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digitalmars.D - Is it time for a unicode update of std.uni?

reply =?iso-8859-1?Q?Robert_M._M=FCnch?= <robert.muench saphirion.com> writes:
The docs state that std.uni is based on Unicode version 6.2. There is 
now Unicode V13 and V14 is being worked on. I'm not an expert but it 
looks like new version not only get more Unicode characters but changed 
rules, etc. too.

Dmitry Olshansky did the std.uni module, which is already very useful. 
The last posts I found from Dmitry Olshansky are rather strange and 
look more like coming from a hacked account.

However, would it make sense to catch up to the latest Unicode version 
or was there only higly niche stuff added?

-- 
Robert M. Münch
http://www.saphirion.com
smarter | better | faster
May 03 2020
parent reply "H. S. Teoh" <hsteoh quickfur.ath.cx> writes:
On Sun, May 03, 2020 at 07:19:49PM +0200, Robert M. Münch via Digitalmars-d
wrote:

 The docs state that std.uni is based on Unicode version 6.2. There is
 now Unicode V13 and V14 is being worked on. I'm not an expert but it
 looks like new version not only get more Unicode characters but
 changed rules, etc.  too.
 
 Dmitry Olshansky did the std.uni module, which is already very useful.
 The last posts I found from Dmitry Olshansky are rather strange and
 look more like coming from a hacked account.
 
 However, would it make sense to catch up to the latest Unicode version
 or was there only higly niche stuff added?


[...]

If somebody is willing to step up to update std.uni, that would be
wonderful!  Be aware, though: Unicode is very complicated, and it may
entail a lot of work.  But keeping it up to date would be a big plus for
D.


T

-- 
This is a tpyo.
May 03 2020
parent reply =?iso-8859-1?Q?Robert_M._M=FCnch?= <robert.muench saphirion.com> writes:
On 2020-05-03 18:58:26 +0000, H. S. Teoh said:


 If somebody is willing to step up to update std.uni, that would be
 wonderful!  Be aware, though: Unicode is very complicated, and it may
 entail a lot of work.  But keeping it up to date would be a big plus for
 D.


Since this thing isn't easy and I expect it to take some time until 
it's done and it only makes sense if it's finished and not half-baked, 
I can imagine to sponsor this effort.

Not sure how such a sponsoring would go off, nor if there is someone 
interested & capable to do it. Anyone?

-- 
Robert M. Münch
http://www.saphirion.com
smarter | better | faster
May 04 2020
parent reply Fynn =?UTF-8?B?U2NocsO2ZGVy?= <fynnos live.com> writes:
On Monday, 4 May 2020 at 07:41:11 UTC, Robert M. Münch wrote:

 Since this thing isn't easy and I expect it to take some time 
 until it's done and it only makes sense if it's finished and 
 not half-baked, I can imagine to sponsor this effort.

 Not sure how such a sponsoring would go off, nor if there is 
 someone interested & capable to do it. Anyone?


I guess you should reach out to Mike Parker and discuss if you 
can set this up as Task Bounty via Flipcause etc.
May 04 2020
parent reply =?iso-8859-1?Q?Robert_M._M=FCnch?= <robert.muench saphirion.com> writes:
On 2020-05-04 07:49:41 +0000, Fynn Schröder said:


 I guess you should reach out to Mike Parker and discuss if you can set 
 this up as Task Bounty via Flipcause etc.


Well, ok... after searching around, my usenet reader didn't find any 
Mike Paker, because the email he uses has nothing inline with his 
name... And, the only contact I found on the web-page is 
foundation dlang.org and an info about the committee, but nothing about 
who is involved with which role or whom to contact etc. So not sure if 
this is the correct/best address to use.

A lot of information but the simple question "Whom do I contact to talk 
about a possible sponsoring?" is not answered. I would highly recommend 
to change that.

-- 
Robert M. Münch
http://www.saphirion.com
smarter | better | faster
May 04 2020
parent reply Mike Parker <aldacron gmail.com> writes:
On Monday, 4 May 2020 at 09:32:31 UTC, Robert M. Münch wrote:

 On 2020-05-04 07:49:41 +0000, Fynn Schröder said:


 I guess you should reach out to Mike Parker and discuss if you 
 can set this up as Task Bounty via Flipcause etc.


 Well, ok... after searching around, my usenet reader didn't 
 find any Mike Paker, because the email he uses has nothing 
 inline with his name... And, the only contact I found on the 
 web-page is foundation dlang.org and an info about the 
 committee, but nothing about who is involved with which role or 
 whom to contact etc. So not sure if this is the correct/best 
 address to use.

 A lot of information but the simple question "Whom do I contact 
 to talk about a possible sponsoring?" is not answered. I would 
 highly recommend to change that.


There's a link to the "Donate" page in the Community menu on the 
dlang.org site. There's also a button in the top-third of the 
main page labeled "Donate" that takes you to it. On that page, we 
list several different ways to donate money and provide contact 
information for anyone who wants to sponsor a specific project. 
I've also written about it on the blog more than once, sharing it 
here, on FB, Twitter, and reddit, and will continue to do so now 
and again so folks who missed it might see it and those who saw 
it won't forget it. Any suggestions to make any of this easier to 
find are welcome.

What Fynn was referring to was the Task Bounty system I've set up 
at FlipCause. You can read about it here under the old "Bug 
Bounties" title:

https://dlang.org/blog/2019/08/17/bug-bounties-have-arrived/

and here:

https://dlang.org/blog/2019/10/04/d-language-foundation-funding-new-platforms-new-bounties/

(Neither of these is mentioned on the Donate page, so there's 
something that needs doing.)

The short of it: anyone can seed a new bounty by going to the 
Task Bounty page at:

https://www.flipcause.com/secure/cause_pdetails/NjI2Njg=

And clicking the first item in the list, "Task Bounty Catch-All" 
that has the "Add Bounty" button. Enter the amount you'd like to 
donate to seed the bounty and provide a description in the 
comment field on the donation for (or email the details to me at 
aldacron gmail.com) and I'll set up a specific bounty for it. It 
you first submit an Issue to bugzilla (in this case, an 
enhancement request to update std.uni) and refer to the issue 
number when you seed the bounty, that will give us a way to track 
it.

Otherwise, contact the email on the donate page if you'd like to 
discuss something more elaborate. That will go straight to Andrei.
May 04 2020
next sibling parent reply =?iso-8859-1?Q?Robert_M._M=FCnch?= <robert.muench saphirion.com> writes:
On 2020-05-04 09:52:29 +0000, Mike Parker said:


 There's a link to the "Donate" page in the Community menu on the 
 dlang.org site.


Hi Mike, just giving some feedback how things could be improved/what 
confused me. That's the one I used.


 There's also a button in the top-third of the main page labeled 
 "Donate" that takes you to it. On that page, we list several different 
 ways to donate money and provide contact information for anyone who 
 wants to sponsor a specific project.


Ok, re-read the page and finally found it in between other text at the 
bottom...

"If you have a specific target or project that you wish to directly 
support, please contact the D Language Foundation."

* Remove the info about the D foundation at the top, it's a duplication 
of the "About the Foundation".

* Before "How can I donate?" I think it makes sense to state the 
contact sentence and give an overview how the process works.

Then my miss-understanding comes from:

* The flipcause section states: "You can choose to donate to our 
General Fund or to a specific campaign." I can see the general fund 
button (BTW: make it first, because you mention it first in the text) 
but no button for "specific campaign".

* Clicking "Human Resource Fund for D Ecosystem Tasks" or "D Language 
Foundation General Fund" makes it a  bit more clear what this is about. 
How about adding these descriptions directly to the donate page? Less 
clicks to result.

* "Donations to this fund will be put toward ...." - Who decides about 
for what the money is used? Is progressed tracked? Is this mile-stone 
based? How frequent is progress tracked, reported? Are people informed 
about progress? How and where?



 I've also written about it on the blog more than once, sharing it here, 
 on FB, Twitter, and reddit, and will continue to do so now and again so 
 folks who missed it might see it and those who saw it won't forget it. 
 Any suggestions to make any of this easier to find are welcome.


Great, how about putting refernces to this directly at the top of the page?


 What Fynn was referring to was the Task Bounty system I've set up at 
 FlipCause. You can read about it here under the old "Bug Bounties" 
 title: https://dlang.org/blog/2019/08/17/bug-bounties-have-arrived/
 
 and here: 
 https://dlang.org/blog/2019/10/04/d-language-foundation-funding-new-pla
forms-new-bounties/ 
 
 
 (Neither of these is mentioned on the Donate page, so there's something 
 that needs doing.)
 
 The short of it: anyone can seed a new bounty by going to the Task 
 Bounty page at:
 
 https://www.flipcause.com/secure/cause_pdetails/NjI2Njg=


I didn't found any way from the sponsor page to this bounty page. I 
clicked "Check Out Our Other Compaigns" and clicked to show all 
compaigns. For the ones with a bugzilla number I don't have a clue what 
these are about. Hence, I have to click through all of them and 
remember what it was about... It's not so easy to get a single page 
overview.


 And clicking the first item in the list, "Task Bounty Catch-All" that 
 has the "Add Bounty" button.


That the "Task Bounty Catch-All" is the one to use for new bounties is, 
at least for me, not clear. Again, I think a short description how this 
is intended right at the top of the dontate page would help a lot.


 Enter the amount you'd like to donate to seed the bounty and provide a 
 description in the comment field on the donation for (or email the 
 details to me at aldacron gmail.com) and I'll set up a specific bounty 
 for it.
 
 It you first submit an Issue to bugzilla (in this case, an enhancement 
 request to update std.uni) and refer to the issue number when you seed 
 the bounty, that will give us a way to track it.


Ok, gain, just add this on the donate page.


 Otherwise, contact the email on the donate page if you'd like to 
 discuss something more elaborate. That will go straight to Andrei.


Ok, again... please note that.

If someon want to sponsor a decent amount this is IMO critical 
information. If I sponsor $100 it doens't matter, if I want to sponsor 
$1000 or more it does.

-- 
Robert M. Münch
http://www.saphirion.com
smarter | better | faster
May 04 2020
parent Mike Parker <aldacron gmail.com> writes:
On Monday, 4 May 2020 at 12:22:37 UTC, Robert M. Münch wrote:

 On 2020-05-04 09:52:29 +0000, Mike Parker said:


 There's a link to the "Donate" page in the Community menu on 
 the dlang.org site.


 Hi Mike, just giving some feedback how things could be 
 improved/what confused me. That's the one I used.


Thanks! I'll give the page a bit of an overhaul based on this.
May 04 2020
prev sibling parent reply =?iso-8859-1?Q?Robert_M._M=FCnch?= <robert.muench saphirion.com> writes:
On 2020-05-04 09:52:29 +0000, Mike Parker said:


 What Fynn was referring to was the Task Bounty system I've set up at 
 FlipCause. Anyone can seed a new bounty by going to the Task Bounty 
 page at: https://www.flipcause.com/secure/cause_pdetails/NjI2Njg=
 
 And clicking the first item in the list, "Task Bounty Catch-All" that 
 has the "Add Bounty" button. Enter the amount you'd like to donate to 
 seed the bounty and provide a description in the comment field on the 
 donation for (or email the details to me at aldacron gmail.com) and 
 I'll set up a specific bounty for it.


Digging further into this bounty-system I find the process upside down.

While creating a bounty I need to provide my payment information, so I 
expect that I'm immediately charged for the bounty. But I don't know if 
anyone will do the bounty at all.

To attract someone I have to guess an amount. Maybe I offer to less, 
and someone would say "for +$100 I would do it" but I'll never know. 
The money then is gone on my side and blocked at the foundation because 
it's "task bounded". So cash gone, effect zero. Tha'ts not a good setup.

There is no information what happens when I press the finish button.

The process should be differnet:

1. I offer a bounty I'm willing to sponsor.
2. Someone shows interest.
3. We check-out of a deal can be found.
4. The bounty is created.
5. The persons interested accepts the bounty.
6. Money is paid.
7. Work starts.

Just having many bounties hanging around that are never every taken, 
doesn't rais a lot of trust. My impression would be: "Hmm... not much 
interest..." without even knowing anything about the process, the 
people, the context.

So, going to post my bounty now to the announce group and see if I can 
sort out details upfront and then decide to start it.

-- 
Robert M. Münch
http://www.saphirion.com
smarter | better | faster
May 04 2020
parent reply Mike Parker <aldacron gmail.com> writes:
On Monday, 4 May 2020 at 16:33:10 UTC, Robert M. Münch wrote:

 On 2020-05-04 09:52:29 +0000, Mike Parker said:



 Digging further into this bounty-system I find the process 
 upside down.

 While creating a bounty I need to provide my payment 
 information, so I expect that I'm immediately charged for the 
 bounty. But I don't know if anyone will do the bounty at all.

 To attract someone I have to guess an amount. Maybe I offer to 
 less, and someone would say "for +$100 I would do it" but I'll 
 never know. The money then is gone on my side and blocked at 
 the foundation because it's "task bounded". So cash gone, 
 effect zero. Tha'ts not a good setup.


BountySource works the same way -- you put the money upfront and 
wait for someone to do the job. In our case, the difference is 
that the money is a tax-deductible donation to the D Language 
Foundation that is earmarked for a specific task.

Prior to the establishment of our bounty system, the best you 
could do was leave a note on the donation form and hope the 
Foundation agreed and could find someone to do the task. Now, we 
have a way to:

a) ensure the donation is earmarked for a specific task
b) make it public so everyone can see how that money is being 
earmarked
c) allow anyone else interested in the same task to increase the 
bounty automatically through the donation form to sweeten the pot
d) allow anyone interested in working on D tasks to find ways to 
make a few bucks

No, the bounty may not get claimed for a long while, but the 
money will not be used for anything else in the meantime. And 
occasional posts on the blog will remind folks that the bounties 
are there and inform them when new ones have been seeded.

The system isn't set up to facilitate linking financiers with 
workers. Its focus is on establishing a means to direct how the D 
Language Foundation directs some of the funds it receives when 
you want your donation go to a specific task rather than to, 
e.g., funding a scholarship or paying for work you aren't 
interested in.
May 04 2020
parent reply =?iso-8859-1?Q?Robert_M._M=FCnch?= <robert.muench saphirion.com> writes:
On 2020-05-04 23:03:15 +0000, Mike Parker said:


 On Monday, 4 May 2020 at 16:33:10 UTC, Robert M. Münch wrote:

 On 2020-05-04 09:52:29 +0000, Mike Parker said:


 

 
 Digging further into this bounty-system I find the process upside down.
 
 While creating a bounty I need to provide my payment information, so I 
 expect that I'm immediately charged for the bounty. But I don't know if 
 anyone will do the bounty at all.
 
 To attract someone I have to guess an amount. Maybe I offer to less, 
 and someone would say "for +$100 I would do it" but I'll never know. 
 The money then is gone on my side and blocked at the foundation because 
 it's "task bounded". So cash gone, effect zero. Tha'ts not a good setup.


 
 BountySource works the same way


Which is not a good argument... IMO then there process is broken too. 
Just took a look at the site:

* many old bounties => system doesn't seem to work very good

* no information about AVG time from posting a bounting until done => 
IMO a very critical KPI

* no information about AVG bounty size in relation to time until done 
=> Again, cirtical KPI


  -- you put the money upfront and wait for someone to do the job.


Which is playing lottery and not really a way to move things forward.


 Prior to the establishment of our bounty system, the best you could do 
 was leave a note on the donation form and hope the Foundation agreed 
 and could find someone to do the task. Now, we have a way to:
 
 a) ensure the donation is earmarked for a specific task
 b) make it public so everyone can see how that money is being earmarked
 c) allow anyone else interested in the same task to increase the bounty 
 automatically through the donation form to sweeten the pot
 d) allow anyone interested in working on D tasks to find ways to make a 
 few bucks


I got that. But I think such a system should have the focus on "getting 
things done". My goal would be to shorten the time from publishing to 
done and clearly try to understand what it takes.

If the experience shows: Bounties < $5000 have mostly no chance to be 
done than that helps a lot. How frustrating is it, to sponsor some $ 
and see the thing sitting around for years? That just doesn't make any 
sense.


 No, the bounty may not get claimed for a long while, but the money will 
 not be used for anything else in the meantime.


But opportunity costs are running...


 The system isn't set up to facilitate linking financiers with workers.


Maybe to do that would be a very good idea.

I even don't have a clue how many from the community would be willing 
to work on a contract/bounty/you-name-it. But if these people are not 
in the community where else should I search?


 Its focus is on establishing a means to direct how the D Language 
 Foundation directs some of the funds it receives when you want your 
 donation go to a specific task rather than to, e.g., funding a 
 scholarship or paying for work you aren't interested in.


Again, I don't have a clue what would be done, or what to expect when 
doing such a sponsoring. To me this looks like: "Hey, throw some money 
of the fence and wait for your lootbox." - Not very motivating.

Since I run my own business, I might have a very different view on 
these things but to sum it up (so far, and don't take me wrong here) 
the D sponsoring is not a strategic part of the D story.

The community and technology is great, a lot of highly skilled people 
are here. We don't have to convince us how good and effective using D 
is. However, I think most would be happy if some things could be pushed 
forward much quicker.

At the end of the day, IMO, this comes down to having some financial 
ressources availble/in the market to move things forward, talk about 
successes, attract others, who see there is an infrastructure to get 
things done, etc.

To get this started doesn't require a multi-million USD sponsoring from 
a tech-giant. It requires a more "business related view" on D and it's 
environment.

Again, please don't get me wrong. A lot of people are very engaged and 
contribute a lot, I absolutly honor this. It just feels we are sitting 
in a 600HP car and drive around at the speed of pedestrians...

-- 
Robert M. Münch
http://www.saphirion.com
smarter | better | faster
May 05 2020
parent reply "H. S. Teoh" <hsteoh quickfur.ath.cx> writes:
On Tue, May 05, 2020 at 11:33:31AM +0200, Robert M. Münch via Digitalmars-d
wrote:

 On 2020-05-04 23:03:15 +0000, Mike Parker said:


[...]

 BountySource works the same way


 
 Which is not a good argument... IMO then there process is broken too.
 Just took a look at the site:
 
 * many old bounties => system doesn't seem to work very good
 
 * no information about AVG time from posting a bounting until done =>
 IMO a very critical KPI
 
 * no information about AVG bounty size in relation to time until done
 => Again, cirtical KPI
 

  -- you put the money upfront and wait for someone to do the job.


 
 Which is playing lottery and not really a way to move things forward.


I don't disagree, but you also have to be realistic that this is a
volunteer-based open source project where, unless you're willing to
donate enough to hire somebody to work on something full-time, you can't
really tell people what to do. (Well, you can, but there's no guarantee
they'll listen to you. :-P)  This is both the blessing of an open source
project -- you can sometimes get talent that produces high-quality work
for free -- and also the curse: sometimes there's something that ought
to be done but nobody's interested to do it.

The reason things are structured this way is because it's not geared
towards an employer/employee (or employer/contractor) sort of scenario
where you offer X$, and somebody signs on to fulfill that work.  It's
more a volunteer/volunteer scenario, where the money you offer is more
like an incentive for somebody to step up to do the job for the reward
if they feel interested and the reward is commensurate with the effort
they think they'll need to invest (note: perception here is very
important, it may not correspond with the actual effort/cost). It's a
buyer's market, not a seller's market, unfortunately.

IMO if we really want to get things moving, esp. on important but
"technically boring" issues that nobody shows an interest to work on,
what we need is to actually raise the money to *hire* somebody to do the
work so that they are obligated under contract to do it.  As long as
we're dealing with volunteers, nothing can be guaranteed -- there may be
nobody interested to do the job, or people can lose interest midway, or
they just don't have the patience/persistence to push things through to
the finish.  The only way to get *guaranteed* work is to hire somebody
with an actual contract that obligates both parties.


[...]

 I even don't have a clue how many from the community would be willing
 to work on a contract/bounty/you-name-it. But if these people are not
 in the community where else should I search?


If it's really that important to you, maybe you should be posting an ad
in the job market.  The problem with volunteers is that they can choose
not to take the job, then there's really nothing that can be done about
it.  Hire someone with a legally-binding contract, then you can secure
some guarantees.

And I don't mean any of this in a dismissive way, it's just the reality
of the situation.  It's just the nature of volunteer-driven work: the
interesting things tend to get done, but the boring (though no less
important) work tends to fall by the wayside.  This is why most
open-source projects have great code but poor documentation: because
coding is more interesting and attracts more volunteers, but
documentation is boring and nobody wants to do it.  Unless you can
generate a high level of interest in something, chances are it will be
sitting there for a long time.  I don't see any other way around this
except to hire someone legally bound to fulfill their end of the
contract.  Once you have a legally-binding contract then you can
obligate them to do the work, even if it's completely boring and
uninteresting. Otherwise all bets are off.


T

-- 
They pretend to pay us, and we pretend to work. -- Russian saying
May 05 2020
parent =?iso-8859-1?Q?Robert_M._M=FCnch?= <robert.muench saphirion.com> writes:
On 2020-05-05 14:36:06 +0000, H. S. Teoh said:


 I don't disagree, but you also have to be realistic that this is a
 volunteer-based open source project where, unless you're willing to
 donate enough to hire somebody to work on something full-time, you can't
 really tell people what to do...


I don't disagree, and I fully understand all the mechanics of OOS 
projects, run one myself a very long time ago...


 It's a buyer's market, not a seller's market, unfortunately.


I agree and IMO not unfortunately... My point is "how to attract" or 
"which setup" would be better suited for such a situation. Is a bounty 
system the best way to get things (whatever it is) done in such an 
environment?

If not, why to have one? The impression I get from a non-working bounty 
system (meaning, bounties are not offered, hence not taken) is reducing 
the perception of the cool work all the people are committing here.

And my impression is, the bounty system is suffering from the "seller" 
side, not the "buyer" side. But again, might only be my impression.

I offered $750 for the std.uni bounty. I can imagine it falls into the 
"boring" category. Not sure if anyone is ever interested. But I don't 
have any clue if I could get it started at all.

I might not have the skills, capacity, etc. to do it but I could 
sponsor stuff. May be we do a short poll, not knowing if anyone is 
following this thread: What would be the amount of $ where you would do 
the std.uni bounty?

1. $750
2. $1000
3. $2000
4. $5000
5. $10000

Anyone? Of course I'm assuming that getting payed for doing something 
is a motivation...

-- 
Robert M. Münch
http://www.saphirion.com
smarter | better | faster
May 05 2020