Which is exactly why the answer should just be "Extras", as it comes pre-installed on every tablet shipped. . . .

So... stop arguing the toss and let's have a solution pronto.

Well, feel free to provide one. Pronto!

Since we don't run gronmayer.com, and most of us probably don't run any website, it's not easy for us to set that up; even if we could (on a separate site), it wouldn't have the database, so it'd be empty until somebody submitted repos. Which would not be pronto.

Sure thing. You just have to pay me more than my current employer does, and I'll be right on it. Pronto.

Surely you'd do as a labour of love? . Ya know 'for the ITT Community' etc.

Anyhoo... I've emailed Gronmayer Grafik who seemingly run the website(found through whois search) and pleaded with them to fix the site and get it running again. I don't even know if they are the right people, but at least it's something.

Nah. I'm just here to spread cheeks er, cheer. Which segues to a joke:

This guy goes to see the doctor.

"So, what's the problem?" the doc asks.

"Well... I have this birth defect..." the guy starts off slowly and shamefully. "You see, I was born with two asses."

"Hmm, that could be a problem," the doc sympathized. "So what are you wanting?"

The guy perked up a bit. "I was hoping there was a surgery to correct it... you know, lop one of 'em off and stitch me up."

"It would be nice if it were that simple," the doc replied. "But there are so many complications. This condition is so rare that only one person knows how to correct it, and he lives half a planet away. And the expenses are asstronomical--"

At this point the guy gets angry and jumps up. "I knew you would be difficult! I read you the moment you walked in. Just a naysayer. An incompetent! Why, you couldn't diagnose a black eye if it was staring you in the face!"

The doc shrugged patiently. "Sounds like you made a rush to judgment, young man."

The guy ducked his head and replied a little sheepishly, "well... people do tend to say I'm biassed..."

JOKE: There was this bloke who had three asses, and.... ahh skip it - it ends in the word 'triassic'.

3 asses. Well, that beats my pair.

As GeneralAntilles has said, the answer to this is simple, and us "seniors" have been advocating it for ages: if the software you want to download isn't in maemo extras (or, for not quite release-level quality) extras-devel, don't moan at us. Moan at the application authors who don't care about your experience enough to upload the apps to extras.

Such authors may well perceive obstacles to extras uploading; if so, they should communicate them either here or on maemo-developers and steps will be taken to address them.

Interestingly, I know of many experienced tablet users (experience as in OS2005 770 users) who now only install one or two extra repos - including extras(-devel). You see, with experience comes the knowledge that it's not only identifying and installing all the extra repos (which gronmayer.com helped with), but the burnt fingers from conflicting versions of the same package in multiple repos.

It's not just users who the multitude of repos hurts: app authors end up duplicating each other's work, porting libraries that someone else has already packaged.

Well, I asked a simple question and got a devious non-answer.

How else do I get a straight answer to a simple question from you guys?

Sigh. Those of us that cannot yet walk on water liked Gronmayer, we found it useful. When we ask for something similar so that we can get on with our lives then it seems to me to be a strange answer to tell us to go and harass every independent developer to use Maemo instead of creating their own repositories.

You think that is important then that is your itch, not mine. I just want to be able to find some apps to install on my N800 today, Gronmayer helped me do that, Maemo in its current incarnation does not - at least not very well, it does not even have an application search field in the downloads section.

I agree that it sounds like a good idea if (I think this is a big if) Nokia can persuade all developers to use Maemo, but I can understand why some devs would not want to be associated with that dog's breakfast of a site.

I just want a pragmatic solution soon, not at some magical time in the future when all independent devs have seen the light.

If Gronmayer comes back and has a donate button then he gets some money from, pronto!