Inigo is expanding, and that also means that we have to start tracking things like employee records, HR forms, claim forms and what not.

Now typical way we would usually go about doing this, is let's define some fields for a table in an RDBMS, write some CRUD (or use a framework) and voila we have a simple form. No problems, I can do this in 5 minutes with Python on Planes and some Snake Oil.

On the other hand,  I think that the form is just a content type (text fields), that could have interchangeable workflow, security permissions and will need to interact with other content types and forms, be easily defined in different custom views and have a nice standards compliant UI that an end user can modify any of the above in flexible ways.

Example, if this employee moves to another department, in the physical world, I would hand the form over to another manager, and that manager would then have the same rights I had by physically having the form, but would not have rights for the forms I have in my hand, even though he is also another manager. The forms in his hands, would not be available either for lower level managers in his department. At the same time, the employee should be able to modify their details, but need to submit to the manager for approval. Did the permissions and workflow code for your 5 minute application consider this? Does it do versioning and track history?

Then the HR department also needs access to it, and they want to quickly have the records sorted by specific keywords such as expertise. Sorry client.. that's another feature, I have to code the view for sorted by that now, and also more CRUD to deal with adding expertise now, or any other possible sortable keyword HR could think of. HR also reminded you that the company is an equal opportunity company and they have some disabled people working that need your application to also be accessibility enabled.

On the other hand, if I created this content type in Plone, it will be just another content type (Employee Record) that could be added and managed as either folders or as views (collections), and this content type would then be able to take advantage of all the existing features in Plone such as workflows, role and hierarchy based permissions, keywords and collections (smart folders in Plone 2.5) and the existing tested standards and accessibility compliant UI.

If the client is already on Plone, even easier, no retraining needed and by installing it as a new Product, all the site managers can now simply "Add Product" in their site setup to add the functionality. Look and feel doesn't have to be redone, and it integrates with what they already have.

Keep in mind however that Plone, like Snake Oil isn't the solution that cures all ills. Do consider however, if your need is similar to the situation above.

A brief article will be posted this weekend with examples. Also you can check it out and talk to me at MyGOSSCon. Inigo will be there at booth B5 where you can see Plone as well as the latest Gnome Desktop running on a Pentium I 233Mhz (kind of).

I applaud the positive actions and posts of Malaysian Indians like danny, ditesh and byte in response to the HINDRAF rally.

I am however very disappointed that some have tried to portray all Malaysians negatively, as much as calling us an apartheid nation and asking foreigners for the boycott of Malaysian businesses. I state again that this is the corrupt BN government against all Malaysians irrespective of race.

This was a Malay Malaysian at Batu Burok who was shot with live bullets by police at a ceramah (public speech) for fair elections recently in Terengganu. Just to repeat that again, they were shot at. One was hit in the chest, another was hit in the neck. How quickly we forget, or maybe because the guys were Malay,  we can look the other way? And if we replace this with Indian it's not ok?

There is a lesson here on why Malaysian rights should be race free. Sticking up for the rights of your race only, doesn't help us build a better multiracial country. We should stick up for the rights that apply to all Malaysians, so whether you're Malay, Indian, Chinese, Iban, Penan, Orang Asli etc. if we see another being deprived of their Malaysian rights that have been accorded to others, we have to stick up for them. If peaceful protestors have been hosed down by FRU, we have to help them (see Kampung Baru folk). Why? Because they're Malaysians. The moment you start having different sets of rights, is when we get into trouble like my example above, and you start being racist yourself. I'm only going to stick for the rights of my own kind!

HINDRAF rally is just the latest in ongoing disputes the Malaysian people have against the current government. It goes to show that the BN government are running scared and cracking down on anything and everything to ensure that the current corrupt system is in place.

Imagine how difficult it would be to get into KL city centre soon for anybody,

• Wearing yellow shirts (or any yellow apparel)
  
• Wearing light blue shirts
• Wearing green and kopiah (skull cap)
• Looks like an Indian Malaysian (I don't know what the criteria they use for this)
• Have an interest in building hobby rockets (particular red in colour)
  
• Calling themselves a blogger
  
• Wearing a Tux T-shirt?
  

We're heading towards a new generation now, with new ideas, and I'd like for us to all move together away from the past racial system and instead work to protect our rights equally as Malaysians.

For example, everybody should have a right to eat what they want, so instead of fighting for the right to have beef or pork banned everywhere based on racial and religious lines, we should instead settle on a set of equal rights where we say, each place of eating should state clearly what they are serving to respect the rights of others to not eat something taboo to their beliefs. Now this would respect the rights of all Malaysians. I believe this is the direction we need to go for the future.

The meetup is on a slightly different day next week, it will be on a Wednesday, Dec 5th the usual location at OUM Angkasaraya.

This month our guest speaker is Mr. Simon Phipps who will be presenting a talk on Sun's FOSS initiatives touching on topics such as strategy and direction as well as projects such as OpenJDK and OpenSolaris. He also has a surprise announcement in store for attendees.

Simon Phipps is the Chief Open Source Officer at Sun Microsystems, co-ordinating Sun's extensive participation in free and open source software communities and actively participating in the global conversation they express.

More information visit the event page.

Feeling lethargic past few days, but managed to clear a few urgent things this morning. Change can be a good thing sometimes, and in going with the dark theme thread at Planet Gnome, I also opted for look and feel change on my desktop.

So here's my new desktop:

Theme is a slightly modified Darkilouche

Icon theme is the nice Tango icons that everybody is using these days.

Just updated the shared Plone instances on on Inigo to 2.5.4. For users,  there will be noticeable performance improvements, mostly in uploading content.

While Plone is very easy for users with lots and lots of features in each major version, the rapid pace makes tracking it for developers keeps you on your toes. Current stable version is 3.0 and previous stable version is 2.5, but 3.1 and 3.5 and 4.0 branches are already available.

This access to future development versions, is one of the major advantages for FOSS developers. Not only can you do testing at very early stages (agile development), but you also have insight into new features that are available in the next version. In one project based on proprietary products I'm aware off the release was so slow (3 years) that by the time development to add features in in original version was finished, they found out that in the new version, the vendor already incorporated these development as new features. That would suck, because definitely the clients would ask, what exactly did way pay for before, and why do we need to pay again for new licenses for those same features? And why do we also need to upgrade and pay for even more licenses every other dependent software in our infrastructure too because of this major upgrade? And why are the previously developed products so unstable on this new version?

With good engineering practices and early access to everything including input on key features that may effect you, this is one place where FOSS development method is clearly better for large  long term projects.

Will ZFS be in FreeBSD 7, you know it will, you have access to the CVS source and can see that it was committed in. You won't suddenly be shocked that it will be removed. If you  really need it you can even provide resources for additional development. You also know that USB storage isn't something you want to be dependent on unless you're willing to fund more developers to work on it. You can then plan ahead, and buy dual usb/firewire devices for backups on your FreeBSD servers.