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attila77	2010-08-18 , 19:55
Posts: 3,319 \| Thanked: 5,610 times \| Joined on Aug 2008 @ Finland	#101

Originally Posted by RevdKathy

On the one hand, as a truly open OS, Meego needs to remember where its roots are - on one level it needs to remain a geek toy, a develepment device, a member of the linux family. The version of Meego which removes the X-terminal in the name of 'making it simple for punters' will have lost its way.

Yes, I'm very afraid this is a real possibility, with already a tendency to profile people into separate user and developer communities. I really really hope it doesn't become another jailbreak/root type of thing.

Originally Posted by Venemo

There _should be_ also cheap MeeGo devices. Very cheap ones that will really make it have a good market share.

In Nokia's case they cannot go too low as it would cannibalize Symbian (which IS more efficient on cheaper devices). MeeGo needs to keep it's top-of-the-line image if it is to compete in brand-name sense. Note that we're not talking about niche stuff, just a healthy measure of 'premium smell' - not unlike what the iPhone does brand-wise.

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	tissot	2010-08-18 , 20:02
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Originally Posted by Venemo

Price is a very good way to achieve better market share. An average person will never pay this much for any mobile device.

I dunno why don't they "get" this.

If anything it's Nokia that uses this most. Just compare Symbian market share and device prices to anything else out there.

If we are talking about Nokia, not us customers it's profits that Nokia is after, they got the market share already and have had that for long time.
Qt while not the savior here it's the one that ties Symbian Foundation and Meego together and when you got the software(hopefully) and userbase for it where do you need market share with MeeGo? Again this is looking it from Nokia's perspective.

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	Venemo	2010-08-18 , 20:40
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Originally Posted by attila77

In Nokia's case they cannot go too low as it would cannibalize Symbian (which IS more efficient on cheaper devices). MeeGo needs to keep it's top-of-the-line image if it is to compete in brand-name sense. Note that we're not talking about niche stuff, just a healthy measure of 'premium smell' - not unlike what the iPhone does brand-wise.

It would cannibalize Symbian - yes, but why care?
MeeGo needs to keep it's top-of-the-line image - perhaps
what the iPhone does brand-wise - completely disagreed

Having MeeGo in the cheaper segment would mean more market share, which would result in more interest from application developers. (Eg. if there is a huge user base, there is more chanche that one's app will make more money, thus it is more worth to develop for that platform.)

A thought about Qt:

Currently it is hard to do anything serious without platform-specific hacks. I think this will change in the future, but most of the so-called "multiplatform" Qt apps are full of #ifdefs... Some stuff simply doesn't work, without any reason.

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attila77	2010-08-18 , 20:55
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Originally Posted by Venemo

It would cannibalize Symbian - yes, but why care?

Because it would allow them to offer comparable functionality on weaker (=cheaper) hardware, which gives them more headroom, either via higher profits, or market share via lower prices.

Having MeeGo in the cheaper segment would mean more market share, which would result in more interest from application developers. (Eg. if there is a huge user base, there is more chanche that one's app will make more money, thus it is more worth to develop for that platform.)

Again, if you're a professional developer, the platform is Qt - in which case whether it is 10% MeeGo or 50% MeeGo (opposed to 90 or 50% of Symbian) changes very little in terms of userbase. This is a huuuge advantage over Android or the iPhone where your tools are limited to products that themselves are just a small part of the overall market (no matter how popular on blogs).

Currently it is hard to do anything serious without platform-specific hacks. I think this will change in the future, but most of the so-called "multiplatform" Qt apps are full of #ifdefs... Some stuff simply doesn't work, without any reason.

I agree, but this stuff is fairly new and the Maemo5 specifics have been added solely to be able to make apps that look and feel like the Hildon ones. Expect that to go away or at least be minimized when Qt becomes the 'native' toolkit of MeeGo and Symbian.

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	Venemo	2010-08-18 , 21:08
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Originally Posted by attila77

I agree, but this stuff is fairly new and the Maemo5 specifics have been added solely to be able to make apps that look and feel like the Hildon ones.

Except for the cases when they simply don't work, and the widgets that look ugly on Maemo, etc.

Also note the many undocumented "features", and the other stuff that simply misses a Qt-based abstraction. In these cases, dependencies on other native Maemo 5 libraries are necessary.

Originally Posted by attila77

Expect that to go away or at least be minimized when Qt becomes the 'native' toolkit of MeeGo and Symbian.

Oh, really?

I can already see the "future" - thanks to MeeGo touch (aka. DUI)

Code:

#if defined(Q_OS_MEEGO) || defined(Q_OS_SYMBIAN)
#include <Dui>
#endif

...

#if defined(Q_OS_MEEGO) || defined(Q_OS_SYMBIAN)
DuiButton myButton = new DuiButton("Click me!", this);
#else
QButton myButton = new QButton("Click me!", this);
#endif

So... Portability between desktop and mobile applications is out of the window from the start, unless writing _very_ ugly code.
This was a very unwise decision from whoever invented it.

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Last edited by Venemo; 2010-08-18 at 21:16.

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attila77	2010-08-18 , 22:57
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Originally Posted by Venemo

Except for the cases when they simply don't work, and the widgets that look ugly on Maemo, etc.

Okay, the ugly widgets are the ones that simply have not been reimplemented because people on it are focusing on MeeGo related stuff, it's not an inherent flaw of Qt.

I can already see the "future" - thanks to MeeGo touch (aka. DUI)

Yes, that Duibutton thing is awkward, no need to rub it in, I do that to Qt people all the time

However, workarounds do exist and hopefully QtQuick (well, QML mainly) will minimize that ifdeffing.

So... Portability between desktop and mobile applications is out of the window from the start, unless writing _very_ ugly code.
This was a very unwise decision from whoever invented it.

Well, TBH that is out the window anyway as you UI is bound to be different on a 3-4" touchscreen and a 22" mouse based one. So straight ports would be out of the question, BUT, I agree ifdeffing is the wrong way to solve that. Let's just hope they don't go as far as making another AVKON

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	Venemo	2010-08-19 , 07:55
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Originally Posted by attila77

Okay, the ugly widgets are the ones that simply have not been reimplemented because people on it are focusing on MeeGo related stuff, it's not an inherent flaw of Qt.

So, the fact that some things are simply not working are not a flaw? How do you mean?

Originally Posted by attila77

Yes, that Duibutton thing is awkward, no need to rub it in, I do that to Qt people all the time However, workarounds do exist and hopefully QtQuick (well, QML mainly) will minimize that ifdeffing.

Yes, hopefully QML will bring us salvation.
Still, I see no reason why they invented yet another lanugage. They could go with an XML-based approach (or they could just adapt XAML with their own schema).
But nooo, let's reinvent the wheel again...

Originally Posted by attila77

Well, TBH that is out the window anyway as you UI is bound to be different on a 3-4" touchscreen and a 22" mouse based one. So straight ports would be out of the question, BUT, I agree ifdeffing is the wrong way to solve that. Let's just hope they don't go as far as making another AVKON

Yes, you are right, the UI layout should not be shared across these platforms, but the general UI logic and the general business logic of an application should be. (And fortunately can be.)

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attila77	2010-08-19 , 08:47
Posts: 3,319 \| Thanked: 5,610 times \| Joined on Aug 2008 @ Finland	#108

Originally Posted by Venemo

So, the fact that some things are simply not working are not a flaw? How do you mean?

bugs != structural flaws. Caveats apply, of course and not much fun when you get a "wontfix" in your face but as said - keep in mind that Maemo is shoehorned into Qt while MeeGo and the new Symbians will be native, so far less prone to such outcomes. Also, development momentum is on 4.7 - they are keen on fixing stuff that isn’t right in 4.7, 4.6 issues are more difficult to push.

Yes, hopefully QML will bring us salvation.
Still, I see no reason why they invented yet another lanugage. They could go with an XML-based approach (or they could just adapt XAML with their own schema).
But nooo, let's reinvent the wheel again...

I’m sure a puppy died there. Oh well. On the Labs blog someone said:

Code:

we tried a couple of syntaxes. The biggest trouble with XML is that everything is a string, whereas logically in QML, everything is a JS expression. This makes it rather ugly, as you either have to always dual-quote:

or otherwise mark javascript:

one obvious problem with the latter arises with i18n:

so rest assured, we carefully examined the syntax issue

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	Venemo	2010-08-19 , 09:38
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Originally Posted by attila77

bugs != structural flaws. Caveats apply, of course and not much fun when you get a "wontfix" in your face

Did you know that QMenuBar::show() doesn't work?
One has to restort to a dirty hack (which involves manually "sending" an X event (or rather making the app think it was sent)).

When I asked on #qt-maemo why it doesn't just work, they said that this by design. How can something be flawed by design?

Originally Posted by attila77

but as said - keep in mind that Maemo is shoehorned into Qt while MeeGo and the new Symbians will be native, so far less prone to such outcomes. Also, development momentum is on 4.7 - they are keen on fixing stuff that isn’t right in 4.7, 4.6 issues are more difficult to push.

This is good news, I hope 4.7 will be available on the N900 (and not necessarily as a part of an FW upgrade).

About the "native" argument... Qt if AFAIK a native C++ library. "native" as in "not managed".
I mean, the meaning of the term "native" is often misinterpreted...

Also, the fact that Qt is not part of the OS by default doesn't mean that it shouldn't work.

Originally Posted by attila77

I’m sure a puppy died there.

I feel sorry for that puppy.

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gerbick	2010-08-19 , 09:44
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Why does it seem like when people ask questions about what the future may hold, others just come out and knock that down?

What happened to general curiosity about what may come in the future? Wouldn't we rather know what's coming instead of assuming? Or should we just idly sit back and let the people with blind faith assume that they know what's best for us, allow the silence to continue and allow accountability and future plans reside in the realm of the unknown?

Makes... no sense to me.

The above is totally rhetorical. Just thinking out loud, somewhat exasperated that I would like to know what will come down the pipe and others are... well, from my point of view, against it for some damn reason.