Zope

There are moments when you go outside the world of Python to run something on the command line in a shell. Python's subprocess module makes this doable. But even though `Guido van Rossum suggested to add a timeout option`_ to that, subprocess.Popen ... [More] doesn't have it. There are a couple of suggestions for crafting such a thing in, some more complicated, some less, some extra complicated for working in Windows, some not. I did not have the Windows requirement here, but I ran into another stumbling block. One of the simplest solutions seems to have been to use the signal module to send a timed SIGALRM to itself. Unfortunately signals in python can be only received in the main thread. That makes the signal solution solution not work in Zope. With some help from mgedmin on #zope, I came up with another solution. I've used threading to spin of a "watchdog" thread that will kill my potentially stuck subprocess after a timeout. Meanwhile, if the main thread finds that the subprocess finished normally, it can cancel out the watchdog. There's even a flag that will be set so the main thread knows if there's been success or a kill... [Less]

Just added the Paypal widget. So if you want to donate. Send us some money. You can use Paypal or send us a check. Remember to review the contribution levels if you want a permanent placement in ZODB book. I would also like to take this time to ... [More] solicit experienced ZODB developers who would like to write on this blog. I hope that this blog could host thoughts and lessons learned using various aspects of ZODB. If a post is particularly good - I believe Carlos has no problem pinching it and giving the author credit in the upcoming ZODB book. If you can contribute financially - there are no more road blocks. Make it happen.If you want to contribute by sharing your experiences with ZODB. Let me know. All you need is a blogger account and I will give you access to this blog.Carlos will be posting a revised book outline by the end of this week. Let's get him working. Contribute now. [Less]

Grok based form framework

Please consider contributing if you benefit from my work with Plone Edit #2 - Well, once again I'm completely astonished by the warmth and generosity of the Plone community. It took less than four hours to reach the target. After 48 hours, we're at ... [More] 143%. People seemed destined to give me more RAM, it seems. :-) I've ordered the replacement machine now, looking forward to taking delivery and then installing a third party SSD and double the RAM shortly thereafter! Many, many thanks to the following contributors (in the order they chipped in): Florian SchulzeAndrzej MleczkoAsko SoukkaSimone DepontiTimo StollenwerkSimone OrsiIsrael Saeta PérezPeter HolzerChristian SchneiderAndy TheyersMartijn JacobsChristoph BoehnerThe folks at Redturtle TechnologyJussi TalaskiviSimon PamiesMax M RasmussenKai DiefenbachDon RossGodefroid ChapelleSilvio TomatisRichard WatsonPedro AraújoRene PijlmanDejan MurkoLaurence RoweAlexander PilzDamian SotoClayton ParkerRafael NunezPaul RoelandRadim NovotnyEric TyrerJane LernerGeir BaekholtIan HoodDavid GlickFrancisco de Borja Lopez RioMatthew BowenCarlos de la GuardiaLee JoramoKevin MitchellBernhard LoeschStephen McMahonDorneles TremeaJoerg BaachJesse SnyderEdward SchumannRoch'e CompaanVitaliy PodobaArryn PidwellMalthe Borch ThorupFabian ReinhardMatthew WilkesDimitri Boone Original post below: As some people may have heard on Twitter yesterday, I had an accident with my MacBook that's left it broken. This comes at a very bad time, with a project to complete, a new edition of my Plone book to be written, and Plone 4 and Dexterity in need of much love and attention. I will need to replace the machine, but my wife and I cannot really afford this right now, with a few other big, unexpected expenses recently having come our way. Therefore, I've set up a "ChipIn" to ask for contributions, which you can see over on the right hand side of this webpage. EDIT - I'd originally taken the price from the US Apple Store, since ChipIn works in US $. Of course, it doesn't really work out that way - it's more expensive here in Australia. I've put up the correct price now, hopefully. Why should you contribute? If you are using Plone, you are probably benefitting from a lot of code I've contributed over the years. I'd like to be able to continue to do that.If you're in the Plone community, I will hopefully have bought you a beer at some point. If not, I'll owe you one. :)You may have read my book. I'd like to be able to get the second edition under way, covering Plone 4.I'd do the same. In fact, I have, when various people's laptops have gotten stolen or damaged in the past. If you want to contribute, please use the widget on the right, or this link. Thank you! [Less]

Packt Publishing has published a book by Juan Pablo Giménez and Marcos F. Romero: Plone 3.3 Products Development Cookbook. It is a very practical book. The authors do not present much theory, except when it is really needed to understand the ... [More] recipes. With 70 recipes of about 5 pages each, there is not much room to go very deep into a subject. I think that does make for a book that I can point to in answer to questions on mailing lists: "Oh, just read that recipe in the cookbook on page 42." Each recipe is structured like this, with some sections being optional: Getting ready some prerequisites for following the recipe. How to do it... actual steps you need to take, commands you need to perform in a terminal, lines you need to add in a file. How it works... explanations for what you just did and how Plone makes it work. There's more... this can point to more information, mostly online, or to alternative solutions. See also: this points to other recipes in the cookbook. Sometimes the 'how to do it' steps make no sense without the hints in the 'how it works' section. For example, when 'how to do it' says this: $ paster create -t plone3_buildout $ cd pox This is only going to work when you follow the instructions in 'how it works' where the authors tell you to enter 'pox' as the project name. In general, the distinction between these two sections does not always make sense to me. But I can imagine that the first time you follow a recipe you will want to read all sections, and the second time you only need the 'how to do it' section because you remember the other steps and explanations from the first time you did this; you may be happy then that this extra information is separated. In the introduction, the authors say: "The book is for programmers who have some knowledge of Python, Plone, and Zope." Indeed without at least some prior experience you may get lost because you miss the bigger picture of the recipes. But the authors start by explaining how to install python and Plone on Linux and Windows, so they get you in a good starting position. I would say the book is for beginning to intermediate Plone programmers. The only new information I saw for myself was about plone.app.content and dexterity. Still, it is good to have available when you think: "Today I want to bake a fresh portlet, let's get the cookbook." You will find good, solid information in this book. As always, there is lots more info on the Packt website, like a table of contents and a sample chapter. You can get a very good idea of what the book is like and if this is something for you by reading the sample chapter about Creating a Custom Content Type with Paster. Disclaimer: I got a review copy of this book for free. If you buy the cookbook via links on this page, I get a small fee. [Less]

Exported a Wordpress WXR file, used wsapi4plone.core to script the import into Plone. Integrated the existing comments into the body text. Added collective.disqus as my new commenting subsystem. Deliverance is used for theming. All document links and the RSS feed stay the same. Here we are again now, hope you like it - it is Plone 4 at least.

The Z Object DataBase (ZODB) has been in production for over a decade. It is very useful outside of the Zope application server. The ZODB offers low friction reliable object persistence. ZODB is not SQL (it is hierarchical and does not require use of ... [More] an ORM layer). Unlike many of its NoSQL cousins, the ZODB supports reliable transactions (ACID). Arguably the ZODB is the most widely deployed object database in the world. ZODB ships with every Plone, Zenoss, Grok, and Zope deployment.Unfortunately the lack of documentation for the ZODB does not reflect its maturity, robustness or feature set. The documentation is scattered. Most of the information is outdated. Many best practices have been learned over the past 10 years. There has not yet been a concerted effort to generate and maintain ZODB documentation. This initiative is set on fixing the first step, generating documentation. The following topical overview is a draft of what material may be covered:Introduction to ZODB.What it is. Maybe some bits about the NoSQL craze, how the ZODB has been doing that for more than 10 years. When is the ZODB a good fit for your app?Your first ZODB application.A short chapter dealing with installation and running the first app.A more complex application.A bit more involved explanation of how it works and a more useful sample application.Basic indexing and searching.The Catalog and indexes. I might use the repoze stuff, which is somewhat simpler.A more in-depth look at the ZODB internals.A little more information about how the ZODB works. At least enough stuff to understand the later chapters about storages and debugging.ZODB Storages.Details about the FS storage and discussion of RelStorage and maybe DirectoryStorage.Other indexing and searching strategies.Other catalog implementations, third party indexes and using external indexing solutions, like Solr.Advanced ZODB.Evolving objects and other problems...not really sure about this one yet.The debugging FAQ: frequent problems and suggested solutions.General debugging strategies and then a FAQ with common problems.Scaling.The ZODB cache, ZEO and replication services.Maintenance.Packing, backups, etc.This project is set on collecting money from the community to fund a seasoned ZODB developer and published writer, Carlos de la Guardia to complete a Creative Commons licensed ZODB book. The effort is significant and we are looking to raise a relatively large amount of money. A professionally written and edited book will be a huge asset for the ZODB community. It will enable developers to evaluate the ZODB quickly and understand the modern patterns of software design applied by seasoned developers using ZODB in production.Update: Jim Fulton has volunteered to technically review the book!Individuals and organizations can contribute and will be recognized for their contribution in the following ways:A printed version available on Amazon will have their name and/or logo's in the book.The ZODB website will provide links to their website.Their contribution will be documented in the main ZODB documentation and will permanently reside in the documentation.The following levels of support are available for sponsoring this project. The target goal is 10000 USD.$20-149, Individual Name$150-399, Company Name$400-999, Company Name + Logo + URL; link on ZODB.ORG $1000-2499, Company Name + .5 page "spread"; link on ZODB.ORG$2500-, Company Name + full page "spread"; link on ZODB.ORGSome other aspects of this project:Provide a modern unique logo/design for the ZODB projectWe hope to flush out and clarify the meaning of all public interfaces and methods in ZODB source docstrings.A Creative Commons licensed PDF will be available.Put the new book online at zodb.orgPossibly provide a hard copy published on Amazon.The ZODB community gratefully appreciates your contribution. We hope to raise enough money to provide the advance to Carlos de la Guardia by end of July 2010. Once the advance is in place Carlos will start work. We will continue taking contributions. Depending on the amount of money we receive in total will dictate the depth and breadth of documentation. Several volunteers/participates have already signed up. We will be providing updates in the near future.The next steps:Register the paypal account to take contributions.Send email to various mailing lists and companies using ZODB soliciting donationsGet Carlos writing! [Less]