecosystems that are going "fine" that have centralised, official documentation and don't require a third party to intervene and collate documentation and recommendations in an attempt to make it easier for developers. The fact this is necessary, or people feel is necessary, makes me want to avoid XMPP at all costs. That's just my very shallow surface level opinion. With all that said, i have to say; what you're doing here is commendable. I don't mean to (pardon my language) shit on something you seem to have worked very hard on. Doing something like this isn't an easy task I'm sure.
  - franga2000 5y ago
    This kind of thing is pretty common with complex systems that have a very long legacy. There's a huge amount of features, many of which are very niche and most people don't even need to know about them. Official docs tend to be unopinionated and cover everything, while third parties create "guides" and similar docs for the features that matter to them. You see something similar with end-user software like Adobe's entire suite where the official docs are basically useless if you just want to learn the common operations quickly and so you have to rely on third-party books and tutorials (like the Dummies books).
  - southerntofu 5y ago
    XMPP has a long history... Two decades of accumulated specifications can make it a bit overwhelming to find what you're looking for. It's important to have external individuals/collectives gathering the pieces they find important and remarks to achieve what they consider a good implementation. It's just like when you do web stuff you may read from MDN, csstricks or smashing magazine. It doesn't mean that the W3C/IETF specs are useless, far from it. But in my view it's useful to find guidance in a nebula of specifications and endless UX possibilities.
cat199 5y ago
if so then same is true for say, TCP/IP, HTTP and HTML
- 0xdeadb00f 5y ago
  Fair point. I think I've maybe changed my tune on this a little bit since writing that comment.
icedchai 5y ago
XMPP is basically an abomination of a protocol. It's too complicated. Other people can explain it better than I: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2069810 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2069810
- pmlnr 5y ago
  Seriously? Go check out Matrix or ActivityStreams, XMPP is actually much simpler.
  - icedchai 5y ago
    The core of XMPP may be simple, but when you add in various XEPs, the complexity builds really fast. Just look at all this stuff: https://xmpp.org/extensions/ https://xmpp.org/extensions/
    - mst 5y ago
      One of the key points of the article we're discussing is to recommend a small curated set of XEPs. Just look at this relative lack of stuff: https://docs.modernxmpp.org/client/protocol/ https://docs.modernxmpp.org/client/protocol/
    - MattJ100 5y ago
      That's a growing list of documents over the course of XMPP. It doesn't really prove anything other than... XMPP has been around a long time, and people continue to develop it. People saying "look at all this stuff" is one reason the Modern XMPP project was born. To draw attention to the actually important things that developers need to read. The XSF receives a lot of submissions each year. Many of these proposals never make it past the "experimental" stage. Others are only applicable in certain domains (IoT, etc.). Over time some of these become widely adopted and progress through the standards process. Some do not. The XSF publishes annually the "compliance suite" which describes what clients and servers should be supporting in different areas: https://xmpp.org/about/compliance-suites.html https://xmpp.org/about/compliance-suites.html
    - southerntofu 5y ago

Do you have constructive suggestions on introducing cohesive design into open ecosystems without a guiding documentation project? (disclaimer: I started this one)

0xdeadb00f 5y ago
Firstly, to answer your question: No. There are other ecosystems that are going "fine" that have centralised, official documentation and don't require a third party to intervene and collate documentation and recommendations in an attempt to make it easier for developers. The fact this is necessary, or people feel is necessary, makes me want to avoid XMPP at all costs. That's just my very shallow surface level opinion. With all that said, i have to say; what you're doing here is commendable. I don't mean to (pardon my language) shit on something you seem to have worked very hard on. Doing something like this isn't an easy task I'm sure.
- franga2000 5y ago
  This kind of thing is pretty common with complex systems that have a very long legacy. There's a huge amount of features, many of which are very niche and most people don't even need to know about them. Official docs tend to be unopinionated and cover everything, while third parties create "guides" and similar docs for the features that matter to them. You see something similar with end-user software like Adobe's entire suite where the official docs are basically useless if you just want to learn the common operations quickly and so you have to rely on third-party books and tutorials (like the Dummies books).
- southerntofu 5y ago
  XMPP has a long history... Two decades of accumulated specifications can make it a bit overwhelming to find what you're looking for. It's important to have external individuals/collectives gathering the pieces they find important and remarks to achieve what they consider a good implementation. It's just like when you do web stuff you may read from MDN, csstricks or smashing magazine. It doesn't mean that the W3C/IETF specs are useless, far from it. But in my view it's useful to find guidance in a nebula of specifications and endless UX possibilities.

cat199 5y ago

if so then same is true for say, TCP/IP, HTTP and HTML

0xdeadb00f 5y ago
Fair point. I think I've maybe changed my tune on this a little bit since writing that comment.

icedchai 5y ago

XMPP is basically an abomination of a protocol. It's too complicated. Other people can explain it better than I: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2069810 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2069810

pmlnr 5y ago
Seriously? Go check out Matrix or ActivityStreams, XMPP is actually much simpler.
- icedchai 5y ago
  The core of XMPP may be simple, but when you add in various XEPs, the complexity builds really fast. Just look at all this stuff: https://xmpp.org/extensions/ https://xmpp.org/extensions/
  - mst 5y ago
    One of the key points of the article we're discussing is to recommend a small curated set of XEPs. Just look at this relative lack of stuff: https://docs.modernxmpp.org/client/protocol/ https://docs.modernxmpp.org/client/protocol/
  - MattJ100 5y ago
    That's a growing list of documents over the course of XMPP. It doesn't really prove anything other than... XMPP has been around a long time, and people continue to develop it. People saying "look at all this stuff" is one reason the Modern XMPP project was born. To draw attention to the actually important things that developers need to read. The XSF receives a lot of submissions each year. Many of these proposals never make it past the "experimental" stage. Others are only applicable in certain domains (IoT, etc.). Over time some of these become widely adopted and progress through the standards process. Some do not. The XSF publishes annually the "compliance suite" which describes what clients and servers should be supporting in different areas: https://xmpp.org/about/compliance-suites.html https://xmpp.org/about/compliance-suites.html
  - southerntofu 5y ago