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Re: Closed Source Packages in Maemo

What are you talking about? What is closed source? All the software providing new APIs are open. These were all announced a year ago. The source code is there. Have some faith in Nokia and Mer...

Re: Closed Source Packages in Maemo

Quote:

Originally Posted by qole (Post 333889)

Well, actually you need two key things that have been poorly done, or missing entirely (in the past) from Nokia's open source attempts:
1) release early and often (no hiding code in between releases!)
2) provide a low barrier to entry (make the released code usable)

Sorry, my English is very bad and I did not understand what you mean.

@ qgil: Already voted. :D

Re: Closed Source Packages in Maemo

Quote:

Originally Posted by qole (Post 333889)

Actually, I very solidly disagree with this one.

The worst thing about most open source projects is that their release engineering and release cycles are abysmally immature.

"release early and often" == "no one with more than 3 functioning brain cells should depend on this software for anything useful".

Release when stable. Release when there's a point to the changes being distributed. Release when the release has matured and been vetted.

Re: Closed Source Packages in Maemo

Quote:

Originally Posted by johnkzin (Post 333922)

There is a paradox in that. Nobody will try the software unless it is stable. Best example is Linux kernel 2.6.0. So many 2.5.x verions, so many 2.6.0-test versions. Only after 2.6.0 was released some very, very nasty bugs were found, and solved.

Re: Closed Source Packages in Maemo

Quote:

Originally Posted by johnkzin (Post 333922)

Or make three versions:
Unstable (in development), Testing and Stable.

- Unstable, for developers. Add all features.
- Testing for find bug. no feature added.
- Stable for end user. Version provided by default.

Re: Closed Source Packages in Maemo

Yes, see alpha and beta versions of SDK, Extras versus Extras-Devel. But when not enough people test and fix bugs on Testing/Beta/Extras-Devel the quality of Stable/Release/Extras won't be good enough.

Re: Closed Source Packages in Maemo

Quote:

Originally Posted by korbé (Post 333928)

ain't that just a Alpha, Beta and public release. practically the whole world is using that strategy over last few years

Re: Closed Source Packages in Maemo

Quote:

Originally Posted by allnameswereout (Post 333753)

You just insulted tons of C and Python programmers. :D has it ever occured to you that if you don't know e.g. C++ you can learn it or hire someone who knows? So lets say you found a bug in PulseAudio. You pay the developer to fix it. With Microsoft Windows that is not possible, whereas almost everything of Maemo is open source. The most important stuff is core software (usually LGPLed libraries) whereas something like Ovi Maps or Google Maps or Mediaplayer can be replaced. The rest of the software does not depend on such proprietary technology. So something like Mer can simply ship without that and be 100% open source, while proprietary software can be programmed and distributed for Maemo without making the OS less free.

I have no disrespect for C and I plan to learn Python once I get my N900. But it does not alter the fact that C/C++ might as well be binary for most people. I do understand it to a point, but not enough to do anything useful. Also talking about hiring a programmer is great if you are a big business, but as an end-user its cheaper to buy a copy of Windows where it "just works".

Funny you should bring up PulseAudio too as ever since Mandriva switched to PulseAudio I cannot get sound to work properly. PulseAudio does not support digital passthru over SPDIF which highlights my point exactly of what for me is the problem with Linux. They happily remove functionality I have been using for years in favour of something new and better, which is not feature complete. Just like how mucked up KDE 4 is compared to KDE 3.

I have also failed to switch back to OSS/ALSA. I uninstalled PulseAudio and got back to ALSA but now have other audio issues and SPDIF still does not work. You just do not have these problems on OS X and Windows.

C/C++ is way above what my brain can handle. A little bash, PHP and Javascript is my limit which is why I suspect I may be able to get into Python a little. But no way do I have the skill to fix the problems I have above. Problems I do not have on Windows 7 as it "just works".

On the other hand I love Linux. It was originally my dialup router and file server, now acts as both fileserver, audio jukebox (when it works) and desktop machine. I would never want to do that with Windows, for a start I would have to buy it first and worry about viruses. But it does not alter the fact, open source is not the holy grail people make it out to be.

Re: Closed Source Packages in Maemo

Quote:

Originally Posted by johnkzin (Post 333922)

Release when stable. Release when there's a point to the changes being distributed. Release when the release has matured and been vetted.

Well... yes and no. If managed properly, release-early-and-often improves your opportunities to catch and fix bugs quickly by expanding your set of testers... which leads to more stability.

Re: Closed Source Packages in Maemo

Quote:

Originally Posted by NvyUs (Post 333934)

ain't that just a Alpha, Beta and public release. practically the whole world is using that strategy over last few years

-CURRENT/Sid/Unstable/SVN is not same as alpha. It is even more dangerous. After you freeze you get alpha/beta/rc/release.