Topic: Joomla & SMF - this is a disaster ! (Read 26573 times)

joejackson · « **on:** July 25, 2007, 12:45:41 PM »

I personally have spent several months preparing an existing website for a relaunch with Joomla & SMF completely integrated and now less than a week from launch I find I can no longer successfully bridge Joomla & SMF due to the Joomla upgrade version 1.0.13.

The choice for me is therefore a horrible one.

Separate my Joomla website from the forum component (SMF) and have them running as standalones, or begin the search for a forum component that will blend in with my website as an integrated 'partner'.

I really don't have much of an option and will have to reluctantly part company with SMF as I simply cannot have two separate logins for my website. They MUST be integrated.

It seems such a pity that a compromise could not be reached and of course both sides will blame each other. I have no opinion other than I feel greatly let down.

My final question is does anyone here at SMF feel that a solution is likely, and my question relates only as far as me selfishly being able to use SMF alongside Joomla?

I currently have this...
Joomla 1.0.12
SMF 1.1.2
SMF bridge 1.1.7

I will have to upgrade to Joomla 1.0.13

How difficult will it be for me to tweak the bridge to work with the upgraded Joomla?

Best wishes

Joe

Motoko-chan · « **Reply #1 on:** July 25, 2007, 01:09:06 PM »

Quote from: joejackson on July 25, 2007, 12:45:41 PM

It seems such a pity that a compromise could not be reached and of course both sides will blame each other. I have no opinion other than I feel greatly let down.

My final question is does anyone here at SMF feel that a solution is likely, and my question relates only as far as me selfishly being able to use SMF alongside Joomla?

Unfortunately, there is no room for a compromise. The easy thing would be for Joomla! to have an exception in the license that allows third-party components under any license, but they feel they do not have the ability to do such as they don't hold all of the copyright in the code (and thus would need permission from every contributor to change their license). The other option would be to have SMF under the GPL, but, for reasons I won't go into here (it is talked about elsewhere) that will likely won't happen. Do believe me, we tried to find a way to respect the license and still allow the bridge to function, but there is no way short of what I said above.

Quote from: joejackson on July 25, 2007, 12:45:41 PM

I currently have this...
Joomla 1.0.12
SMF 1.1.2
SMF bridge 1.1.7

I will have to upgrade to Joomla 1.0.13

How difficult will it be for me to tweak the bridge to work with the upgraded Joomla?

I'll leave the changes part for those who have the knowledge of the bridge, but I do want to ask why you have need to move to 1.0.13. (I don't follow J! progress, so I don't know what changed).

I do have an idea for "integration" that might work around the license, but it wouldn't be all that nice and is kinda clunky. Basically, don't integrate SMF as a component via the bridge, and keep separate installs of Joomla! and SMF. With a third package (that is self-contained), watch for db modifications (new account, etc) and then do the same changes for the opposite package. With a small SMF mod, you might be able to get SMF to respect Joomla!'s login cookie and session info (assuming that won't trip the license issue) to allow a one-login solution. As I said, it is clunky, but I personally don't see that running into licensing issues as it doesn't touch any GPL code.

joejackson · « **Reply #2 on:** July 25, 2007, 01:31:43 PM »

Joomla 1.0.13 will no doubt be followed at some point by 1.0.14 and 1.0.15
Not upgrading just so the bridge to SMF continued to work would not be best practice.

I have grown to really like SMF and the community here is an informed and friendly one, but I cannot have SMF running as a separate item to the website. It is crucial they are integrated.

I really don't have a choice and if I cannot have SMF integrated with Joomla working from a single login then I must find another forum and that fills me with such disappointment at the time I have spent creating my current integrated setup.

Before making a final cutoff I will of course look at ways of keeping the current bridge functional with the changes brought about by Joomla 1.0.12 > 1.0.13 upgrade, but if I cannot do so I have no choice but to move on.

Any suggestions or ideas will be most gratefully received.

Kindred · « **Reply #3 on:** July 25, 2007, 01:35:06 PM »

my suggestion, at this point, is to take a look at Mambo.

1- most (if not all) of your template work done for Joomla will still work on Mambo
2- many of the joomla modules will still work on Mambo, and many of the modules and component authors will likely be moving to that system as well.
3- the bridge is available for mambo, and integrates even better than the joomla bridge did.

karlbenson · « **Reply #4 on:** July 25, 2007, 01:43:23 PM »

I doubt SMF will be the only forum software that is impacted by the Joomla decision.

I expect there will be other forum software devs looking at the decision taken by smf and depending on their licensing, looking at whether they need to take action too.

I'm not much up on what licenses each forum software are using , but simply looking for a GPL one, you may end up with inferior forum software.

kai920 · « **Reply #5 on:** July 25, 2007, 01:49:03 PM »

Quote from: Kindred on July 25, 2007, 01:35:06 PM

my suggestion, at this point, is to take a look at Mambo.

I wonder how many Joomla users are currently considering this route?

I see 3 options for my site going forward, and Joomla is not included in any of them:

1 - migrate to Mambo
2 - migrate to Tinyportal
3 - ditch any type of CMS and run SMF standalone only

cferd · « **Reply #6 on:** July 25, 2007, 02:17:50 PM »

Quote from: joejackson on July 25, 2007, 01:31:43 PM

Joomla 1.0.13 will no doubt be followed at some point by 1.0.14 and 1.0.15
Not upgrading just so the bridge to SMF continued to work would not be best practice.

If you're intent on leaving SMF behind, then Joomla 1.0.13 may not be the best choice. The future of Joomla is not 1.0.14 or even 1.0.15, it would be 1.5, which is up to RC status.

Otherwise, like Kindred said, Mambo may be the way to go in order to continue with SMF going forward. I for one, am sticking with my J1.0.12 and SMF for now, with contingency plans in the works.

joejackson · « **Reply #7 on:** July 25, 2007, 05:00:25 PM »

I like Joomla, I like SMF, I don't want to leave either of them behind.

Joomla works well as a CMS for my website, and SMF works well as the forum portion,
but without any doubt whatsoever there cannot be a situation that requires two different logins.
They must work together with a single login.

As this now seems impossible I have two ways forward.

Either lose Joomla and find another CMS that can bridge with SMF
or
lose SMF and find another forum that can bridge with Joomla.

The learning curve and work involved I believe will be much less if I retain Joomla.

I am reluctant to do this, but I don't see any other way ahead.
The whole situation seems to have underlying power issues between two factions and their respective licence stances.
That is not my business and I have no opinion on right or wrong.

Kindred · « **Reply #8 on:** July 25, 2007, 05:06:08 PM »

Let me put this to bed right now.

there are no "underlying power issues" between SMF and Joomla.
The difference is that SMF is not GPL. SMF will not be GPL (discussion elsewhere).
There is no issue of power involved in this, it is a legal issue of interpretation of the GPL license.

joejackson · « **Reply #9 on:** July 25, 2007, 06:57:54 PM »

Let me put it to bed also.

Legal issues are decided in courts of law.
Until this happens there are only opinions, established best practices, and workable compromises.
This is the way of things in a society where democracy rules.

Interpretations until tested in a court of law remain only opinions,
and where opinions are concerned we can indeed achieve compromise if,
and it's a crucial "if",
if there is a willingness to do so.

In this instance there does not seem to be a willingness to achieve compromise
and my experience tells me that this relates to some underlying issue.
It cannot be a legal one because legal issues must be decisded by courts of law
and unless I'm mistaken there has been no lawful legal ruling on this matter which means it is one of opinion.

jomaco1 · « **Reply #10 on:** July 25, 2007, 07:06:55 PM »

Hmm...perhaps the next time I get pulled over for speeding, I can get out of it by saying "sorry officer, that's just your opinion."

joejackson · « **Reply #11 on:** July 25, 2007, 07:16:28 PM »

My friend, if you were pulled over for speeding and there was a difference of opinion between you and the policeman about whether you were speeding or not, it would be settled in a court of law by the production of evidence and argument and the court would decide the outcome.

Until this time you would be innocent until proven otherwise.
Any guilt applicable to you would only be a matter of opinion.

joejackson · « **Reply #12 on:** July 25, 2007, 07:36:09 PM »

Thanks to all the very helpful people who helped me along the way in becoming familiar with SMF.

It's a great shame we won't see any results of all that effort, but I wish you well for the future.

Peter Duggan · « **Reply #13 on:** July 25, 2007, 08:34:04 PM »

Quote from: joejackson on July 25, 2007, 06:57:54 PM

In this instance there does not seem to be a willingness to achieve compromise

Sadly, this does a great disservice to those who took part in all the genuine negotiation that preceded the announcement.

Quote

and my experience tells me that this relates to some underlying issue.

And your experience is unfortunately letting you down here.

So of course you're terribly disappointed, and that's understandable, but *everything possible* was done to avoid this situation.

Kindred · « **Reply #14 on:** July 26, 2007, 12:32:57 AM »

joejackson,

As Peter points out, you are mistaken. Legal issues are legal issues. They may get TESTED when taken to court, but it is the goal of nearly everyone to avoid court by obeying the rules. Joomla and the FSF have stated what they feel the rules are. We tried to find a way to work with/around that interpretation, but were unable to come to a sastisfactory conclusion.

We (as developers and supporters of SMF) have no hard feelings toward joomla, and there was never any power stuggle to put anyone on top or put anyone down. Unfortunately, we could not find a common ground to work from when the only two choices appear to be "change the joomla license or change the SMF license".
We have no intention of saying that joomla has done anything wrong (they have not). We regret the choice they made, because it means that we can not continue to develop the bridge between our two systems, but it was their choice to make.

joejackson · « **Reply #15 on:** July 26, 2007, 04:15:13 AM »

Thanks for the reply, and I'm certain you have done so with complete honesty and integrity.

It is not my intention to do anyone a disservice, but as this issue has not been decided in a court of law the position regarding the legality of any licence interpretation is still one of conjecture and opinion.

Therefore at this stage it would have been possible if both parties had been willing to compromise, but that willingness is not there. That is the key.

Neither side was willing to move from their position to facilitate a compromise - so by definition when both parties are declaring they would like this to have been possible, but could not bring themselves to make it happen, there MUST be some underlying issue.

Anyway, I won't post anything else as it won't change the situation and although I now have thoughts on the bigger picture involved here, my intial and main problem was a purely selfish one.

Good luck with the future of SMF, it is a fine product.

Motoko-chan · « **Reply #16 on:** July 26, 2007, 11:04:37 AM »

Confirming the license before a court of law requires a lot of money, something we (and most other developers that have pulled their code) can't really afford. I don't think they can either, but they are more likely to be able to get free legal assistance from the FSF or similar organization. Given this, until someone can afford to get a straight ruling and has standing to do such, it is best to try and come to an understanding and if that fails to just stop working with that other party.

Quote from: joejackson on July 26, 2007, 04:15:13 AM

Therefore at this stage it would have been possible if both parties had been willing to compromise, but that willingness is not there. That is the key.

We were certainly willing to compromise, including adjusting the licensing of the bridge to be able to continue it. However, given that the only option given to us that would have followed their interpretation (which no one else has been able to get them to soften) was to license both the bridge and SMF under an exception-less GPL, there certainly wasn't room to do much. There was playing with offering a multi-nested script (one wrapper is GPL, the next is LGPL, etc), but the drop in performance that would have caused made it unworkable. Given further clarification by the FSF, that probably wouldn't have worked legally anyway.

You can find some of the old discussion over in this topic.

joejackson · « **Reply #17 on:** July 26, 2007, 11:21:27 AM »

Thanks.

Motoko-chan · « **Reply #18 on:** July 26, 2007, 11:26:37 AM »

Actually, I specifically found the one post by Orsito discussing some possible ways to develop the bridge, which of course, were rather impractical.

http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=177335.msg1155097#msg1155097

joejackson · « **Reply #19 on:** July 26, 2007, 11:49:31 AM »

Thanks again.

I feel as if I have two options now...

a) Joomla bridged with phpBB
or
b) Mambo bridged with SMF

I like SMF but it all depends on how good and easy to use Mambo turns out to be.

News:

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