Any Version 4 News?

  • There is some activity in the docs repo. Pull requests are getting merged.


    But it's hard to know what's going on. It could be that we suddenly get version 3.x or 4 even... or nothing. In terms of communication it wouldn't take much. If Perch HQ surfaced a few times a month to say 'we are still working on it'. That would be so helpful.

  • There is some activity in the docs repo. Pull requests are getting merged.


    But it's hard to know what's going on. It could be that we suddenly get version 3.x or 4 even... or nothing. In terms of communication it wouldn't take much. If Perch HQ surfaced a few times a month to say 'we are still working on it'. That would be so helpful.

    I agree. The fact that they aren't posting is a real worry, because obvious damage is being done (to brand and tribe) by radio silence.


    Drew and Rachel have always played their cards close to their chest, being careful not to promise a delivery date for features for example, which is understandable. But to go so quiet is un characteristic.


    I found Drew's post in this thread quite alarming. The tone of it seemed a bit 'I give up'. I do hope they're ok.


    Perhaps they are working on selling Perch off and don't feel they can announce anything until the deal is agreed. We can only guess.


    What I hope is, is that they've formed a band called Deep Perchple and they are currently on tour having a great time.


    Either way, drewm & rachelandrew, my thoughts are with you, as I expect many others here are too.

  • Hi all.


    Firstly, I'm really sorry about the radio silence. As Drew inferred in an earlier post I've not been involved in Perch (other than the fact I deal with the business admin and the servers) for some time. The product doesn't make enough money to justify two people working on it.


    As things stand there is not active development happening with Perch. I believe there are issues with Shop and the SCA requirements, Shop has never had enough usage to really justify a lot of work to implement these things. When we launched it we hoped it would drive take-up of Runway but that hasn't really been the case, and making it a paid add-on would not have made a lot of difference. So I don't think developing that further is something that is likely to happen in the near term.


    In terms of the core product, if there are compat issues with newer versions of PHP I'd be keen to find out what they are in order that people don't run into those, as that seems like something I could get fixed. The core products, Perch and Runway, are very stable and there is no reason why people shouldn't be using those for as long as they want a PHP based CMS, however things like Shop require constant changes to keep up with legislation, and that's not something I'm going to be able to invest time in. My suggestion is that we move those to GitHub under the same account as the docs (they currently live in a private git repo, so that should be easy enough to do) and then if members of the community wish to help fix those issues that's great.


    I'll keep an eye on this thread now anyway if folk have comments but I feel that is probably the best course of action right now. I'm sorry I don't have better news of a new version, however given the current climate I feel the key thing is to make sure that things are stable for your sites.


    Rachel

  • rachelandrew My main question is will you make sure that Perch keeps pace with PHP? I like it and want to continue using it but as PHP versions advance there have been issues that pop up with Perch. Perfect example is PHP 7.4 I have noticed a few issues so I reverted to older versions of PHP to make sure Perch was compatible. I create smaller mom and pop sites so it will work for me as it is, but it will become untenable if it doesn't keep pace with PHP.

  • Thanks rachelandrew for taking the time to explain things. We've missed you around here.



    I think at the very least the community would like to see you:

    • Keep Perch compatible with the latest version of PHP, which you and Drew seem very willing to do
    • Communicate with customers


    I honestly don't expect you/Drew to answer site building questions or constantly communicate with us, but there is an expectation from customers to at least get a response from you on threads like this and this.


    I realise Drew does the forum moderation and keeps it free of spam, but it is a bit slower than expected. For context:

    Every now and then someone on the Perchology Slack group mentions they have to wait days (or even over a week) to get their posts approved here. Sometimes they even get help on Slack before their post gets approved.


    I have also started receiving emails from other customers (who are not on Slack) about this, and all I can do is direct them to the Slack group. The last email I got of this kind was on 23 April. The post still hasn't been approved. While I can't examine the contents of the post myself, based on the slug in the URL they sent me it doesn't look like spam.



    While Perch is great, a stable product may not be enough. Even if the product is not being actively developed, you still need to actively run the business including performing the trivial customer-facing tasks.


    My suggestion is that we move those to GitHub under the same account as the docs (they currently live in a private git repo, so that should be easy enough to do) and then if members of the community wish to help fix those issues that's great.

    In the short run I rather see you communicate with customers more (at least when necessary and expected) than manage PRs on GitHub, but open sourcing first-party add-ons sounds like a good idea.

  • I'm sorry to hear that there's no active development and that you have not been able to push forward with the Perch v4 product and its licensing model.


    I'd echo hus_hmd comments about PHP updates, communication and replies to some admin and licensing issues.


    I'd like to see Perch/Runway core product and add-ons developed. Putting first-party add-ons on GitHub sounds like a good option.


    For Perch/Runway core, I will keep working with it and suggesting it for client sites where it's a good fit. However, this is more and more difficult if development is not there.


    I don't know what to suggest re the core product and I know there have been suggestions about open sourcing. I'm not sure if that's the way to go. I'm sure you have considered different options though.


    I'm more than happy to help with Perch where I can.

  • ...In the short run I rather see you communicate with customers more (at least when necessary and expected) than manage PRs on GitHub, but open sourcing first-party add-ons sounds like a good idea.

    It's a bit greedy perhaps but could we have both? There's a lot of love and enthusiasm for Perch in the community. Several have offered to help with development so moving some addons to GitHub would be a good move. I'd like to see Perch itself move in this direction. That seems better than halting development altogether and starting a slow countdown to obsolescence.


    It terms of communication it wouldn't take much. Brief responses to vital issues and the a few updates a month would be great.


    It's good to hear from you though rachelandrew!

  • I'd like some clarification on whether the Shop SCA issue is going to be addressed. This could have some ramifications for my clients that use Perch Shop.

    This is the same for me too and the timing of this thread being active again is spooky. We took the heavy-hearted decision to move away from Perch/Runway because of the issues raised in this thread. Our clients must have a platform that is supported and continuing to be pushed forward and I was hoping the new subscription model would achieve that as we'd have no problem at all paying for it.


    We have one client using a very active online shop that we built with Shop and to say they are nervous of all that's going on is an understatement. I know SCA is not enforced yet, but they are only willing to wait until the end of May before making the decision to port the shop to a new platform. They have been asking us for this for 8-9 months so I can't blame them. It doesn't sound like an update is due but I'm keeping my fingers crossed just in case.


    It's great to hear from Rachel though and as always, she's been very honest with us. I would hope both her and Drew know how thankful we are of all the efforts they have put in to build a wonderful product to work with.

  • I would love to see Perch continue to be developed to v4 but I understand that isn't possible now.


    I think Perch is a fantastic CMS which is perfect for so many of the sites I and many others work on. The fact it allows you to admin as much or as little of a site as you want (with so many fantastic out of the box content editing options) and still keep streamlined markup without having to download multiple plugins for performance is great.


    I for one would be happy to continue to use Perch on my sites as long as there was some sort of guarantee that the first party add ons provided and the core were kept compatible with the latest PHP version and there were security patches if there were ever any issues. If there were any important support issues, like those listed in the posts above it would be great to hear from Drew also.

  • I'd like some clarification on whether the Shop SCA issue is going to be addressed. This could have some ramifications for my clients that use Perch Shop.

    I've used the new Stripe Omnipay gateway in another perch app, which functions very similar to shop. Now that they've said they won't be working on new updates I'll see if I can put together the new gateway for shop.

  • Hi all. Thanks for your understanding with this. My first priority is getting Perch and Runway working correctly with PHP 7.4, and then moving our addons on top GitHub and making them available for PRs.


    The reality of this process is that PRs need reviewing and testing, and that often takes just as long as writing the code. Therefore if it's going to be successful, I think we realistically need a few people who are going to be willing to participate in the reviewing.


    I'm going to look at she what aspects of the work done on v4 can be ported back into v3 so that functionality can be used.

  • Hi all. Thanks for your understanding with this. My first priority is getting Perch and Runway working correctly with PHP 7.4, and then moving our addons on top GitHub and making them available for PRs.


    The reality of this process is that PRs need reviewing and testing, and that often takes just as long as writing the code. Therefore if it's going to be successful, I think we realistically need a few people who are going to be willing to participate in the reviewing.


    I'm going to look at she what aspects of the work done on v4 can be ported back into v3 so that functionality can be used.

    Drew, I think you'll find that members of the community will be more than happy to help out.

    However good communication is essential, so that the community is kept in the loop and is reassured that the future is not quite so bleak.

  • I am sorry to read this but hardly surprised. It has been obvious that whatever is being said the devs have moved on to other probably more lucrative areas of income. I have (had) used Perch for many years but made a decision a while ago that it was just not going to be a viable option going forward and was falling way behind other options available and support was almost totally reliant on a few community members who could just disappear at any time.


    Honestly I would prefer Perch was either completely open sourced or just given up on, falling between the two stools inevitably leads to decay, and more importantly increasing issues for clients and developers alike who struggle to live with old code and feature sets.


    It gives me no pleasure to finally kiss Perch goodbye but client interests must come first, despite historic attachments and good memories.

  • not going to be a viable option going forward


    Are dinner plates really smashing around us? Websites crashing on the floor in pieces? I'm not seeing that. Remember it doesn't need to do everything under sun, it's a platform you can extend however you like. V3 did bring a lot of cool stuff, it's got a premium vibe, easy learning curve, and underrated "secret sauce" of how it combines with templating and functions. In terms of a fast user-friendly place to put web content, for your apps or whatever, I struggle to see other options able to pull the same bag of tricks. I like open source too, but always happy to pay for well-designed software. When clients understand that, they're not going to listen to your post. BTW, you signed up just to announce you won't be using the software anymore?