I Own the Plone Buildout Builder

I attended the 2008 Plone Strategic Planning Summit last weekend. It was a energetic and draining three days of conceptualizing and re-conceptualizing Plone. It ended on Sunday with a list of desired action items, most of which found volunteer champions. Many thanks to everyone who took ownership and to Jon Stahl, who facilitated and ran an amazing event - more like herding tigers than herding cats.

One of the few action items which did not receive a champion was the buildout builder. Upon reflection, I decided that it fits with our long-term plans at Georgia Tech and that it, too, needed a champion. So, motivated by the phenomenal display of responsibility I had just witnessed, I told Alex Limi that I'd tackle it.

Since I told Alex in passing, it is not surprising that my offer did not make it into the official list posted to plone-devel. However, we soon got a ticket created for the buildout builder and I am now following through with the statement of plans requested of all owners. Here's the four items requested....

1. Within one week, email plone-dev and announce yourself as a champion

I am the champion for the buildout builder.

2. Define the task, the deliverables and what success looks like

• The buildout builder is, at its simplest, a way for a user to create a buildout through a structured GUI that they can then use to deploy a Plone site with the options they requested in the GUI.

• The task is to produce the buildout builder and deploy it as is appropriate (more on this in the next post).

• The deliverable is an implemented buildout builder, available for use, with a maintainer.

• Success consists of delivery of the deliverable, in August 2008 or before, and the deliverable's usefulness within the Plone community.

3. Put forward an action with a timeline

This task requires development. I am willing to undertake the development, but will not be available to do it until this Summer. If I am the only developer, then we can expect the deliverables in August. If others would like to join in or even take leadership of the development, then we'll be on their timetable, though, again, deliverables will appear no later than August.

I hope to spend the next few months in planning what the buildout builder will look like. I have many ideas that take it beyond its simplest form and would like feedback on them from the community. I also encourage you to communicate new ideas that I haven't considered.

4. Solicit engagement and action

Comments are enabled on the blog post. I welcome help in all forms - if you are willing to help, please contact me by leaving your info in a comment (name and irc nick should be sufficient - no need for anyone to post email addresses in public). However, please hold substantive comments about what the buildout builder should do or how it should do it until you read my next post, which will seed the ground with what I am already thinking.