User contributions (shipping from Non-US countries)

[Gaelyne Gasson <gaelyne@videocam.net.au>]

G'day Phil,

I wasn't really trying to make more work for Mike, or even being
argumentive... and I hadn't thought of the consequences for those who
do consultation work.  

My only "argument" really is that Minivend is set up beautifully for
companies in the US with the UPS shipping zones and rates already
plugged in. For those of us in other countries though, it can take a
lot of effort to change the country.asc file and make local changes in
the shipping.asc file.  And on the flip side, Minivend is already set
up for internationalisation in terms of currency and language. It
seems odd that it should be so favourable to international use in one
way, but not when it comes to shipping (which relies on local
information).  For the record, I'm an American by birth but Aussie by
choice, so I do understand both sides of the coin.

My time converting the country.asc file did prove interesting as it
turns out that there are more countries we can ship to from Australia
than from US (this was something I didn't anticipate).  Plus while
checking on restrictions, I learned that you can't send playing cards
to Togo. (I guess they don't play "Go" there). :-) 

I'll archive my changed files as soon as I've assured myself that they 
are viable and I've written a few notes.  One of the other files that
needed changing was the ValidCC.pm file - we have an additional credit
card in Oz called Bankcard that needed to be accomodated for.  

Cheers,
Gaelyne


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 On 8 August 1999 Phil Welch wrote:

 > Point well made.  There are of course several forcing functions; one being
 > that Mike wants/needs to control the main distribution; another being that
 > there are a goodly number of MiniVend "Consultants" that earn their way in
 > life by providing what you want for free; and still another being the
 > reluctance of some folks who feel their contribution would be perhaps
 > critiqued for its merits or lack thereof; and finally the built in
 > reluctance many of us have to give, though we are generally first in line
 > for the getting.
 > 
 > In the main, Mike does give credit to "many" contributors to the MiniVend
 > project, so clearly there are givers, and probably enough to implement what
 > you suggest.  So what's lacking?  Sanctioning by Mike?  Web space?
 > Folks to review contributions to insure they do what they say they do (not
 > in my estimation a small thing), and to determine in which release(s) the
 > contribution will correctly function.  What about the contribution which
 > requires numerous changes in numerous modules, which has only been tested
 > for a single release?
 > 
 > I gather that there are more folks than myself that don't know Perl and who
 > would therefore have a potentially difficult time blending changes into
 > whatever release we are currently using.  But the real fun begins when Mike
 > releases a new version, so we have to try to blend our changes into a new
 > release with enough changes to make it challenging even for a Perl
 > programmer.
 > 
 > Of course, were you sitting here with me discussing the various
 > considerations involved in the undertaking you suggest, you could rightly
 > argue that contributions should be make available for those that have both
 > the skills and willingness to use them; and I would agree.  I might even
 > support your argument by suggesting that the original contributor assume the
 > responsibility for maintaining both current and future releases of their
 > contribution to insure that they coincide with future MiniVend releases.
 > But of course that would put an abrupt end to most contributions if anything
 > would.
 > 
 > What about a middle of the road possibility?  Suppose contributions be
 > required to be self contained such that they would continue to operate from
 > MiniVend release to MiniVend release without change.  This would allow
 > credit to be given to the contributor, but which could be optional for those
 > that would like no such credit.  And then as for the enhancements requiring
 > changes throughout MiniVend; submit them to Mike for consideration.  If he
 > liked the contribution, then he could choose to blend such contribution(s)
 > in with the basic MiniVend product as he deemed appropriate, thus
 > eliminating the need to redo contributor enhancements when a new release
 > arrives.  The more likely situation is that a company "can't" implement the
 > next new release because of the mountain of enhancements they have made to a
 > prior release.  Even major corporations fall into this trap.
 > 
 > If your suggestion brings forth a brigade of contributors, and if Mike
 > supports such an undertaking, I would be happy to provide web space.  By why
 > of suggestion, we could use MiniVend to catalog these contributions, and
 > even implement them within subcatalogs so that folks could see what a
 > contribution provided before choosing to download and implement.
 > Unfortunately, while I can contribute the web space, my expertise with
 > MiniVend is pretty much limited to installation and is therefore a long way
 > from being able to implement such a catalog.  Anyway, it really should most
 > appropriately be on the MiniVend site.
 > 
 > Regards,
 > 
 > Phil Welch