Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

We're in agreement with that, and no worries as I could have expressed my point better :cool:

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

+1.
For any platform, where QT can reach - like blackberry toasters and android freezers - we have already separate poll of 25 devi9ces via QT program, yep?

you're right, that it was clear to me - via common sense - that by "multi-platform", I mean "our" platforms, i.e. Maemo, Harmattan and Mer. Symbian can be licking on the top, but shouldn't be valued as much.

/Estel

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Multi-platform category is a good one, and I'm all for it. :)

In a competition, especially with prizes, there is no common sense. If we want for the competition to go as smooth as it can, we need all the rules to be defined, so everybody is clear on them.

If we include only maemo/meego devices, most probably the winner will be the one with most of the devices, as without a physical device, porting becomes increasingly harder.

The less devices there are, a tie is more likelier. For which we'll also need rules.

IMHO, in competition we'll get what we ask for.
In the other categories we have the invisible hand of the crowd, that ensures some quality and necessity of applications.
If we look for bigger number of applications, we may end with a bunch of small, not so useful ones.

We should also define what is counted as a port. I know it's common sense, but the more the rules are defined the better in the end. They should have the same functionality. Everything has to work on all of them. And others. To not get into situation: it works... kinda. :)

Maybe we could combine the number of applications with a voting through some point system. Maybe 50-50 points, proportionally.
5 platforms, 10 points per platform.
10 applications, 5 points per place. 1st-50, 2nd-45...
Add points together, and compare.
This way, there would be some quality control, from the community.

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Okay, so we need a voting for the Multi-Platform Award,
we'll suggest to target the maemo-ish platforms first,
and we'll take both amount and quality into consideration.

Good idea, but would make the election process more difficult to understand.

How about that:
all apps which are available for multiple platforms will automatically be part of the multi-platform award voting.
In the voting process, we not only show the name of the app and link to it, but also show the amount of platforms it is available for so the voter can take this into consideration.
Of course not everyone would be able to test a multi-platform app on every platform it is available for...
But is that needed?
The idea of adding a voting process is just to filter out the low-quality apps from the high-quality ones, so testing is only needed on one platform.

The community participating in organizing the coding competition would just have to make sure that the app really runs on the advertised platforms.
I could test on N810, N900 (maemo5 and nemo), N950, BB10 dev alpha, Symbian, Android...
I'm sure we'd find iOS users if needed...

edit:
Thanks ljo for the donation about 60 Euro! http://wiki.maemo.org/Maemo.org_codi...ity_Prize_Fund

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Sorry to half high jack the thread but as I am developing my first application and the information could be useful to others - what is the best place to ask developer questions specific to e.g qt mobility/qml?

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Your best bet would be the Qt Developer Network forums: http://qt-project.org/forums/
You can also try Nokia Developer Discussion Boards: http://www.developer.nokia.com/Community/Discussion/

You can also sign up for Nokia Developer Launchpad https://www.developer.nokia.com/Developer_Programs/

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

The development forum on this website, as well as the maemo mailing list are also good targets for questions. My programming questions around here were always quickly addressed by somebody knowledgeable.

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Sounds reasonable.

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Any rules for "where to upload the binaries"?
At the last competion, for half of the apps I wanted to
test, I couldn't find any binary or I couldn't find the
maemo5 binary even it was announced for both (meego/maemo).

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

last year we encouraged to upload a binary to competition.meetmeego.org, but some participants asked to just include a link to the repository where it was uploaded, because the installation process was quite difficult.
We agreed while remembering that the easier the download process is, the more votes your app would probably get.

We could make the "Upload your binary" field as required for submitting an app, no matter what...

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

thp created a harmattan organization on github. Seeing how all entrants have to be open sourced, shall we make it part of the rules that they host their source (and the .deb builds) there?

Contestants can then just link to their binary in the relevant field on the wiki.

Edit: Just realised this would only be valid for harmattan, fremantle and others would have to be hosted elsewhere.

Edit2: Why not just just stipulate that we use the relevant repos? Ie maemo.org repos for maemos 5 and earlier and AppsforMeego for Harmattan. If you want the prize, jump through the hoops!

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

couple thoughts...

i second (third?) kojacker's opinion about being more specific on the "multi platform"
shouldn't we bluntly restrict this to NOKIA platforms?
i'm pretty sure an Android (or iPotato) dev whose application somehow got to run on Maemo (Qt? more likely Python...) probably wouldn't care about the N9(50) (except maybe as a curiosity & sell it on eBay, definitely the N950) :mad:
this would on the other hand mean we could include Symbian / NOKIA Belle (via Qt) :p

after all, the main prices (N9(50)) are NOKIA devices and if i understood it properly, are sourced from NOKIA (?)
correct me if i'm wrong :confused:

N900, dead platform?
as i posted already a few times, i'm able to get a N900 from various shops, all with 2 yr NOKIA warranty (with or without contract).
whether it can be augured as a sign NOKIA is going to release a business worthy successor to the N900 & publicly available successor to the N950 is open to debate (to be held elsewhere, i'm sure) but still, N900 does not seem dead yet, not quiet, at least.
as i once posted before... Totgesagte leben länger :D :rolleyes: :eek:
when looking on eBay (or elsewhere) at the number of bluetooth slide keybords for iPotatos (mostly), one can't help feeling this is still high on many ppls wish list, possibly even requirements :cool:

even more off topic, sort'a...
last few hrs my inbox is over flooded with e-mails from the Maemo mailing list applying for a N9 (or N950).
those are for the Community award, i guess, but still... does it make sense to award a N9 to ppl who already have a N950?
i could marginally agree with the idea of a N9 owner getting a N950 for its obviously featuring a hw keyboard, but the other way around?
explain me the logic, pls?
doesn't quite apply to the coding competition i guess...


eeeeee, what about the TMO logo?
if not replace the election Logo with a CC & All one, could we at least remove it? :eek:

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Thanks misterc :) I can understand a lot of what you said regarding the Nokia products. Though we don't want to be too blunt in the rules with a "Nokia only" and maybe rule out projects which involve other platforms in conjunction with the Nokia product - for example an N900 project that interfaced with a Raspberry Pi project, etc etc. I remember in the first competition we also considered allowing entries from PC projects that could be used to benefit the Maemo device. So perhaps there will be entries that don't necessarily run completely on the handset, and might still have merit for the competition. Although I don't remember one like that actually ever being entered... maybe that's a challenge for someone to come up with something ;)

haha funny you mention that :p as I was jotting down my own application for a N9 (though 5 mins ago I decided to not send it in because i don't see myself as worthy of a community award. i think they should be reserved for extra special members of the community, or people who have done really extraordinary things for the community.) But I'll copy it below, it might help explain the logic behind why some people with a N950 might like a N9 :)

Nobody steal my ex-application! :p

So for me, the reason would be NFC. There may be other hardware reasons why someone would benefit from a N9 over a N950 - it's not just a case of one having a physical keyboard (though it's nice :cool:) There are some more details about the differences between the two devices on the N950 wiki

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

I hope this is tongue in cheek. IMHO, including Android and IOS is just silly. We are just now getting to work on defragmenting Harmattan (and that is not easy). If for no other reason that they do not officially support Qt/QML (and I think there are several other good reasons), we should exclude Android and iOS.

Also, I think I asked the Nemo people some time ago if they were interested in promoting it as part of the coding competition. Never heard back (I think) - so I think someone should talk to them to see how they feel about it.

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

This is Off Topic but...
As the inspiration and a driving force behind the Coding Competitions, which have had over a hundred entries, I think you're more than worthy of a Community Award. If you were to add that achievement to your list, I'm sure the Council would make the award. Don't sell yourself short mate!

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Ah you're very kind mrsellout :D but ive been more than rewarded already with the N950. Indeed driving the competition was a prize in itself as you get to meet so many people in the community and learn so much more about what's going on - I'd really recommend everyone to give it a go. Sometimes you get the odd headache here and there but it's all worth it :) And it's not that hard either, as you know we have a great community here and everyone helps out and everyone pulls together :cool:

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

regarding uploads:
So we should tell them to upload their apps to the official repos (harmattan -> OBS) and linking them at the submission site, right?

multiplatform award:
this is making so much trouble...
if we'd exclude any platform, there would be an upper limit of platforms, resulting in making the multiplatform award meaningless.
Because then it would be very likely that a winner from one of the categories would also win the multiplatform award.

should we cancel it and add another category or a different award?

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

I think we should keep it and give it to the runner up of the other categories with the most platforms. This way we will promote writing for multiple platforms in all categories as a multiplatform app will have one more chance to win, and we will be assured of the quality of the application.

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

If I may chip in, I'll say that I am against all categories. Just make an everything-goes category, let the submissions in and award the 20 best ones, whatever they may be. Nothing else will be fair in my opinion.

Suppose you award 2 submissions in each category. 9 people submit apps to the Utilities category, 4 of which are genius, kickass, holy-crap-this-is-brilliant applications. 5 people submit games, all of which are just "meh." So you award two of the lame games and sacrifice 2 of the absolutely awesome utilities? Sorry, I think that idea is very risky therefore inadequate.

Get rid of categories. The only category worth keeping should be "quality."

Bonus: most of the ongoing discussion in this thread will become moot and the whole project will just move on.

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Brilliant idea I would say.
Would even make the voting much easier.

Just one "category" + the Beginner Award?

Just one prize possible, highest prize counts. If a participant already has a N950, it will be exchanged with the first N9 winner.
If another participant already has a N950, it will be exchanged with the second N9 winner and so on...

Any concerns regarding this system?

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

It's a big change, but it might be the right one. Thinking of the top of my head, some concerns are...

You might not get the same breadth and variety of entries this way. I've always felt that community applications have always been very 'System and Utilities' category oriented, but I don't feel there is the same amount of games or other applications coming through. By removing the categories you'd be removing an incentive for developers to work on these types of applications, imo.

I also think that by having categories you can help stretch the skill set in the community by encouraging and rewarding developers in areas they normally wouldn't enter unless there's a shiny new device to be won :p If it's going to be one big pot of entries all judged together then I, as a developer, am going to stick to my comfort zone in order to make the best quality app i can rather than push the envelope or try something new. For example, I see Cocos2d-x is the featured Qt project of the week (Nokia Developer Team twitter feed). It would be awesome if somebody was to use it to create new games for the competition and bring those skills into the community.

Another concern is presenting the entries for judging. Picking a random number in my head.. 50.. if there are 50 entries in the competition, are people really going to comb through 50 application descriptions to compare and judge them? Having categories breaks it up into 5 or 6 apps which are similar that can be more easily compared. Also, if I am only interested in media or location based applications I know where to go to find them, I don't need to search through a long list to see if there are any.

Hmm.. that's all the possible concerns I can think of at the moment. What does everyone else think?

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

I think that the brightest ideas are most probably the simplest ones, and yet it's so hard to come up with them. I agree with the big pot idea. I will try to address some of kojackers concerns.

Presenting the entries can still be done in categories. After all even the repositories need a category for submission so this imo is a non-issue.

The incentive for developing something apart from System/Utilities is that it is going to get more votes exactly because most utilities are already covered.

The other concern (about incentive to try something new) is legit, but it does not seem to be affected by the existence of categories, as not every developers comfort zone is the same. However we could come up with an incentive for the new. For example award 10 more points to apps from the missing list, or apps with no competitor (no other app with similar functionality).

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Hello,

I like the idea of having only one 'category', but on the other hand as I see is that having (e.g.) an office app challenging with a game it's not so fair. Moreover, as kojacker says, it's hard to go through all the app and make a fair vote.

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

I have one more idea, trying to unite previous two.

What if we keep categories and voting by categories, but do it slightly different way.

Application must take some minimal appreciation (score system or so) to pretend for winning. By default, each category is granted with X prizes. If there's not enough appreciated applications in some category (X-Y), then Y prizes are redistributed to the category overflowing with good apps.

It can as involve developers in exploring something new, as stop them from making crappy pieces of code.

Edit: rearranged my thoughts in more readable way.

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

It's good to hear new ideas, keep them coming in! We've had the same categories (basically) for a couple of years so perhaps it's time to freshen it up :)

You can probably find issues with fairness whichever way you run a competition, and I can see pros and cons with both approaches (categories and no categories).

Sometimes i think we do run too many categories, but I also think having some is helpful. It's all a balancing act i guess :rolleyes:

Hmm... I see what you're saying beresk_let and it's a good idea too :) But i'm thinking who is going to judge if an app is crappy or not? :p I don't think we could have a poll for the community to judge how good each of the entries are or we'd be all fed up with voting all the time! :p So that raises the idea of a selected panel who would test and judge the quality of each app? It would kinda suck for newbies and indeed suck a lot more for experienced developers to have an app ranked as poor when they worked so hard on it, it might be demoralising rather than encouraging, so we'd have to find a nice way to tell people they suck more than others at developing apps ;) But i can see that your idea could work with some thought behind it :)

One way the big pot idea could work is to have a trusted maemo.org panel of reviewers/testers who would work through the entries and provide a final list for the community to judge and rank in the final order. So if there were 50 entries, the panel could narrow it down even to 10 and the community would decide the final placings. But then we'd lose a lot of the community involvement.

Bah .. i don't know, brainstorming.. :)

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Well, kojacker, you're right. Score system need much more time and testing (7 points or 8? Hmmm... let me run this app once more) in general.

But as long as every developer has his (or her) preferred area, so do users. If I don't use much mobile office applications (I really don't), why'd I test them? But some of them may be great and handy for those who do use and test them more accurately. Let them vote and make their preferred apps win!

If we make a big pot, I _will_ have to test all of them, too, because the other way wins the app which has more users and testers (auto-win for games, for example). And there's a danger that some very good, but niche application, will just get drowned. As an example, like if Fremantle and Harmattan get drowned the same way in Android/iWhatever flood :)

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

This sounds good to me. I think multiplatform is good as long as we keep it among related platforms and it promotes that type of work, which the community would greatly benefit from.

As to getting rid of categories, I think they worked OK last year. Maybe reduce the number of categories.

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

I may be interested in participating here; I currently only own a N900, but I'm not a beginner in Linux or programming. I may contribute in various ways to this community :)
Is there a place where to subscribe ? Or is it still in "beta"-stage ?

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Hey Tofe, thanks for being interested - welcome aboard! :) With your programming skills and your N900 you have everything you need to get involved ;)

The competition is still in the stages of being set up, and once it's ready to accept entries you'll be sure to hear about it! In the meantime have a look over the competition wiki and feel free to join in on our discussions here as we get everything ready. For example, the recent discussions on categories - your point of view would be appreciated as much as everyone elses so don't feel shy to join in :)

@SD69 could you do us a favor and add the 2012 wiki link (http://wiki.maemo.org/Maemo.org_coding_competition_2012) to your OP? It's just for new folks stumbling onto the thread.

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

I noticed qwazik was proposing replacing the council election banner on the side bar on the right hand side of the TMO page. He was proposing replacing it with a banner pointing to the council pages. I've asked if we can time share the space with a banner for the coding competition, similar to how we had our coding competition banner last year. We'd only need it for 2-3 months so I can't see a problem with it :) The only problem might be getting a good looking banner lol maybe qwazix can help us with that. Or if there are any budding Michelangelo's or Rolf Harris's out there... ;)

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

council will be pleased to request putting CC banner, as soon as you find appropriate one. BTW, something tells me, that qwazix will like to prepare one for CC :)

/Estel

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Removing all categories sounds very drastically to me.

What about creating only two categories?

games and no games

The games categorie was the biggest one last year if I remember correctly.

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Just to add a little to the discussion of categories vs. no categories:

I just had a look at the results of last years coding competition.
The number of valid votes per category varies from 51 to 96.

When using no categories an effect of this could be, as beresk_let already mentioned, that submissions get overrun by other submissions that simple happen to fall into a more popular category.
E.g., could the top placed submission in an unpopular category never win as it gets overrun by even the last placed submissions in a popular category.
On the other side, this may in fact reflect the absolute "popularity" of submissions overall and not just relatively to each category.


Combining submissions grouped in categories with a single overall voting imho is a bad solution as it gives the impression that categories are important whereas they don't.

Similarly, I consider a "pre-selection" bad as well as this involves some "elitist"/"privilidged" board to meet decisions and exclude submissions on it's behalf. Imho the election of winners should be entirely up to the community and not be (event partly) influenced by some other authority.


So, from my perspective, it boils down to the question of categories vs. no categories. There are reasons for each variant. The most prevalent, from my point of view, is that an overall voting would really reflect the absolute popularity of an app. On the other hand, this results in unpopular application fields being entirely overrun by popular ones.

Another, addmittedly theoretic result of using an overall category is that, as far as my understanding of the voting process we use goes, we would need votes for at least 25 applications. These do not need to be a single vote but all people must have voted in total for at least 25 applications in order to ensure that an order amongst participants can be established to distribute all available devices (This gets even worse if we consider additional prices like money etc.).
E.g., imagine there are only 10 popular apps that receive votes and other apps do not receive votes. Then we could easily establish a ranking between these 10 apps. However, the remaining apps would all share the same rank as they are all placed last. In this situation it would be impossible to determine the remaining winners.
This is admittedly a very theoretic consideration and is also only as far as my understanding of our voting process goes. As we never did a similar voting with such a high number of candidates we do not have any experience from past votings.


These are my, more or less, two cents on this topic.

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

It would be good to have a link to http://www.developer.nokia.com/Commu...i/Apps_Missing visible somewhere for all participants. Some might find useful to find inspiration based on needs declared by users. The content of that wiki page comes from the thread What apps are you missing for the Nokia N9?

(Sorry if this has been discussed before, I haven't gone through the entire thread.)

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Please check and comment on the relevant thread

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

http://wiki.maemo.org/Maemo.org_codi...ation_proposal ;)

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Hello,

I have my application published in Nokia Store for a half of year. Can I also submit it to coding competition?

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

Please don't forget that CC isn't biased to Harmattan - at least, I don't perceive it like that, and hope for many Fremantle proposals/winners. Or, even more likely, multiplatform (Fremantle/Harm/Mer, or at least, Fremantle/Mer - subjective opinion) ones.

/Estel

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

@SD69

Your link to the wiki in the first post is missing a slash between the org and Maemo.

http://wiki.maemo.org/Maemo.org_coding_competition_2012

Re: 2012 Coding Competition
 

qwazix has come through with some designs for the competition banner, of the two proposed i think the one attached below looks best - what do you all think?

I think we should grab it :D