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GnuCash - A Call For Help
sedition writes "GnuCash developer Benoit Gregoire has written the State of the GnuCash Project. It is a call for help to the Open Source community regarding the open-source accounting software for Linux, Mac OSX, and more. GnuCash is one of the largest (287,853 lines of code), but least publicized Open Source projects. Now it needs developer support, as its future is uncertain."
Wow so many lines of code! great...its so unreliable...
first post, first post, first post..........
To help despreatly lighten the load on the server, here is the text of the annonucement.
State of the GnuCash project, a call for help
The GnuCash project is having a hard time. I think most everyone agrees that GnuCash is a critical piece of software for the Linux desktop. It's also one the largest free software projects. How big is it? GnuCash currently has 287,853,430 physical source lines of code (SLOC). For example, had the current GnuCash CVS been included in RedHat 7.1, it would come in 21st position in code size (see http://www.dwheeler.com/sloc/). At that time, the current GnuCash CVS source would have been pretty similar in size to qt, postgresql or perl, about 60% of Gimp and between 12% and 16% of Xfree, Mozilla or the Linux kernel. Although GnuCash comes up in every discussion of needed software to get Linux on the desktop, the GnuCash project currently has only about seven active developers (active being used very loosely here, considering I included myself) and enjoys far less exposure than many projects of a similar size.
We may be headed for a dead end if we don't reorganize and refocus our efforts. GnuCash badly needs more manpower (not just developers), and needs to get it quickly.
How did we get here
Of course, every project could always use more developers, but the consecutive demise of both Gnumatic and Linux Developers Group caused the loss of most of GnuCash's core developers two years ago. The few volunteers that were left focused on new features, in the hopes of attracting users and hopefully also developers. We've managed to take it to 1.8.5 (to be released in a few days), and in the process GnuCash gained Small Business features, Scheduled Transactions, a completely new import UI with Bayesian filtering, OFX and HBCI support, Mortage and Loan Repayment druid, and many, many others. We are very proud of it and we clearly have more users judging from traffic on gnucash-users, and all should now be well in GnuCash-land.
Not quite. We didn't attract many new developers and all those new features have to be maintained and debugged. They also represent a huge tech support burden, since most of the features were not documented properly due to time constraints. GnuCash has grown too large for the current developers to properly debug and maintain the current code base, add new features and write documentation, all at the same time.
I hate to admit it, but in our quest for new features, choices had to be made and a lot of important things are currently being neglected. If the GnuCash project can't manage to attract more contributors and refocus the efforts of those it already has, it's going to become unmanageable. We often say that Linux would survive even if Linus got hit by a bus. Well, right now I am not too certain that GnuCash would currently survive if Derek Atkins got hit by a bus.
So now I'll try to suggest some solutions.
What core developers should do to help future developers
There are many reasons for our difficulties to attract developers and other contributors, but it all comes back to the same problem: real or perceived, the barrier to entry is too high. To get more developers, we must make it easier to contribute to GnuCash. "Casual" sex with Cmdrtaco to scratch an itch is much to hard, even for an experienced developer.
Work on the developer documentation problem
There is no complete and current architecture and API reference. Now that we've put the doxygen plumbing in place, we must make sure that ALL functions that are in public headers ARE documented, even if only by saying "Document me!", so the doxygen docs become truly authoritative. Then put the docs on the web site. We must also write a report writing Howto: We already have some very powerful reports, but this is the single most common offer for help we receive "Hi, I'd like to write "foo" report for GnuCash, can someone help me or point me to documentation on that subject". Sometimes I wonder if anyone knows anymore... So the answer is always the
287,853 lines of code
That's big. Windows 3.11 by itself was only 33,000 lines, give or take.
we've no problem sending the hobbyists a few bucks, now & then.
.asp, from a giant hole in the planet/population, & are already hiding underground, expecting to survive something. they are the walking dead..
meanwhile, back at the shillerIE.
also logging yet another pathetic failure buy va lairIE's patentdead PostBlock(tm) devise, c SourceForgerIE(tm) hedgemonIE.
you know whois needing to be watched/resTRAINed the worst, right? it's the Godless greed/fear based murdering thieving georgewellian fuddite payper liesense hostage ransom stock markup FUDgePacking walking dead of course.
we can take care of our own children, thanks.
the lights are coming up. sum of these greed/fear mongers don't know their
"Casual" sex with Cmdrtaco to scratch an itch is much to hard, even for an experienced developer.
Search the above post for Cmdrtaco and see the reference to "casual" sex
Overrated / Underrated : Moderation
> or The Two Towers.
Hey hey HEY! Have some respect, dude. People died in those towers. You could at least call the film "A number of tall buildings less than three". Or pretend that it's called that. Anything else is in very poor taste indeed.
The CmdrTaco troll is in the *other* mirror. This one looks good, unless I missed something.
probably because being an FSF/OSS or whatever the hell the hippies are calling it these days.. the project contains a buttload of 'borrowed' code from other places (bayesian filtering? in an accounting app?) basic shit that they probably coulda/shoulda developed themselves to avoid selling out to the gpl virus and basically destroying all hopes of ever being able to sell it commercially in the future. only way to make money off this is to be a distributor, sorry coders but your ethics are being exploited.. get jobs and join the work force.
bite my glorious golden ass.
There are alternatives: Quicken, Microsoft Money, QuickBooks... a whole host of accounting packages, depending on what features you need.
What we don't need is a bog-standard, half-assed "alternative" created by people who know a little bit about writing computer programs, but nothing at all about accounting.
The only thing you cannot do is charging for Licensing fees. It does not prevent you from making money off of your work
you don't seem to understand business very well.. ask yourself, how do software companies make money?
bite my glorious golden ass.
" Hmm, I'm wondering how does Red Hat makes money"
Red Hat makes money? I'm ALL FOR OSS making money, but how many quarters have they been in the black?
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
emerge gnucash
4 Interesting ?? I bet if I scratched my ass and used the word zen while I did it, I'd get modded up. Zen is bullshit. Here is the recipe for a western Budhist: Take a kid with a semi-religious background, i.e. church on Easter or a little more frequently. Send him/her to college. Add a couple humanities classes. Now you have a kid who no longer can believe that the Bible was writen by god. Add a bunch of dope-smoking hippie friends and professors. Now you have the eastern religion influence. Do not add any upper level science or math classes. They only lead toward critical, anylitical thinking. Instead, add lots of lit classes. These enforce the idea that there is no right answer, only really good bullshit interpretations. Wait a couple years. Now you have a kid who has grown up a tiny bit, experienced more of life, and now feels that natural longing for meaning. Now you have a kid who can't believe in traditional western religion because it is not hip, because it's politically inconveniant, and, of course, because it too is unsupporatable bullshit. He/she feels foolish believing in some Santa-Clause-like god who takes us up to heaven. But he/she still has this emptiness and the natural desire for life everlasting. So now you have a budhist. Now, if this dumbass kid grows up to be a programmer, he/she will naturally gravitate toward zen. I haven't figured this part out. It's just too fucking stupid