Community Concerns

Thank you splittingred for sharing your thoughts. It's good to hear from someone with some inside knowledge for a change.

It may not be what most of us would have wanted to hear but at least (or: at last) an honest assessment of the state of things. In contrast to the official "don't worry - everything's great" tweets we keep reading. It seems a lot of things have been replaced by marketing.

I'd say if a core developer's list of concerns is longer than your own it's officially time to raise your eyebrows.

I think this thread definitely shows what MODX, the community, stands for at its core; a community of open discussion, integrity, and a deep-seated desire to really see not only the product succeed, but those who depend on it as well. Through this open discussion, there has been a clarification of what and where the true issues lie. Increased dialogue with the community, and community involvement clarification.

From my perspective, I can see that there is a desire to understand what the community's role is in MODX. Does the community necessarily have any weight in what goes on in the development of the roadmap, or how MODX advances as a CMS platform? How does the LLC see its role in the progression of MODX; active contributor, or facilitator? Personally, to say that because the software is free, the community has no real say I think really perpetuates the old model of business development, and it totally defeats the purpose of OSS. I don't believe the community is asking to have a say in how the LLC handles itself, that for sure is not our business, but MODX as built an atmosphere of community involvement and so has built its foundation upon it. I think it would be very foolhardy to start shutting out the very community that makes your software worth using, and helps market your brand.

To also put paying ambassadors, and other financial contributors under that same "community" policy of "no say", is just bad business. What businessperson would ever invest money into a business they were not fully apprised of, it just wouldn't happen. The ambassadors may not have a percentage stake in the LLC, but how much worse off would the LLC be without such monthly financial supporters? I'm not sure any company would invest in a product if they felt that their money was being mismanaged.

I really do like Red's and Mark's suggestions of delegation. I'm not sure if it is necessary to split MODX into two separate entities, but rather in a restructuring of how the LLC plans to advance forward. Having the LLC act as a community facilitator and financial proxy may make it possible for both the community to help develop, and for each person in management to play to their strengths.

Quote from: splittingred at Jun 01, 2014, 02:32 PM

I've attempted to stay out of this thread, but since my name has been thrown around for a bit now, I feel I have to respond.

splittingred, thanks for the response, though I can understand your reluctance. It does clarify a great many issues, pull together a great many threads, and show where things may need to happen. In particular, it gives us more insight into the problems which Mark Hamstra was addressing with his document, and into lossendae's concerns.

I've been watching this thread with a lot of interest. I was a very active MODX enthusiast for quite some time but certain issues (a lot of which have been raised here) and the direction that MODX was taking made me wary and I drifted elsewhere. I am still somewhat active in that I maintain quite a few MODX sites and still consult for quite a few MODX developers, but I haven't built a new site in MODX for ages because I'm concerned about the future of the project. I think the points that have been raised here around the role of the community are quite salient.

I don't really have much to add to the discussion. I have said a lot in other threads about branding issues, the need for other developers to be mentored and trained into helping with the core, and such, so I won't repeat myself. I just wanted to say that I too am invested in seeing how things go, and would be behind the idea of Foundation, although I do wonder if there will be enough relinquishing of ownership by the team to allow this to happen. There has to be a change in the leadership model and an acknowledgement that the community IS already invested and needs to be involved rather than ignored.

Quote from: splittingred at Jun 01, 2014, 02:32 PM

There is a lack of available, strong technical leadership that can contribute at a consistent enough level.
This was prior provided by Jason and I; however, Jason is now swamped (from what I know) with Professional Services work, and I have full-time employment elsewhere that prevents me (time-wise) from making sizable contributions anymore. However, even that was never enough - MODX needs a larger pool of technical talent to lead and direct the project.....

I believe that this is mainly caused by confusion over technical ownership. There needs to be a dedicated team of integrators, who are defining and over-communicating technical direction and ensuring that commits coming in are aligned with a constantly-evolving roadmap. This, IMO, needs to be owned by the community. The LLC needs to explicitly grant this ability to the community....

I hope the best for MODX, but things have to change, and soon.

I agree wholeheartedly!

I strongly agree with the modx.org idea put forward by Mark (and documented here).

The challenge is getting from here to there without doing more harm than good.

It's important for there to be buy-in and leadership from the LLC otherwise we'll end up with a forked project and a split community.

I think like the renewed interest with the impending 2.3 launch would be a great time for the LLC to separate their commercial work and the MODX Cloud SaaS Platform from the FOSS project by establishing a new not for profit .ORG.

This could be a win-win situation for everyone involved:

• Transparency and greater community ownership for the FOSS CMS. More people will be willing to go all-in on MODX if it's future is more transparent with a clear roadmap.
• LLC can still be one of the largest contributors to the .ORG with board seats, trademark ownership, and spending a % of certain staff members time on FOSS
• LLC can focus on making money. Who hasn't dreamt of licensing a version of the MODX Cloud software that I can run on my own dedicated server.
• Association memberships with badges/logos are easily valuable marketing tools. Moreso than being in a donators hall of fame.
• Everything inside the "community" part of the current modx.com could move to the .ORG including the professionals directory. Naturally the "MODX Systems" with their Consulting Services and MODX Cloud Product should be one of the top MODX Service Providers. The wall of fame could turn into a foundation membership database of some kind.

I feel like this is what should have happened in 2013 but we ended up with the SiphonLabs drama instead.

The more I hear people here acknowledging the issues they're seeing, versus the complete lack and disregard of the individuals you would expect to be taking active part in this discussion, the more I think this needs to happen sooner than later.

The modmore team will support this in any way possible. I will gladly help define what needs to be defined, but I do want to reiterate that while I pitched the original idea of a foundation in this thread, that it should not be something "by mark" but "by the community". By all means take that google doc I posted and tear it apart in search of better ideas.

Quote from: lossendae at Jun 01, 2014, 03:29 AM

Proximity has been replaced by marketing.

I think the best form of marketing the LLC could do would be to get the MODX community on board again, then they would have lots of advocates.

I have not read the discussion from the start to end, this must I confess before I continue.

I've worked in close relation with the LLC during the past in similar manner like Mark has worked, bit in the different regions due to our skill sets are different. I cannot tell too much of the disclosed information but what I understand is that we all know that LLC gets funded by professional services that keep MODX development rolling. Now just the problem is that all of LLC people seem to have more to do outside of core coding. This was just a guess really.

The foundation idea actually has been done already by MariaDB https://mariadb.org/foundation/ where they have pretty much the same ideology like Foundation for MODX would have. Why I see the Foundation to be good for MODX would be that people who contribute could get faster code reviews etc... right now I have a gut feeling that if the PR affects core and especially the xPDO layer/SQL Model all goes through Jason who seems to be wasted with other stuff. Still guessing here I have PR to xPDO going on for PostgreSQL driver and can do pull request for PostgreSQL MODX when ever I want. But I have the gut feeling that no-one on LLC would have time to test them, where the MODX request would require more than one person to try it out. I've been clicking here and there, but would require more people to test out things.

If the foundation would be done, the 5 board members should be cherry picked from different aspects of web development. One has to master SQL, One has to master ExtJS (cursed thing), etc... in my opinion. And that is tough pick really who would be qualified for the positions. Mark could be the chairman and the big leader. But rest of the positions, hmmm.... from what I've followed the community. There are rare few who understand core enough. But hey, that's just my opinion again

Oh well, writing this after been awake for 1 day. Not a good idea

Hey Shaun! Glad to see you posting here. It's nice to know you still care about us.

Before I begin responding to the topics of this thread, I'll clear up the rumor that I have any equity stake in MODX Systems, LLC. I do not and never have had any equity stake in MODX Systems, LLC. I do however, have a huge stake in MODX the software.

I am an employee of MODX Systems, LLC and the Chief Architect of MODX. Here is my perspective on this thread.

The Silence

First, the lack of posts, minimal technical roadmap direction, and general silence here are multifaceted. It is partially a result of two years of distractions that have changed the priorities for MODX Systems, LLC, especially with regard to management of the OSS project. It is also a result of focusing more on actions rather than words. Words sometimes set expectations improperly, but actions rarely do. As leaders of the MODX OSS projects, we have many times set improper expectations with words, and we sincerely want to change that. That said, we absolutely concede that communication from the project leadership must be improved.

Technical Debt

Despite Shaun's departure, one half of that technical leadership is still here and working hard to reinvent both MODX the OSS, and MODX the brand as stewards of that software and it's community. To be honest, the complexity and stalled development of MODX is more a result of technical debt inherited from former employees, than me being swamped by professional services work. I am swamped with replacing the extremely vulnerable infrastructure that was left behind, and trying to find ways to "fix" core code issues that are not just related to an aging codebase, but in many cases are the direct result of feature implementations and changes added with an attitude more akin to reckless abandon than careful planning.

Toward Open Governance

MODX does need a larger pool of technical talent to lead and direct the project. To that end, we are currently seeing a great increase in quality technical contributions, which we will continue nurturing. Our intention is to continue shifting more and more integration responsibilities to the community as this momentum continues. Once enough momentum is reached, we can begin working toward establishing open governance through a proper advisory board where membership is based on the merit of individual or corporate-sponsored contributions and other transparent factors.

So ultimately, I see no reason for confusion over the ownership and leadership of the product. The so-called roadblocks to establishing an organization for open governance of the project are just that, regardless of the brand ownership. I am actively working to reduce the high cost of ownership of this infrastructure for exactly this reason. We want to grow the MODX community as much as anyone with an interest in the MODX OSS, and in conjunction with the increasing technical contributions, I believe that is exactly what we are achieving.

The Aging MODX codebase

The real difficulty here though is addressing the aging MODX codebase, as many are pointing out. The scope of the current MODX codebase is huge, and part of it is definitely the result of a "not invented here" syndrome. I'm not going to name any specific parts of the software architecture, as this is part of the "roadmap" problem, but it is definitely past time to address the code deficiencies in MODX that are quickly making it technically irrelevant and reducing the critical focus on producing actual Content Management features.

So what extreme, well-defined, strategic measures will MODX be taking to move it to the next level at this defining moment? As a contributor or user of MODX, do you know that those should be? We know the deficiencies and problems, but do you have solutions to those problems ready to contribute? If you do, I would love to discuss them with you.

In the meantime, I am thinking about these problems constantly, and am actively exploring a variety of paths that we might take to get MODX to that next technical level architecturally. And so are a handful of others that are collaborating with me on these problems. They are anything but ignored by the technical leadership – just because you do not see huge strides in the commit logs, product roadmaps, or community discussions on how to best Composer-enable MODX or what pieces need to be decoupled from one another.

Sometimes silence is golden. It remains to be seen in this case, but I will do my best from here to make expanding the technical leadership and making our processes more transparent, my highest priorities. Right behind making sure MODX stays relevant.

Thanks for the update Jason, I'm certain it is appreciated.

Your points and will give them due consideration prior to replying more fully.

It looks like the challenge you're presenting to the community is to develop a higher standard of thinking around MODX, and evolving it's future. I guess the only way this can work is through conversation.

Once again, as this is important, MODX is a solid product that hits the mark in many many ways. I think we all want to make sure it continues to do so.