[midPoint] Evolveum is disengaging from OpenICF project

[Radovan Semancik]

Hello community,

After many years of a cumbersome cooperation we have decided to finally 
disengage from the ForgeRock OpenICF project. We are not happy that we 
had to do this step but there are many reasons to take this move. First 
of all I want to point out that cooperation with the engineers working 
on OpenICF was never the problem. The engineers are excellent and 
helpful. And even though we do not always agree we were always able to 
find some way to cooperate. The technology and the engineers are not the 
problem. The problems go deeper into the processes, management and 
perhaps even business strategy and company politics. Evolveum was a part 
of OpenICF project almost from its beginning. We have made significant 
contributions to crucial OpenICF connectors over past few years. However 
we have not been able to find a way how to efficiently merge the 
contributions with the OpenICF development trunk. We have tried to adapt 
and we have tried several approaches but none of that really worked. 
After two years of failed requests and suggestions to streamline the 
OpenICF contribution process we had finally given up. I'm very sad that 
this had to happen. But our patience is not infinite. And we did not 
want to waste time on bureaucracy and politics instead of writing a 
working code.

Therefore we have decided to split our effort from OpenICF using the 
code that we have created for OpenICF and that was never integrated with 
OpenICF development trunk. We are moving the connector code under our 
own project code-named "Polygon". Currently the LDAP, CSVFile and 
Databasetable connectors have been converted to "polygon" connectors 
that operate directly on top of ConnId framework. Other connectors will 
follow over time.

There should be no significant difference for midPoint users from a 
functionality perspective. The Polygon connectors provide the same or 
better functionality as compared to OpenICF connectors. Only the 
connector type/bundle identification and namespaces are changing. Both 
the OpenICF and ConnId connectors are sill compatible and fully usable 
in midPoint. We will even support the original OpenICF connectors - 
however there are limitations. Starting from midPoint version 3.1 the 
midPoint subscription will include the support for the "polygon" 
versions of LDAP, AD, CSV and DBtable. A separate support agreement will 
be needed to cover OpenICF versions of these connectors. Also the issues 
of any OpenICF connector will only be fixed in its respective polygon 
versions.

I personally hope that this is a change for the better. We are formally 
dropping off the OpenICF project but we are not resigning from all the 
cooperation. We will still try to find a way to cooperate on a technical 
level with OpenICF engineers. We are just not able to fight the 
resistance and bureaucracy of OpenICF project any more.

-- 

                                            Radovan Semancik
                                           Software Architect
                                              evolveum.com