General questions about this project

[MarvinLudwig]

Hi Nikku,

this is not really an issue, but a couple of questions I have. I am pretty new to Github, so if there is any other way to start a discussion, please let me know. First of all, I'm glad that you started this project, thanks! I think I remember you from the Yaoqiang discussion. As Yaoqiang is dead (IMHO), we need another open-source standalone BPMN editor. Forking one of the existing Eclipse plugins seems to be a good way to go. Though I am not a really good Java programmer, I would like to contribute as much as I can, but before I have some general questions:

• Organization: Will this be a "one man show" or is your intention to get a community? What are the measures to attract other contributors? Could there be support from the Camunda community.
• What is the technical connection between Camunda Modeler and this project? Is the purpose of this project just to strip down Camunda Modeler or will new features also be implemented? How are new features in Camunda Modeler are brought into this project, is much manual work neede.
• Why Camunda and not Activiti? (Non-judging question)

I guess your answers of these questions might be valuable to other potential contributors as well, an could be written on the front page.

Thanks

Marvin

[nikku]

Hi Marvin,

thanks for your interest in this project. To start with a disclaimer: I am working for camunda and have in large parts built the camunda Modeler, an Eclipse plug-in for BPMN 2.0 modeling. This is a personal side project of mine, as an efford to provide a OSS standalone modeler for BPMN 2.0 modeling.

It will soon be merged into the camunda github space as an efford to provide company support, maintainance and attract more contributors.

To quickly answer the Camunda vs Activity question: In my honest biased opinion, the camunda Modeler is better functionality (supports pools, lanes and advanced layouting) and quality wise (700+ testcases).

You are always welcome to contribute to the project in the same regard as you may contribute to the original camunda Modeler. Whether or not this will be a one man show depends on if people are willing and able to contribute. The modeler as such is a complex beast (similar in Yaoqiang I guess) and people need to get time to get into it.

The best way to start contibuting is probably by trying out the modeler and giving constructive feedback on what is good, bad and missing. If you try out to setup the development environment, report on where you get stuck and we fix the issue with better documentation.

In short, the camunda Modeler is the core modeling component that needs to be maintained.

• the camunda Modeler is an Eclipse plug-in that is meant to be embedded in an Eclipse IDE
• this project takes the modeler, strips it down and provides a relatively small packaging for the modeling plug-in as well as an installer and some minor modifications

To get the latest changes in this standalone modeler, the camunda Modeler must be checked out and updated, put together with this project into a Workspace and be built from Eclipse. This is likely to change, when this project gets merged into the camunda code base.

Whether or not new features are implemented depends on whether features are missing. My goal for the modeler is to offer an easy to use standalone BPMN 2.0 modeling tool. That said, I would always say yes to extensions that make the program a better BPMN 2.0 modeling tool. I would however be sceptical about proprietary extensions that do not add up to the simple modeling tool vision (check #3).

If there are any other questions, do not hesitate to discuss them in this thread.

[nikku]

I updated the project documentation on how to contribute with more hints on setting up the development environment and building the application.