So, as part of the work on getting Free Software to High Schools I have setup Melange tonight on Google App Engine. Now more on what we are going to be using this for later, this post is more about my first thoughts about using the App Engine.

Well first thing is it has so far been crazy easy to use. Now I am not sure if that is due to the excellent documentation on the Melange site on starting to use it or more to do with Google App Engine. One thing I did find surprising (but I already knew) was that they were using Django in Melange which runs on App Engine. Now from what I had first heard you could not run standard FOSS web applications on App Engine, turns out adaptation can be done and is worthwhile for some applications.  However I still see this as a major barrier to entry for using App Engine, one that will turn a lot of users away.

I don’t think this is going to seriously impact managed hosting of more traditional LAMP stacks, the worry I do have with App Engine is vendor lock in.  Now I am not laying the blame at the doorstep of Google here but what I would say is if they want this to be taken seriously by web developers they must make it just as crazy easy to move away from Google App Engine as it is to use it.  The lack of vendor lock in is one of the major reasons I love FOSS, the very same software stack that App Engine is built on.

For me, onto learning more about Melange and getting information into it to convince more people that FOSS development can benefit high school kids here in Scotland and I hope everywhere   Finally let me thank Google for open sourcing this application, making it easier for us to provide similar benefits to high school students as they have previously with GSoC and GHOP.

Take care.