Mailinglist Archive: opensuse-factory (673 mails)

[Felix-Nicolai Müller <fnmueller@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

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Andreas Jaeger schrieb:
| Reading Felix-Nicolai's blog post, I'd like to get your input on the
| following statement from him:
Sure thing
|
|    I believe that openSUSE is supposed to be a community based and
|    community driven product. While many devs work for Novell and do great
|    work, openSUSE does also depend on its many users. So they should get a
|    hear. It is not OK to only raise this issue on a factory
mailinglist - a
|    mailinglist a regular user will never see.
|
| * factory was setup as list for future development of the openSUSE
|   distribution.  Why is that not working?  Where would you expect to
|   have general discussion about the direction of the distribution?
It is not working because this (and issues like this one) is not
discussed in spots of the internet that are reachable by the regular
users. Most don't subscribe to the list for future openSUSE development,
but go to the forums. This would have been a good place to ask what
users expect and want.
It is perfectly fine to discuss this on this or the -kde ML amongst the
devs. But don't expect this ML to reflect the broad scope of users that
make openSUSE what it is - one of the most liked Distros in the world
with many "support branchens" and spreading the good word about Novell
too. There is no way you can ay at the end (doing it this way) that you
asked the users.
The rather weak response on my blog either shows that the interest in
KDE4 is rather low, that people feel it has been all decided anyways,
that a blog is not the right form to reach the regular user or that it
has not been publicized enough. I don't know which of these reasons is
true (yet).

However, how the KDE4 discussion developed indicates that there is a
bigger and more general problem we will have to deal with asap: lack of
communication and miscommunication.
Let me make this perfectly clear: This is OSS, so the attitude of the
KDE devs that everyone has to either like it or shut up and live with it
(which is my personal experience when I hear things like that there are
"just some community members beating up again on Beineri" (which is not
true, I would rather say his nervous costume is rather thin)) is not
debatable, at least if you believe that the mainly by Novell paid KDE
devs really are OSS like (I am not saying here that this is my
impression, but this is what some might be inclined to debate). However,
if they do what they want and "ram KDE4 down the users' throat" they
must be able to take the heat.
And this is what happened. It was silently decided in 11.0 to only push
KDE4. It was (as for as I experienced it) by user intervention that KDE3
was included. Where would openSUSE be today if that had not happened?
Would the customers be happier or less happy? I somehow doubt taking
away choice would have made them happier. The KDE  devs and any
developer group (as in OSS) can do what they want, but they also have a
responsibillity to take a stand in front of the user for their action.
Either that or the users decide to do what they want and execute their
freedom of choice and use a different product (remember: "rammed down
..."). And do not expect users (who are all contributers - even if it
just for the cause to spread Linux and / or openSUSE) to help products
they do not understand or like. Even regular users can have a major
impact factor. It is geruilla marketing.
Now, communication has already improved by the last painful KDE4
discussion for 11.0. At least people on certain MLs are now asked what
they want. However, this does not serve the "normal" user. Maybe it
would be wise to split the discussion between devs and testers (who live
on MLs) and the users (who live in forums). That way devs could be
presented with an overview of what regular users want - just like the
summary I tried to compile on my blog - and discuss all that internally
(but still openly and transparently to the interested public) on a less
heated ML. That way, even if users complain later on, you can tell them
that you !really! gave them the opportunity to have a say. This is still
not the case now.
As I said, the process has already be improved, but even when opening
the thread on KDE4 for 11.1 it was not made clear how the process to
reach those options given was achieved. I now know what the devs think
to be legit and possible but I do not know who said what when and why.
This points directly to the general problem and what I describe as
missing transparency. I want to know the true reasons, which I
ultimately only can if I can get a transcript of the discussion how
those options were reached. To give you a better example: I filed a bug
report against the non-alphabetical ordering of DEs in 11.0 installer.
It was closed with the comment "This was well thought through by us".
Sadly the bug was removed from bugzilla (at least I can't find it no
more), but yaloki remembers the bug including the response. When I get
such a response for making myself a fool for creating bug reports I feel
entitled to know the anonymous mass of "us" and the definition of "well
thought through". So basically: Who said what when and where.
In order to understand why devs or any group wants something and sees
certain choices a short summary of why the think so and what they think
is not enough. One needs to see the process how the decision was
reached. It would help all groups involved to at least have the
opportunity to take that chance.
Sometimes I am under the impression that how things are done are decided
in a 15-30 minute talk in some office. I would be delighted to be proven
wrong.

Who is a contributer in OSS? Everybody! While having more devs would be
nice, many many people contribute by pushing OSS, the idea, helping
friends, people on IRC or in forums. Some pay, some spread the word,
some code. Measuring codelines is not what can be used to measure
contribution. The answer "what do you do? Why don't you do it yourself,
it is OSS" is not a generally appropriate answer. Such an answer cuts
many people short. Without customers and people pushing OSS, devs would
be nothing (except to be happy for themselves, but then again, they
would probably be lacking input from other devs). No one dev alone can
cope with something like a bigger than little OSS project.
|
| * openSUSE is community based and community driven - but we have Novell
|   engineers doing engineering work with limited time and resources.
|
|   Community means not only discussion but also contribution - and I've
|   heard many requests about KDE3 and KDE4 but so far only saw Carlos
|   stepping up and saying "KDE3 is so important for me that I create a
|   KDE3 LiveCD for openSUSE 11.0".
Discussion can be very helpful contribution.
|
|   It's good to get input and help with prioritization but how can we get
|   more people working on KDE to maintain KDE3 and to improve KDE4?
KDE3 will die. I don't expect anyone to step up to maintain KDE3 as
those who could due to knowledge and time and money will probably wisely
invest the effort in KDE4. I expect those who don't find KDE4 to be
attractive to change DE. For instance: I am in the phase of changing to
XFCE. Just as a personal comment: From a technical standpoint I could
step up and help maintain KDE3. But I am not willing to invest precious
time in a deemed dead project (as this is always heavily emphasized by
current maintainers) as well as I can help better in other areas, like
usability (a straw openSUSE or Novell folks just would have to pick).
And this is where transparency is of matter again. I find it really hard
to produce useful input on usability issues because I am not supplied
with the intel I need. E.g. the UX group made a questionnaire and some
research on the installer and while making public that the openSUSE 11.0
installer is the best ever and the easiest and so forth the actual
numbers (and I would need the setup of the actual experiment) can only
be seen if you have access to the internal Novell network.
How much BS, traps and effort do I have to go through in order to be
_able_ to contribute? And how can it be expected from me to contribute
in all areas (maintain KDE3, talk to the community and cope with
usabillity)? How much can and do you want to ask for? It's not like this
is my entire life or if I'd get money out of this to live from.

I hope this answers you questions. I hope you can answer mine.
Felix
|
| Andreas


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