Seems like an interesting effort. A developer is building an alternative Java-based backend to Lemmy's Rust-based one, with the goal of building in a handful of different features. The dev is looking at using this compatibility to migrate their instance over to the new platform, while allowing the community to use their apps of choice.

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[–] deegeese@sopuli.xyz 85 points 10 months ago (3 children)

I have a hard time believing that rewriting the backend from scratch would be faster than getting PRs approved on the main project.

Forks like this with one guy who "knows best" usually die a slow quiet death as they get left behind by the main project.

[–] spaduf@slrpnk.net 57 points 10 months ago (2 children)

I think how quickly this project has gotten to near feature parity is a testament to how slow Lemmy development has been. Think about scaled sort (a feature that has been hotly requested since the migration) and how long that took to get merged in. A sort should not by any means be slow to implement.

[+] cosmic_slate@dmv.social 30 points 10 months ago (2 children)

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[–] spaduf@slrpnk.net 24 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

IMO slow development isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

Sure but even just recently there was the example of breaking federation over Christmas. Some of those issues persist through 0.19.3 which came out today

Similarly scaled sort would have made a huge difference for small communities in the period directly after the migration.

[–] Carighan@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago

IMO slow development isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

Quite the opposite, often it's a benefit as you don't end up wasting time and changing code for features where you don't actually know yet whether your current usage demands or supports them. There's a lot of genefit in not moving fast and not breaking things. Mostly that, well, you don't constantly break things.

[–] deegeese@sopuli.xyz 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

A sort should not by any means be slow to implement.

Sure, if the sort key is something readily available. But for scaled sort they have to compute relative size/activity of the communities the specific user is in. The cost isn't the sort, it's computing the metric.

[–] spaduf@slrpnk.net 9 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

I'm not talking about the literal sorting algorithm. Pretty sure scaled sort is exactly one more operation than hot.

[–] MeanEYE@lemmy.world 5 points 10 months ago

Depends on amount of technical debt really. Sometimes rewrite is the only way. But in general fixing things can be done. It's just matter of time, focus and effort.