Friday, 15 July 2011 16:34
Are you a developer? Are you planning on writing a standalone web-app? Which of these frameworks would you choose for your application: Symfony, Zend, CakePHP, Nooku - or the Joomla Framework?
I know that I wouldn't use the Joomla framework. Its not mature enough and other frameworks provide a lot more bang for the buck. I want to write code fast, which at the same time integrates as many features as possible, which is something that Ruby on Rails or Nooku are great at, but not the Joomla framework.
But also for the project its a bad move. For one, the workforce is split into the CMS project and the framework project, and for the other, its also making development unnecessarily difficult. Just think about fixing a bug that is both in the CMS and the framework.
Last but not least, there is the target audience: Joomlas strength is the large group of average Joe Users and not the small group of James Hackers. Catering to a small group that maybe makes 0.1% of the community while at the same time neglecting the other 99.9% will not help the project.
The idea to split the framework from the CMS was made somewhere in 2006, when the project was young and everybody was basically brainstorming. Most of the people that were involved in that brainstorming have since left the project, but the idea went from being "something to think about" to "this was a decision, we have to do this." There have been several developments in the project lately, that are based on ideas and brainstorming from the early days of the project, but which have since outlived itself and should not be followed up on anymore. I would wish the PLT would take a step back, relax and try to get an outside view to get a new feeling for what is important and what isn't.