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Posts: 17 | Thanked: 2 times | Joined on Oct 2007 @ Canada
#41
Originally Posted by GeneralAntilles View Post
OS2008 introduced some major API breaks (for the better, as we're now up to date upstream which will make porting much, much easier), so of course OS2007 apps have to be ported.
I'm sorry, this doesn't wash. It's great that they've introduced new APIs, even better that upstream GTK etc is being tracked now. However, this shouldn't have come at the expense of the old APIs. When MS, Apple or even Debian/other Linux distros upgrade to new libraries, they keep old ones around as well so that everything doesn't break. I typically have wxGTK libraries of about three or four versions on my systems for different apps that haven't been brought up to current.

I realize that there are extra constraints with this being an embedded platform. I also think it's acceptable to have this sort of breakage for brand-new platforms in brand-new categories. However, as the platform matures, as is surely the case with ITOS 2008, this sort of behaviour becomes less and less tolerable. I hope this is the last time that Nokia intentionally breaks compatibility. Otherwise, I fear they risk alienating 3rd party developers for the platform. Just look at all of the OSS apps that only work on specific versions of ITOS for examples of this already. Jpilot and Abiword to name two. What did this buy us? Lost apps and lost developers.

Apple, Sun, Microsoft, Red Hat, Canonical, all of them keep old versions of libraries around to prevent just this sort of thing from happening. Sure, deprecate old APIs/libraries, but at least keep them around for a release or two. Can you imagine how popular Java would be if each new release of the JDK broke _ALL_ non-trivial apps compiled against the previous version?
 
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#42
Originally Posted by MstPrgmr View Post
Watch out for the scrolling RSS, it's a CPU hog. Try doing something like playing songs in Rhapsody while the scrolling RSS is enabled and you will see what I mean.
Hmm, i have the idea the scrolling stops as soon as you put another app on top of the "desktop". (Watch the cpu applet!)

Maybe switching from the desktop to an app slows it down a bit, before the rss reader regonizes it isn't on top any more?
 
Posts: 3,841 | Thanked: 1,079 times | Joined on Nov 2006
#43
As soon as I get (the official) OS2008 I definitely intend to pack up my old OS2007 runtime libraries and install them somewhere in OS2008. As benmhall said, that's supposed to work. I'm just hoping that there's no such silliness as forgetting to update the shared library major number in those upgraded OS2008 versions (that would be terribly incompetent if so). And even if they didn't, I'll put the libs somewhere out of /lib /usr/lib and try my old applications with a runtime wrapper.
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Posts: 81 | Thanked: 3 times | Joined on Jul 2007
#44
For those of us who are either thinking about installing 08 or have decided to wait for the official release, how about a few screen shots so we can see what it looks like?
 
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Posts: 2,669 | Thanked: 2,555 times | Joined on Apr 2007
#45
Here's my slightly customized OS2008 homescreen.

 

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Posts: 574 | Thanked: 166 times | Joined on Oct 2007 @ BC, Canada
#46
Originally Posted by shacky4 View Post
For those of us who are either thinking about installing 08 or have decided to wait for the official release, how about a few screen shots so we can see what it looks like?
Reggie posted a 16 minute video walkthrough.
http://www.internettablettalk.com/fo...5094#post95094
 
Posts: 81 | Thanked: 3 times | Joined on Jul 2007
#47
Thanks! Not too awfully different. I look forward to seeing and hearing more about 08. More pics would be great. I will probably wait for the official release, (unless they take too long.)
 
Posts: 81 | Thanked: 3 times | Joined on Jul 2007
#48
Originally Posted by technut View Post
Reggie posted a 16 minute video walkthrough.
http://www.internettablettalk.com/fo...5094#post95094
Cool. I'm watching it now. Thanks.
 
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Posts: 11,700 | Thanked: 10,045 times | Joined on Jun 2006 @ North Texas, USA
#49
Originally Posted by benmhall View Post
I'm sorry, this doesn't wash. It's great that they've introduced new APIs, even better that upstream GTK etc is being tracked now. However, this shouldn't have come at the expense of the old APIs. When MS, Apple or even Debian/other Linux distros upgrade to new libraries, they keep old ones around as well so that everything doesn't break. I typically have wxGTK libraries of about three or four versions on my systems for different apps that haven't been brought up to current.

I realize that there are extra constraints with this being an embedded platform. I also think it's acceptable to have this sort of breakage for brand-new platforms in brand-new categories. However, as the platform matures, as is surely the case with ITOS 2008, this sort of behaviour becomes less and less tolerable. I hope this is the last time that Nokia intentionally breaks compatibility. Otherwise, I fear they risk alienating 3rd party developers for the platform. Just look at all of the OSS apps that only work on specific versions of ITOS for examples of this already. Jpilot and Abiword to name two. What did this buy us? Lost apps and lost developers.

Apple, Sun, Microsoft, Red Hat, Canonical, all of them keep old versions of libraries around to prevent just this sort of thing from happening. Sure, deprecate old APIs/libraries, but at least keep them around for a release or two. Can you imagine how popular Java would be if each new release of the JDK broke _ALL_ non-trivial apps compiled against the previous version?
With any platform you pick your poison. I hope that maemo does NOT follow the Microsoft example and burden the OS with a lot of backward compatibility-- that comes at the expense of speed, and in an area that the tablets can't well tolerate, room (onboard memory).

I understand that you suggest keeping certain legacy libs available for a followup release or two, but in Microsoft's example those legacy libs hang on indefinitely. Remember "DLL Hell"? I don't want to see the tablets replicate that nightmare.

There may be a good middle ground here, but if I had to pick my poison, I'd pick breaking ties with legacy apps and pray that the developer incentives (like the big tablet discounts 500 people will enjoy) will help bring broken apps forward.

The end result, of course, should be that the API breaks come with reasonable benefits, and I don't just mean eye candy. I believe they will.
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Posts: 273 | Thanked: 15 times | Joined on Oct 2007
#50
I have to say that the media player is a huge disappointment. I'm used to being able to copy video from my media server to an sd card in my treo 700p w/o re-encoding or jumping through any special hoops. TCPMP plays whatever I throw at it.

Now the N800 runs a OMAP2420 microprocessor at 400 MHz. The Treo runs a Intel XScale at 312 MHz. Is the XScale that much more powerful than the OMAP2420?

The N800/OS2008 has yet to play any of my personal videos. Luckily, I didn't buy it for that, but I'm surprised as heck that it does such a poor job.
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