[Vtigercrm-developers] Richie, Gopal or vtiger representation

[Graham Miller]

Hi all, I am new to the community. We are considering joining a CRM project and want to actively
participate for the benefit of ourselves **and** the community.

More comments found below.

Manilal K M wrote:
> Hi all,
>   I am glad that the vtiger community  has started seriously to look
> into the issues of contributors. Before adding anymore features to the
> current code base, I would prefer fixing the security issues and
> cleaning up code in the current code base.

I agree.

> Eg. The application uses PEAR and ADOdb in the source code. I don't
> know why we require two database abstraction layers. This makes the
> code unmaintanable and cumbersome. The current module management is
> really a mess.

This does seem strange. And yes, there should only be one database abstraction layer.

> There is also the whole issue of application structure and strategy.

Has anyone documented the security flaws and what application structures need attention? It
would be good if this info was all in one place so the big picture could be considered.

> Please refer the bug:
> http://trac.vtiger.com/cgi-bin/trac.cgi/ticket/4102 

The bug you mention does not indicate a dramatic flaw in security in my opinion. The passwords
for POP or IMAP are passed in clear text during the protocol transaction between any mail client
and the server anyway so I would not consider them to be that secure.

And further....
I had a look at the roadmap and found it hard to determine what the direction really is. All
those bug fixes and feature requests do not clearly communicate the basic direction or focus of
the project. I think the project needs a big picture description so potential contributors can
feel comfortable about their decisions to support this project.

We are considering investing a large amount of time and money to a CRM project that will end up
value adding our client's internal financial advice platform and would therefore want to be able
to see the direction the CRM software is taking and preferably to have a say in that direction.
That would be paramount if we are to consider returning the results of our programming and
design efforts to the CRM community. And we would certainly want to do that in return for using
a very good piece of software for our benefit.

The alternative for us is to use the current branch and go off on our own. Because we feel there
are some structural things we would want to change in vtiger, our efforts would probably not end
up compatible and therefore will not get returned to the community.

This is my 2 cents worth.

cheers
Graham Miller
Technical Director

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