Forum OpenACS Development: Response to Is ArsDigita forking the ACS?

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Posted by Roberto Mello on
ACS 4 is indeed a great step from ACS 3.x. I think ArsDigita went the Oracle way because it would be easier for them, and perhaps more profitable, since all their clients care about is Oracle (and Java).

<p>
<i>"As a founder of an open source community I would have thought that ArsDigita would be interested in a layered
    architecture built on open standards. Such an architecture would allow OpenACS to easily swap Postgres instead of
    Oracle for example. " </i>

<p>This would be nice, but perhaps not doable right now.

<p><i>"It would also enable some members of the community to make a cleaner movement away from the AOLServer onto Apache. "</i>

<p>You don't have to use AOLserver anymore. If you are tied to Apache or IIS, (Open)ACS will run just fine on these web servers with the appropriate module. AOLserver is still much more efficient so that's the way ArsDigita went.

<p><i>"What concerns me is that the jump between ACS 3.x and ACS 4.0 is too big and too Oracle specific for there to be much
    incentive to follow."</i>

<p>The jump is big but IMHO it's way worth it. I wish we all had an open source database of the caliber of Oracle too and then everything could be built on an open standard. Join the OpenACS project and help us port ACS 4 to PostgreSQL (and possibly InterBase).