Contributors v. Writers v. Editors
Chris Carlson
cwcarlson at cox.net
Fri Jun 20 02:07:34 UTC 2008
Mr. Smith,
I sure hope what you say isn't true. It may seem like it, but from what
I've seen comparing Fedora 9 to RH7.3 (where I used to be), the desktop
has improved considerably. Also, since this project is a collaborative
effort, it requires people to focus on the important issues. If you
feel that the desktop is the top issue, then I'd like to suggest you
help make it so. Based on what I've been seeing on the fedora-list,
there are gobs and gobs of bugs that need to be fixed that have nothing
to do with the desktop (your issues with sound are an example).
Could it be that individuals are focusing on their pet projects rather
than the desktop? My guess is the average individual working on Fedora
is Linux-savvy and doesn't care about the desktop for themselves, so
they put their efforts into the bugs or features that interest them.
I also believe that the desktop is extremely important. For Linux to be
accepted in place of M$, it *must* be idiot-proof. Unfortunately, the
underpinnings seem to be changing so rapidly, things that used to work
don't anymore, and no one wants to go back and fix them (or at least
very few do). So, the system gets lots of features, but the desktop drifts.
I myself want to work on the desktop (presuming I have the time).
Unfortunately, it seems that this has become an ominous task as I now
have to learn yet another language (gnome script or kde script), and
that isn't on the top of my priority list right now. Working with X, Xt
and Motif was so much easier 10 years ago. I could develop a Motif
window much like Gnome's or KDEs, but it seems that the world had
abandoned Motif. By the time I get Gnome understood, there'll be yet
another window manager that will be the favorite. :-)
Anyway, I wouldn't say that the desktop is dead; it's just dormant while
other things are more pressing.
Thanks for your view, though. It helps me to understand where efforts
need to be placed.
Chris
Dan Smith wrote:
> Some folks contribute in multiple ways. I've not been able to make a
> big contribution. Life has been a challenging for me the last year or
> so. Another issue that has come up is Fedora's abandonment of the
> desktop. That is a real problem as a key issue with Linux adoption is
> the desktop. It is where you win the hearts and souls of most users.
> Which is also a key issue between me and the group in philosophy. I
> see our key duty in this project is to help adoption of Linux.
> Documentation being the bridge for novice users to gain enough ability
> and confidence in Linux to switch from M$ products to Linux. Fedora
> being for years the easiest to use and most powerful distro out there.
> The official abandonment of the desktop, something you could see
> coming by the official policies of Fedora is the eventual death knell
> of the distro if that course is not reversed fairly quickly. Inovation
> on the desktop is what will prove most vital in adoption rates. Fedora
> in the last 2 years sank from the top used distro to a distant third
> or fourth last year in a Linux journal survey and the same trend has
> been reflected in other distro surveys over the last few years. An
> even more telling sign is three years ago if Linux support was offered
> it was offered as an RPM. Today you are just as likely to see a .deb
> package as an RPM. Many sites don't offer RPMs at all any more. A
> huge change from a few years ago when RPM based distros like Fedora,
> Mandrake and SUSE ruled the Linux market.
>
> I strongly feel that Ubuntu's desktop innovations is the key factor in
> this. I have strong issues with Ubuntu's unfriendly attitude toward
> KDE and it's live CD only distrobution methods. I've not been a big
> fan of Debian distros over the years either so Fedora has remained my
> primary distro where 3 years ago it was my only distro.
>
> Ubuntu for example has tackled the multi-media issues with a gusto. It
> also has worked hard to support the JACK audio system which for some
> reason is the backbone of choice with Linux audio recording software.
> Fedora is almost anti-Jack. It is a real challenge getting Jack to
> work on Fedora for some reason. I've gotten tt to work once so far but
> it was so buggy that I never could use software like Rosegarden with
> any success.
>
> So there is also the issue of enthusiam. Fedora is still easily the
> best free server distro out there. I prefer it even over CentOS which
> is a knock off of RHE. To be honest I prefered Fedora over RHE. Been a
> few years since I was at a shop that used RHE and since there's no
> personal distro no way to keep up with RHE except to use CentOS.
> However what an admin uses at home is going to be what they use at
> work most of the time. Most people will go with what is comfortable,
> known and familuer to them over something that might have a couple
> nice features but is something they don't work with every day on a day
> in and day out basis. As such I feel Fedora's decision to not continue
> to compete on desktop innovation is distrocide, which makes our
> efforts rather pointless and leaves me struggling to find a new
> favorite distro. What I use every day will be what I will be most
> likely and willing to contribute too. Albiet my contributions to this
> group have not been great. In fact I've started a couple arguments
> LOL. However I feel it's important that we keep things open and folks
> on this list have responded in that spirit. Even if they didn't agree
> with me, my disention has been taken in the spirit it was meant, that
> is as constructive criticism. Not sure I can really be listed as any
> of the above any more. Been a year since my last writing contribution.
> Two contributions which never got submitted still sitting on my hard
> drive. I'm considering bowing out of the effort completely however.
> Right now I'm spending more and more time in other distros. I am
> desperately attempting to find drivers for my break out boxes and
> software that I can use for multi-track recording under Linux. My
> laptop is running Kbuntu since finding Fedora drivers for it would be
> a real nightmare. Dell puts out Ubuntu specific drivers that work
> quite well. No point breaking something that works fine. I'm trying
> out 3 Debian based musician specific distros for my recording box and
> considering going with Kbuntu on a new machine for the multi-media
> aspects that I've struggled with on Fedora using FC 6 and 7 on 64 bit
> machines. If I go with the 32 bit version I can get things running but
> would love to use the 64 bit version instead. Not real sure what I'm
> going to do with my file server. FC 7 complained about not having
> enough RAM on it so it's still running FC 6. 128 megs should be plenty
> for a headless server but FC 7 didn't like it. Wasn't even attempting
> to install X on it. So I have to find a less Ram intensive modern
> distro for that machine. Still running FC6 on my other 32 bit machine
> because the scanner drivers break on FC7 but work great on FC6. I also
> lose the sound card on FC7 while it is autodetected and runs great on
> FC6. Problem is it's getting harder to find support for FC6 and when I
> do upgrade the machine it'll probably have to be a non-Fedora distro.
> There are probably solutions but the time and effort to get it working
> compared to using a distro that still supports the rather common
> hardware (Nvidia sound and video) just makes more sense. Less hassle
> and potential for accidentally knocking out my sound & scanner and
> having to redo everything. Last year I had 5 machines all running
> Fedora. In a few months I'll probably be down to one or two Fedora
> boxes.
>
> So in short. People contribute on multiple levels. The level of
> contribution I feel has waned a bit. Still lots of people wanting to
> help. Unless your looking for somebody specific for a specific task
> dont' see how it really matters much. Important thing is generating
> enthusiasm and getting bulk work done initially. That's kind of been
> the weak point of the project the whole time I've been a member. Once
> started work seems to flow very well. Getting the initial documents
> started seems to be the most difficult aspect. There are
> knowledgable, friendly and willing people to carry the task from there
> to completion.
>
> My 2 cents on the topic.
>
>
> On Thu, Jun 19, 2008 at 11:43 AM, Chris Carlson <cwcarlson at cox.net> wrote:
>
>> That won't drive me away. As I said, I'm trying to figure out the lay of
>> the land here. Now I take it there is some documentation that is considered
>> Fedora documentation while other documentation is from other organizations.
>> I guess I presumed if it was accessible from "fedora" via yum, it was
>> considered Fedora documentation.
>>
>> Thanks for the insight.
>>
>> Chris
>>
>>
>> Sulyok Peti wrote:
>>
>> 2008. 06. 18, szerda keltezéssel 22.38-kor Chris Carlson ezt írta:
>>
>>
>> Given this background, I thought I could be of some use to the Fedora
>> documentation project. I'm not sure how much time I'll have, but I want
>> to help. I've already found a minor typo in the documentation for
>> glXIntro. The example program sets an attribute to GLX_DOUBLE_BUFFER,
>> but the symbol doesn't exist; it's now called GLX_DOUBLEBUFFER.
>>
>>
>> I do not want to drive you away, but this problem is not a Fedora Docs
>> issue. If you type
>>
>>
>> $ rpm -qif /usr/share/man/man3/glXIntro.3gl.gz
>> Name : mesa-libGL-devel Relocations: (not
>> relocatable)
>> Version : 7.1 Vendor: Fedora Project
>> Release : 0.31.fc9 Build Date: 2008. máj. 10.,
>> szombat, 07.43.18 CEST
>> Install Date: 2008. máj. 30., péntek, 18.39.24 CEST Build Host:
>> xenbuilder2.fedora.redhat.com
>> Group : Development/Libraries Source RPM:
>> mesa-7.1-0.31.fc9.src.rpm
>> Size : 938090 License: MIT
>> Signature : DSA/SHA1, 2008. máj. 28., szerda, 13.32.44 CEST, Key ID
>> b44269d04f2a6fd2
>> Packager : Fedora Project
>> URL : http://www.mesa3d.org
>> Summary : Mesa libGL development package
>> <<<<<<<<<<
>>
>> So this doc belongs to http://www.mesa3d.org
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
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>>
>
>
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