work for community porting libs to haxe

[kobi2187]

Hello fellow haxers,
My name is Kobi, I am from Israel.

I've been on the community for some time, but wasn't very active.
I have used Haxe (and typescript) on the last coding project I was involved with, which was for a newspaper company.

I had an idea to help push Haxe forward.
It is quite lacking in the amount of libraries, although the existing ones are of high quality.
I know C# pretty well, and used to be a professional developer with C# (v4 era) and .Net
There are many many mature libraries in that mainstream language.

My idea is to have a part-time salary, by porting open source mature libraries from C# to Haxe.
In order for this to be sustainable, I'd have to have a source of income and hoped the community can provide that compensation.
I am willing to give it a real try, as an independent developer, with the aim of benefiting everyone, if enough people give a little.

Just today, I opened a patreon account, and wrote this idea as transparently as possible, along with the (minimal) sums needed.
The idea is to have an open poll where every patron (supporting member) can name their porting request.

I would very much like to hear your suggestions, and other feedback.
https://www.patreon.com/kobi7

Please share your thoughts with me.
Thanks a lot, kobi

[Franco Ponticelli]

It would be interesting to have an idea of what libraries you want to port first.

Not to derail your idea too much, but you mention that Haxe has already "high quality" libraries. While I agree that a lot of them really nice code in them, I would restrict the numbers of "high quality" to just a very few selected libraries. Most haxe libraries I saw do not have proper documentation and that, in my opinion, disqualifies them as "high quality". I am personally guilty of that ... I have done a lot of Haxe libs and some of them are even pretty cool, I just don't have the time/power of will to document them. Maybe your effort could also include that? Try to compare libraries and support the ones that are worthy with better documentation?

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[tom rhodes]

Some investment from the haxe foundation into externs would probably be the quickest and most cost effective way of getting "high quality" libs into the haxe world. Ports is better though if they work across multiple targets...

[Creative Magic]

Don't want to be all negative, but could you please list the libraries, frameworks or tools you've published? Maybe something on GitHub?

If I am to support you, how can I know you can write good stuff?

As you've said yourself you haven't been very active, so I'd really like to see something you've made before.

Also, as Franco Ponticelli already mentioned, it would be nice to see some list of draft of what libraries you'd like to port.

[Cambiata]

Hi Kobi!

Just an alternative idea:

If you know C# pretty well, maybe you could take part in maintaining/developing the Haxe C# target and/or the tooling around it?
I would love to see C# and .NET Core running on Haxe...

Best! / Jonas

[jacek szymanski]

Hi,

I don't think it will work this way. I think the best way for you is take a not very big, but preferably useful and missing library, port it - it won't take long, I ported kxml2 from Java in less than two workdays, with tests; arguably it is a very small library, but if you are really think about supporting yourself with that, you should be able to work longer, maybe a month, to assure people that you're serious. Or perhaps ask the community what is most sorely missing.

Not to discourage you, but even then it is far from guaranteed that you'll be able to support yourself with patreon money. On the other hand, you can then also try to sell commercial support for ported libraries, or offer porting for commercial customers. Won't be easy, but that's the fate of independent programmers...

js.

---

From: Kobi2187
Sent: Monday, May 22, 2017 8:31PM
To: Haxe
Subject: [haxe] work for community porting libs to haxe

[kobi2187]

Hello Franco, it is an honor to hear from you.

I have no problem with doing maintenance work, tutorials, or documentation.

Do you feel it's benefiting the community as much as having new libraries, though?

Thanks, kobi

[Franco Ponticelli]

I do, until you run out of useful libraries to support :) ... or if you find something that is really not covered by the existing ones (or they are not just good enough).

[kobi2187]

Ηi, it is a very valid request.
However I don't have anything handy right now, as what I wrote were protected closed source projects in different companies.

I realize it sounds risky, therefore I modified the Patreon page to charge by creation, instead of monthly.
If you contribute, you can participate in the poll to choose the port to work on, and only when it's ready will you get charged.
There is also an option to limit the amount per month. Perhaps it is more logical this way, anyway.

From my perspective, I can get hired in the usual market, but then there isn't time to create something better for all of us. It's an opportunity but really depends on circumstances. Let's see how things roll

Thank you for the feedback to my proposal.
Kobi

[kobi2187]

These are great advices. I think I'll take them.
I changed the Patreon way to charge by finished port instead of a salary kind.
I intend then, obviously if time and circumstances permit, to create a few samples.

Here is a list of some nice C# libraries
https://github.com/tallesl/net-libraries-that-make-your-life-easier
https://github.com/thangchung/awesome-dotnet-core

What does everyone feel that is missing in the Haxe ecosystem?
For me the number one was proper regular expression, (and native unicode support).

See you, and thanks!
Kobi

[kobi2187]

Hi Jonas, that is very good.
My intention (however) was first to enrich us, by increasing the "frontend" part, instead of the generated backend. (so haxe libraries can target java, c#, c++, hl, etc.. and not be limited to a c# target)
There is no plan as of yet, but one approach is to "port" the basic dot-net core libraries (corefx) that most other libs depend on.
I don't know yet, how low level I can get. meaning, the basic types will be in haxe - need to see how both match.

What libraries do you feel are missing for you personally, it seems you worked with Dot Net before?

Thanks for your suggestions!
Kobi

[kobi2187]

Hello again!
I've made a form with 4 questions at this URL:
https://goo.gl/forms/qbf5hsBWofSe2wtX2

Do you have a few minutes to ponder and then write your opinion there?
I hope having your input will help me better understand the needs of the community. (if there are even needs)

Thanks, kobi