[TYPO3-ect] Ideas to clean up TER

[Michael]

On 13/02/12 17:17, Oliver Hader wrote:

> [...] I share the thoughts
> of "hiding" outdated extensions in the extension manager and the TER
> online search at the same time. However it might make sense to have an
> additional search for those with a big red warning which states that
> these extensions are not maintained by the original author and the
> security team anymore.

+1, as suggested in:
http://lists.typo3.org/pipermail/typo3-team-extension-coordination/2012-January/003941.html

> What we need to continue:
> 
> 1) News article to announce the whole procedure with a detailed
> explanation of why this happens, what the consequences will be and how
> to circumvent a extension gets "invalid"
> 2) Write to extension authors directly (use the email address in
> ext_emconf.php) and/or the mail address of the key owner - this way we
> can check if these addresses are still valid

I assume this applies to *ALL* ext developers: even if their ext already
shows a dependency to (valid) "start/stop" TYPO3 versions.

Please keep in mind that the email in ext_emconf.php (which is in fact
the same as in the TYPO3 database table "cache_extensions") is an
arbitrary field. I had a quick look at the DB table and some records are
empty, some show more than one email address (comma-separated), some
show invalid addresses like "user_NOSPAM at domain.com" or
"user(at)domain.com", etc.

> 3) modify the ter_fe extension to support outdated extensions - there's
> something going on for the typo3.org relaunch - however I could not find
> the accordant project on forge.typo3.org - might be that one:
> http://forge.typo3.org/projects/show/extension-terfe (ter_fe2 branch)
> 4) "connector" to current TYPO3 version needs to be integrated (to find
> out automatically when a version is considered as outdated)

The identification of "unmaintained" extensions should be on our ToDo
list, too. This covers to change the TER to accept new extensions and
extension updates only, if they have the "start" and "stop" TYPO3
version set (I assume this is the SOAP interface for t3x upload?). This
possibly also requires a change of the EM, to make these two fields
mandatory? Or am I wrong?

> [...] then the ECT needs some more
> new and active members - see the project page on Forge: [...]

I would be happy to contribute to this initiative, depending on the
tasks and timelines of this. Or, at least support the ECT in their efforts.

Cheers
Michael