Apps Messaging Manifesto

[Mark Taylor]

On Wed, 11 Apr 2007, Rob Seaman wrote:

> This has been an entertaining discussion for those of us in the peanut 
> gallery.  The diversity of opinions is quite marked.  I wonder if this is 
> because nothing like a true manifesto has been stated as yet.  A manifesto 
> should begin with a simple declarative statement of a shared vision, for 
> example:
>
> 	The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class 
> struggles.
>
> or:
>
> 	The Industrial Revolution and its consequences have been a disaster 
> for the human race.
>
> or:
>
> 	GNU [...] is the name for the complete Unix-compatible software 
> system which I am writing so that I can give it away free [...]
>
> (Stallman could have benefited from having Engels as an editor.)
>
> Can anyone sum up the essence of astronomical application messaging in a 
> single sentence?  Also, what is the name of this project?  GNU demonstrates 
> the value of picking a clever name.  (Linux shows the greater value of naming 
> software in Finnish.)

John has already had a go at kick starting this one:

On 9 Apr 2007, John Taylor wrote:

> Here's what I'd like to see in our manifesto.  Does anyone have
> anything to add (or for that matter, update or delete), bearing in
> mind we want to  keep it short.
> 
> ============================================
> 
> 1) A simple solution which does the right thing nearly all the time
> is better than a complicated one which does the right thing all the
> time.
> 
> 2) The design of the messaging system (and messages) should place a
> low burden on authors who wish to make their applications compliant.
> 
> 3) We don't have all the answers up front, and our goal should be to
> get software out into the community quickly so that we can get
> feedback to refine our ideas.

A couple of other items from the PLASTIC manifesto 
http://plastic.sourceforge.net/manifesto.html (also John's) may be
closer to what you had in mind:

   - The astronomer should have a suite of tools at his disposal,
     each of which does one thing well, and can be composed according
     to his needs.

   - Developers are more likely to produce tools that do one thing well
     if they can easily out-source their secondary concerns to other
     tools.

Though in some cases these points were deduced from the state of
the protocol post hoc, I'd say they are a fair representation of the
thinking which led to PLASTIC as it stands.

Maybe someone from elsewhere on the "diversity of opinions" spectrum
(or even in the peanut gallery) would like to agree/disagree/comment/
suggest amendments.

Mark

-- 
Mark Taylor   Astronomical Programmer   Physics, Bristol University, UK
m.b.taylor at bris.ac.uk +44-117-928-8776 http://www.star.bris.ac.uk/~mbt/