September 2010 - openSUSE Project - openSUSE Mailing Lists

[opensuse-project] My Idea of a Good Strategy
by Andy 17 Sep '10

17 Sep '10

To me, the best thing that you guys can do is first define "Who do you want to target?" Why? because it is the best decision that will show you what you want. Something that I can envy from Ubuntu, for example, is the fact that they always wanted that "human connection" with their users. They displayed this in all areas in marketing and I think it still sells well. I believe openSUSE is a tool that helps power users primarily but has lost the feel of what it is like to have newcomers in their distribution. Many may fear that because you take a more "novice" approach to the desktop, that it will take away from the ability that power users have to use the distribution. But to me the matter is more simple. Power users will be more comfortable if they use openSUSE that has a more minimalistic and simpler approach to the desktop because that way, They will be able to focus more on the tasks that they are performing rather than devising ways to customize the desktop to their needs, and things like that. Please, remember that there is hidden potential within the novice users you can attract to openSUSE. Andy -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

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[opensuse-project] Strategy Team Presents First Part of new openSUSE Description
by Andreas Jaeger 16 Sep '10

16 Sep '10

Hi all, Your strategy team has been working hard, as promised, to incorporate the comments you have all given over the last few months into a new document. That document aims to describe where openSUSE stands right now, what users we target, what we are doing. Who we are has been covered pretty decently in the current community statement and now we would like to present you with what users we target. While you can all give us your input in the usual way (commenting on news.opensuse.org, replying on the openSUSE mailinglists, on the forums and in private mail or IM), we have decided to make use of another commenting platform which is much more suited for a discussion like the one we are having. This is called co-ment, a pretty awesome commenting tool under the Affero GPL. We would like to ask you to give your input on the document there instead of in the other channels so the discussion will be more structured and easier for everyone to follow. Select some text you want to comment on (a word, a few words, a sentence) and choose the little yellow + sign on the top- left to add your comment. If you click a colored section of the text, you can see the comments which have been made on it and add your own. Easy peasy! You can find the document here [2]. And for reference here [3] the openSUSE Strategy portal on the wiki. Please have fun! Greetings, Your strategy team References: [1] http://en.opensuse.org/openSUSE:Strategy_Community_Statement [2] https://lite.co-ment.com/text/lNPCgzeGHdV/view/ [3] http://en.opensuse.org/Portal:Strategy -- Andreas Jaeger, Program Manager openSUSE, aj(a){novell.com,opensuse.org} Twitter: jaegerandi | Identica: jaegerandi SUSE LINUX Products GmbH, GF: Markus Rex, HRB 16746 (AG Nürnberg) Maxfeldstr. 5, 90409 Nürnberg, Germany GPG fingerprint = 93A3 365E CE47 B889 DF7F FED1 389A 563C C272 A126

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[opensuse-project] Today we launch The Dabber video player for free
by Daniel Dabber 16 Sep '10

16 Sep '10

Ladies and gentlemen, mina damer och herrar. Today we launch a free version of our popular Dabber player at http://www.dabber-player.com The Dabber player is one of the most beautiful 3D-interface videoplayers for embedding on any webpage. Now you can host your own online tv-channel, display your best content and best of all you can change the look and feel and adapt the player to your webpage. No more black, boring, standard embedded and sad videoplayers. Let´s make Internet more beautiful! You can use our entire range of improved, evolved and very beautiful Dabber video players for only $75 and Free for non commercial use. And for only $95 per month you can have storage, trafik, contentmanagement and all players! Order yours today and use them, love them, and improve all websites out there. You can find them at http://www.dabber-player.com A huge thanks goes to all you brave ones who have ordered and implemented our early Dabber players so far. Your orders, thoughts, feedback and love have taken us to this day. You know who you are! New players and plugins are in the pipeline, both for YouTube, Vimeo, JW, Flow, Html5 and other. We can already provide a CMS as a Wordpress plugin We look forward to your order and feedback! For future newsletters and info please subscribe at http://www.dabber.tv/#news Daniel Daboczy CEO & co-founder DABBER website: http://www.dabber-player.com mobile: +46 (0)736 26 99 85 e-mail: daniel(a)dabber.tv SKYPE: mrdaboczy adress: Frejgatan 8, SE-114 20 Stockholm, Sweden Nominated for "Best Streaming Innovation of 2009" at the prestigious Streaming Media awards in London. This message was sent to opensuse-project(a)opensuse.org from Dabber Stockholm. To stop receiveing info or newsletters from us please reply with the word unsub. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

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[opensuse-project] Revising the Board election rules
by Andreas Jaeger 15 Sep '10

15 Sep '10

Last years election of seats for the openSUSE board showed that our election rules are not complete. So, before the elections this year start, I propose that we refine the rules and like to start with this post a discussion on how to change them. I see the following situations not handled: * Less candidates than seats for a category (Novell/non-Novell) * Equal number of candidates and open seats for a category (Novell/non- Novell) * a board member resigning * a board member disappearing and not engaging in the board * a board member getting hired by Novell or leaves Novell We also need to clarify when the new board constitutes. We should have a light weight process that is not overly complex and results in endless votes. We vote for people that volunteer their time for the openSUSE project and don’t get any material benefits for it. So, let’s keep that in mind when discussing alternatives. Also, currently the board has five elected seats (three non-Novell and two Novell) that get elected, so it could be that we have enough non-Novell candidates but not enough Novell ones etc. To make this text easier, I will not mention this everytime. I have a first proposal before discussing the situations: The board should be allowed to appoint people to board seats until the next board constitutes. The alternative would be to have a special election when a seat becomes empty. I fear that this just overly complicates the process. New rule: Appointment: In case that board seats will get appointed, they get appointed by the board. Appointed seats are only appointed until the next election. The board can appoint also non-Novell folks on Novell seats and vice-versa. I suggest also to not only have self-nominations but that people can nominate others – and the election officials will then ask the nominated person whether they stand up for election. New rule: Nominations: The election officials will take self-nominations, nominations by others and can nominate people for election. The election officials will contact the nominated people and ask them whether they stand for election. Insufficient Nominations: This is a sorry state since it means that not enough openSUSE members are willing to volunteer for the board. In that case, the board should appoint people to join the board and it can put Novell employees on non-Novell seats and vice-versa. With the next election, the seat distribution would be fixed again. New rule: Insufficient Nominations: If there are fewer nominees for elected Board seats than required to fill all seats, than the board will appoint these remaining seats. The question remains what to do with the candidates that volunteer, let’s handle them in the next case: Equal number of candidates and seats One option here is to just declare the candidates as new board members. This would be the simplest process. In other situations, you have a vote of confidence where people give a yes/no vote for the candidates. One suggestion is a yes/no/abstain vote for the candidates and a candidate needs more yes than no votes to be elected. If somebody does not get elected, the seat gets appointed (see insufficient nominations). Since it could happen that one category has enough nominations but not the other, the voting would be different for both categories and this makes the whole process complicated. So, I suggest to change the rule to have just more than 50 per cent yes votes. New rule: Equal number of candidates of seats: If there is an equal number of candidates and seats, voting occurs as normal but each candidate needs to have more than 50 per cent yes votes. In case that seats do not get elected, the board will appoint them. Board member resigning The board should appoint somebody. New rule: Resigning: If a board member resigns, the board should appoint a new board member. Removal of board member This is something that’s not covered yet as well. What happens if a member disappears virtually? Or what if a board member goes wild? New rule: Removal: In the event of repeated absence without contact, or other serious misconduct or negligence, a Board member may be subject to removal. Before any other process occurs, the Board member in question will be personally contacted by the chairperson to try to resolve the situation. If this contact does not successfully resolve the situation, the Board member in question may be removed by unanimous vote of the other members of the Board. The board should appoint a new board member. Getting hired by Novell or leaves Novell The elected seats are currently either Novell employee seats or non-Novell employee seats. Should a board member resign if he gets fired or hired by Novell? IMO the board should stay functional, the seat was elected. So, again let’s use a pragmatic approach: New rule: Change of employment: The board member will continue to stay in the board until the end of the term and the next election the distribution of seats gets fixed again. Constitution There was some confusion when the new term starts, let’s rectify it. New rule: Constitution: A new board term should start on the first of January, the elections should be finished 14 days before. In the case of delays, the new board will start 7 days after the election results are published. Amendment How can we change the rules? Should the election officials be in charge of them or the board itself? As member of the election officials for the 2009 board election, I propose this change but I suggest that anybody can propose changes but that the board has the final say on them. New rule: Amendment: Changes by the election rules can be done by vote of the board where 2/3s approve including the chairperson. So, once there’s consensus about my changes, I propose that the board approves them as stated in the Changes of elections. Conclusion The current openSUSE Board election rules are available in the wiki. Did I miss any case in the elections? What would you differently than I proposed? Btw. I read the Fedora guidelines on Board elections and also read also what Jono Bacon wrote in “The Art of community management” on governance. Published also via: http://lizards.opensuse.org/2010/08/25/revising-the-board-election-rules/ Andreas -- Andreas Jaeger, Program Manager openSUSE, aj(a){novell.com,opensuse.org} Twitter: jaegerandi | Identica: jaegerandi SUSE LINUX Products GmbH, GF: Markus Rex, HRB 16746 (AG Nürnberg) Maxfeldstr. 5, 90409 Nürnberg, Germany GPG fingerprint = 93A3 365E CE47 B889 DF7F FED1 389A 563C C272 A126

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[opensuse-project] openSUSE Strategy Discussion: Status quo strategy proposal
by Andreas Jaeger 14 Sep '10

14 Sep '10

Today we continue with public discussions about strategy proposals, this time with the "Status quo" strategy proposal: ---8<------8<------8<------8<------8<------8<--- == Statement == We deliver a well-balanced GNU/Linux platform for modern computers (workstation, laptop, netbook, server) that equally appeals to end users, power users, developers and server/network infrastructure administrators. It shall protrude professionally and let the user be productive. == Background == This strategy tries to quantify what we tried to do in the past — as it was not written down earlier. So, this is what most users expect from openSUSE today, but does not give a vision for change looking forward. In the context of other distributions, we differentiate ourselves from Ubuntu targeting the newbie and further differentiate from Fedora being experimental bleeding edge — instead we pick "the middle ground". == Key ideas == * Creation of a general purpose distribution that ** anyone can use without too much effort ** is known for good quality (stable and usable but neither outdated nor bleeding edge) ** has good and sane defaults so the user can do what s/he wants to do ** has programs that work out of the box ** focused on modern hardware and their use cases (workstations, laptops, netbooks and servers) ** is targeted towards end users, but is reasonably equally usable for other workloads * Critical analysis of hyped items before inclusion == Activities == === We need to be excellent in the following === * Do as we always did! That is, ** good compromise between actuality and stability ** agreeable release cycle of 8 months ** support for the three most recent releases * Supporting our target customers ** End users: *** Delivering multiple desktops, focusing on both GNOME and KDE *** Focus on providing tools for being productive and creative (IDEs, editors, authoring tools, graphics manipulation, office productivity, etc.) ** Developers: *** Development environments for especially C, C++, Perl, Python, Java, Ruby: IDEs, tools and support libraries ** Power users and system administrators: *** Providing admin tools that are powerful yet (reasonably) easy *** Agreeable command line experience *** Virtualization technique, e.g. KVM, Xen *** Standard networking services * Continue the naturally growth of openSUSE:Factory by incorporating contributors' submissions. === We will try to do the following effectively === * Innovate and keep up with latest upstream developments. * Include a more minimalistic desktop environment. * Provide a low entry barrier for potential contributors. With the openSUSE Build Service, it is easier to make contributions than any other Linux distribution to date. * Offer easy creation of specialized install media (appliances) through SUSE Studio. * Good presentation and marketing, in particular communicating our existing strengths and unique features (i.e. competitive advantages). * The usual niceties: speed, less bloat, possibility of minimality. === As project, we will not focus on the following === (fill in if exists) -- Andreas Jaeger, Program Manager openSUSE, aj(a){novell.com,opensuse.org} Twitter: jaegerandi | Identica: jaegerandi SUSE LINUX Products GmbH, GF: Markus Rex, HRB 16746 (AG Nürnberg) Maxfeldstr. 5, 90409 Nürnberg, Germany GPG fingerprint = 93A3 365E CE47 B889 DF7F FED1 389A 563C C272 A126

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[opensuse-project] EULA and suseStudio
by Raul 13 Sep '10

13 Sep '10

Hello, I wish I took away a doubt: I created a version of the openSUSE suseStudio, called "Iguana". It's ready, but not yet publicly launched why not have a license (EULA). The Iguana has packages that are not GPL (Skype, Java, flash, mp3). My question is: Can I launch without a EULA? Thanks for attention, -- Raul Libório http://rauhmaru.blogspot.com/ rauhmarutsªhotmailºcom openSUSE Member | Linux User #4444581 "There are only 10 types of people in the world - Those who understand binary, and those who don't." -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

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Re: [opensuse-project] EULA and suseStudio
by rauhmaru＠gmail.com 13 Sep '10

13 Sep '10

Hi Andrew, I was reading the LGPL, I think it will serve, but some softwares, such as Skype, say in their EULA that is not allowed to import or export your software. See http://www.skype.com/intl/en/legal/eula/#license_restr , point 2.2 Thanks! On Mon, Sep 13, 2010 at 15:08, Andrew Joakimsen <joakimsen(a)gmail.com> wrote: > You need to look at the non-GPL license software and see if they allow > redistribution. Don't worry about any GPL linking B > -- Raul Libório http://rauhmaru.blogspot.com/ rauhmarutsªhotmailºcom openSUSE Member | Linux User #4444581 "There are only 10 types of people in the world - Those who understand binary, and those who don't." -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

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[opensuse-project] community references
by Andreas Jaeger 08 Sep '10

08 Sep '10

I've started to collect some references that could be relevant for our openSUSE community. As the Community statement states, we'd like to have a friendly, welcoming, vibrant, and active community - and grow it. openSUSE is a unique community project. Communities seems to be one of the web 2.0 buzz words and therefore a lot gets written about how to create and keep a lively and healthy community. Some of that is relevant for openSUSE as well. This page collects - mainly links - to information about community projects and their best practices. The goal is a reference for those that like to look beyond our own openSUSE community to learn from others. The URL is: http://en.opensuse.org/openSUSE:Community_references Remy already polished and added stuff and I'd like you to invite updating the page - and using it, Andreas -- Andreas Jaeger, Program Manager openSUSE, aj(a){novell.com,opensuse.org} Twitter: jaegerandi | Identica: jaegerandi SUSE LINUX Products GmbH, GF: Markus Rex, HRB 16746 (AG Nürnberg) Maxfeldstr. 5, 90409 Nürnberg, Germany GPG fingerprint = 93A3 365E CE47 B889 DF7F FED1 389A 563C C272 A126

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[opensuse-project] Get full satisfaction with a larger size
by opensuse-project＠opensuse.org 03 Sep '10

03 Sep '10

Ranked #1 Men's Supplement by FHM magazine, find out more here http://www.manshorts.ru/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

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