June 2010 - openSUSE Project - openSUSE Mailing Lists

Re: [opensuse-project] openSUSE Strategy Discussion: another proposal
by Marcus Moeller 17 Jun '10

17 Jun '10

Hi all. ... > "Welcome to the Revolution > SUSE needs to reclaim the desktop based on simple things such as having a > great and daring color palette for the desktop. If you notice, the opensuse > default wallpaper is green, and yet the highlighted items on the file > manager is blue, as well as the oxygen style icons. Suse, loses its branding > fairly quickly once KDE 4 is used. I guess this is not directly related to this thread but I just want to leave a short comment. The goal is to 'extend' oxygen with openSUSE gears. I personally like to keep as most upstream defaults as possible but add brands where it makes sense (and that's how it's done atm). If some parts could be improved that are not directly related to the SUSE brand, do it upstream. That's how open source works. And if you want to promote KDE, the best way so to promote it 'as is'. Best Regards Marcus -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

1 0

[opensuse-project] software.opensuse.org: package search
by Graham Anderson 14 Jun '10

14 Jun '10

Package search is currently borked for all openSUSE choices using the distro selection drop down menu with the helpful error: Error Error Server said: However the response code is 404 and not 500 *shrug* -- “What can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof.” - Christopher Hitchens -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

3 2

[opensuse-project] independence
by Trifle Menot 11 Jun '10

11 Jun '10

On Tue, 8 Jun 2010 10:05:40 +0200, Andreas Jaeger <aj(a)novell.com> wrote: >openSUSE has evolved from SUSE Linux which was a distribution developed behind >the firewall to a project with open mailing lists, bugzilla and wiki now to a >real open source project. It's not anymore only Novell/SUSE employees that >can do things - everybody in the community can get involved. That includes >filing bug reports - like Richard does -, software translation, writing >documentation, marketing the project and development. >There might need to be some attitude adjustement for Novell developers for >many of whom openSUSE is not the first priority and I'm happy to help with >that when it gets pointed out to me. The question remains how to grow the >openSUSE contributor community so that Richard doesn't need to learn C++ to >get a bug fixed ;) > >If you like to continue this thread, please followup on the opensuse-project >mailing list with a different subject I hear rumors Novell is for sale. Will opensuse get its own bugzilla independent from Novell? And what else needs to be done for opensuse to gain full independence? -- Web mail, POP3, and SMTP http://www.beewyz.com/freeaccounts.php -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

30 144

[opensuse-project] How to improve the openSUSE experience [Was: independence]
by Anshul Jain 10 Jun '10

10 Jun '10

Edit: I'm cross-posting my comments as I feel that this deserves a thread of its own, independent from the originating thread which was on another issue... Couple of my observations on how we as a community can make openSUSE better:- (Disclaimer: This is for the normal user and not the expert) 1. Simplify zypper: The whole upgrading procedure where patches and packages are treated separately have to be streamlined. It is a tad confusing for the normal user. Mandriva provides a very elegant and neat way to upgrade the system through their mdkonline applet. Something we should look at as well 2. Package Management through YaST: The Qt version rocks, but the GNOME version simply is sucks. 3. Better bootsplash experience by using Plymouth 4. Simplify the repository structure. There are too many confusing ones, Factory, STABLE, UNSTABLE etc...the KDE guys are working on simplifying it...I guess. GNOME needs simplification. Many mistake Ubuntu to have the best user experience distro....but that tag actually belongs to Mandriva, which still has managed to keep itself alive (I don't know how longer though). Some of their tools are very good like msec (Mandriva Security), menu layout for GNOME and KDE which is unique and very consistent. We could take some cues from there and add the requisite polish on top of it. I'm sure some of these suggestions will be flamed...but I'd appreciate if this not be taken as criticism, but as suggestions to greater improve the distro that we all like. -Anshul -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

5 6

[opensuse-project] Marketing
by Trifle Menot 10 Jun '10

10 Jun '10

"openSUSE" Drop the camel case, it's a pain to type over and over. In a modern search engine world, the keyword value of a name is more important than its capitalization. Germans seem to be fond of camel case (SuSE), but most of the world does not speak German. "opensuse" is better. No caps needed. Not even one. -- Web mail, POP3, and SMTP http://www.beewyz.com/freeaccounts.php -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

5 7

[opensuse-project] Re: Re: [opensuse-gnome] How to improve the openSUSE experience [Was: independence]
by Anshul Jain 10 Jun '10

10 Jun '10

On Thu, Jun 10, 2010 at 10:35 PM, Christian Jäger <christian.jaeger(a)rub.de> wrote: > > > > > -- Gesendet von meinem Palm Pixi > ________________________________ > Anshul Jain <anshulajain(a)gmail.com> schrieb am 10.06.2010 18:50: > > >>> 2. Package Management through YaST: The Qt version rocks, but the >>> GNOME version simply is sucks. > > And please try to get up to date about what's going on in the project before > demanding things that are already in the works. Intensive conceptual work > and development went into the new and improved version of the GNOME package > manager that is in factory. Have you even tried it? > > BTW, I was involved in the design of the 'old' package manager that you > dislike so much; my motivation was that I loathe the utterly human-unusable > QT-package-manager... > > Chris > > If the existing YaST package manager module has undergone a change (and I cannot run Factory as I have only so much space on my laptop), then more power to you. Regarding whats wrong with the GTK interface (in 11.2) is the fact that you need to press two buttons both of which are not close by to select a package for install. First you need to select the package, the go to the lower right corner to select to install. I believe that a simple checkbox beside the package to be installed would be the right way. -Anshul -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

1 0

Re: [opensuse-project] independence
by Dominique Leuenberger 09 Jun '10

09 Jun '10

>>> Per Jessen <per(a)computer.org> 06/09/10 10:28 PM >>> > >Certainly. He also paid USD20million for a ride on the Soyuz - just for >the experience. You have to inform yourself better. Which does not dis-prove the point: he did not do it for 'nothing', he did it, as you write yourself, for the experience. Being rich allows you to enjoy such craziness... 'we' normal people go to a normal amusement park. Rather boring, Dominique -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

2 1

Re: [opensuse-project] independence
by Dominique Leuenberger 09 Jun '10

09 Jun '10

>>> Per Jessen <per(a)computer.org> 06/09/10 8:20 PM >>> >Dominique Leuenberger wrote: > >> Per, >> >> There would be plenty of things you can do on Bugzilla, which would >> not even require coding, or anything. Like: confirm bugs, look if you >> have all the information in a bug to be able to reproduce it. > >Hi Dominique > >that's what I do for the stuff I report, and when I come across bugs I >also recognize. If I can reproduce, I always provide the info. Are >you also talking about others peoples bugs here? Per, Yes, put your feet one step higher. A lot of reporters are 'shoot and forget', but yet after the release you read in blogs that even though it was reported it did not get fixed. Sure, unfair, but reality. Having YOUR help (addressing your directly, but everybody else in the community) in bug screening, info providing, bug confirming, is a rather simple start in getting involved (and no: we should not end up like any random launchpad entry with 100+ "me too" statements... that's ridiculous).. Especially if after a later release you see a bug disappeared: simply ask back: "I tried it with newer version of package XY and can't reproduce this error; can you confirm whether this is solved or still an issue?" Even if the bug is not solved (for the reporter, and you could not reproduce due to whatever difference) is actually not a problem: the reporter feels that somebody cares for his report. Which is an important fact for reporters to see. Other cases, it can be reproduced only with specific hardware (I for example, as a community user, non-novell staff) maintain (almost fully in this cycle) Compiz. A big bunch of the bugs is weird and the latest ones are just not seen on my machine. Yet we could track it down to some issues in intel drivers. So you see: there is more you can help in bugzilla than only looking at your bugs. For example: sign up to opensuse-bugs@ and be ready to read a lot of mails (kidding. don't read all of them). I for myself screen the NEW ones, either for just 'solving' them if I can, marking them as DUP as I remember having seen it somewhere or even just to know what 'issues' others are seeing, in case I run into something similar. In this sense: let's get it going (and this is only bugzilla: many other aspects are certainly as 'simple' to get started and involved... it just requires the motivation). Dominique -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

1 0

[opensuse-project] An update about the Strategy Proposals
by Bryen M. Yunashko 09 Jun '10

09 Jun '10

We wanted to give you an update regarding the status of our Strategy Team's release of strategy proposals for public discussion. Truth is, despite our best intentions to release on this date, we failed to realize each of our personal schedules leading up to this date. For many of us on the team, we had a number of commitments and didn't realize that most of us had scheduling conflicts. We are 90% done completing the wording of our proposals. While we could have rushed to finish everything by today, it was agreed that quality of the proposals was more important than rushing to meet a deadline. As such, we have agreed to postpone the release for one additional week until everyone is able to return to the table and finalize our proposals. The new release date for the openSUSE Strategy Proposals discussion will now be on June 17th. We thank you for your patience and understanding and look forward to a lively discussion next week once the proposals are published. Sincerely, Bryen M Yunashko openSUSE Board Member -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

1 0

Re: [opensuse-project] independence
by Alberto Passalacqua 08 Jun '10

08 Jun '10

2010/6/8 Trifle Menot <triflemenot(a)beewyz.com>: > On Tue, 8 Jun 2010 15:09:06 -0500, Alberto Passalacqua > <albert.passalacqua(a)gmail.com> wrote: > >>2010/6/8 Trifle Menot <triflemenot(a)beewyz.com>: >>We need to listen to opinions only if there is actual interest in >>helping. You stated you won't help, conditioning your help on >>something that is not going to happen. I miss the constructive part of >>the criticism, and I agree with AJ you're just trolling. > > Some people think a troll is anybody who says anything they don't like. > There may be a clinical term for that. Well, I've been around since the beginning of the openSUSE project, and we had quite animated discussions, we disagreed many times, others we found a way to do things, others we did not. Surely you cannot say in this community others opinion is not listened, and you cannot say they try to mute you. Of course there are limitations to what can be done, but that's just the reality of things. As many told you, independence is something important for the openSUSE community too. Independence however does not mean excluding Novell, but simply not depending on them as much as now, if possible. However, you already said more than once you won't be part of the effort to achieve this goal, so the discussion stops making sense. A. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

2 1

Re: [opensuse-project] What's wrong with independence?
by Alexis "Agemen" 08 Jun '10

08 Jun '10

> independence to mean with or without Novell's partnership. I consider > Novell's partnership to be vital. I don't think it coul be rational to think another way. Even if the community achieve independence, I really hope we will have the chance to count novell in the community. Because, contrary to most of these people who don't imply enough in projects (and unfornately i'm one of those, sorry... I try to help my way, though :-) ), Novell has resources it can allocate to the openSUSE project. Insuch a scheme, Novell becomes a contributor. And I think it would be a very profitable situation. Greetings, Agemen. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

1 0

[opensuse-project] Distributing a distribution based on openSUSE 11.2 and created with SUSE Studio
by Alberto Passalacqua 08 Jun '10

08 Jun '10

Dear All, I would like to create a live distribution (CD and USB) based on openSUSE 11.2 with SUSE Studio, and then redistribute it. The basic idea is to provide openSUSE 11.2 with the addition of a few open source packages used in Computational Fluid Dynamics or, more generally, in scientific environments. In particular, the distribution will contain, initially: - OpenFOAM (www.openfoam.com) - Salomé ( http://www.salome-platform.org/ ) - enGrid ( http://www.salome-platform.org/ ) - wxMaxima ( http://wxmaxima.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page ) - Grace ( http://plasma-gate.weizmann.ac.il/Grace/ ) The idea is to provide users of these software an easy way to access to it with openSUSE. My questions are about the redistribution. According to the guidelines I'm supposed to remove all openSUSE branding, but it is not clear to me how I should proceed on SUSE Studio to do so. Additionally, does this mean that I cannot use the "openSUSE" KDE Menu (meaning with the Geeko icon? And I have to remove the window decorations with the chameleon too, going back to a basic KDE look? Thanks for any help you'll provide. Best regards, Alberto -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

5 9

[opensuse-project] Blogging and visibility
by Javier Llorente 05 Jun '10

05 Jun '10

Hello listmates, Some people already blog about their work on openSUSE. However, others prefer to be silent about their work. So in that case, I suggest having a member of the same team blogging about that person's work on his/her personal blog or on an openSUSE/Team blog and then request to have it aggregated on the appropriate planets. The idea behind this is giving the openSUSE/Team (replace team with KDE, GNOME, etc) more visibility. Greetings, -- Javier Llorente

6 7

[opensuse-project] Strategy Discussion
by Marcus Moeller 02 Jun '10

02 Jun '10

Hi all. I have noticed the Strategy Discussion on the news: http://news.opensuse.org/2010/05/20/opensuse-strategy-meeting/ and would like to share some ideas. As I was off for quite a while (helping out on Fedora/CentOS as well, e.g. organizing this years FUDCon EMEA) I want to point those who don't remember me to my personal page on the wiki, first: http://en.opensuse.org/User:MarcusMoeller But now back to the topic. The SWOT doc already contains some useful information, but first question I would like to ask is what are you heading for? Imho there are two major points: the product itself and the community around it. I have picked up some imported points from the SWOT and commented below: W: Novell is not seen - like Red Hat - as Open Source friend `-> this is definitely true. Maybe Novell could act as Sponsor for more oS events. But first of all, Novell should communicate their aims clearly (besides 'We support Linux, as long we are making money from it', which is what a large part of the community thinks). Besides that, recently announced Novell products like 'ZENworks Application Virtualization' are only available for Windows and there are no clear statements if there will be a Linux version available, ever (which Red Hat clearly communicated to their community/customers with their latest virtualization product RHEV, where all components will be available for Linux, too.) S: decent .net support with mono (?) `-> this is only visible for a real small part of the community. Most of them does not really accept the joint-venture with M$ (which has not been communicated very well in the past) and see not benefits in Mono. We have to point out the real advantages of interoperability, here. Maybe some good example (maybe even commercial) .NET apps that work on Windows as well as on Linux would help. W: Bad QA `-> I once brought up the idea of an open QA group, where every interested contributor could take part. Afterwards it has been announced, but with limited slots (afair 30 ppl) Why that? If ppl want to contribute, please let them! Maybe: http://en.opensuse.org/Testing_Team has to be re-introduced, either in the news or in weekly newsletter. (which would be in general a good idea, to introduce team and is how we handle it at CentOS) W: lots of cool features are not documented, thus not used or integrated `-> At Fedora, the artwork team recently introduced the one page release notes, which contains the highlights of the newly released distribution. I would suggest to create one for oS, too (we need a good designer and one who has some Scribus knowledge for that, maybe gnokii or jimmac could help out there.) T: Distribution becomes a commodity and all distributions become more or less equal `-> yeah, it would be nice to only have one distro in the future, but I guess that won't happen :) S: no appstore `-> Gamestore could be taken as base. Pavol already did some nice work on that. W: factory not very usable `-> I would suggest to release less, but better tested milestones and RCs W: no openSUSE community manager even when there is an openSUSE community manager `-> I think that's not fair for zonker. He had some good ideas and spent a lot of effort in different areas. Maybe he was just not that known/visible outside the openSUSE community (and maybe even inside). I would also suggest to remove spotlight.os.org, lizards.os.org and only use the planet and the news. Besides that news should be also announced on social networks like identi.ca and linux.com. I spent some effort on that, but was quite alone, till now. (Besides that, if you like my ideas, you could try to hire me, but only part-wise as I like my main job :)) W: no organized (language-)local communities, nothing that connects them to the openSUSE.org project; Ambassadors not functional `-> the ambassadors project started quite chaotic. The main complaints where missing swag and support from Novell. But the groundwork has been done now and this is where the plants will grow. W: not enough presence on universities (but that applies for FOSS in general ...) `-> we are already doing oS install fests twice a year (on new students laptops) here at the ETH where usually about 40 ppl attend. Maybe we could just communicate it better, to motivate others to do the same. (Btw. asked for swag this year, but did not even get a reply since zonker is gone). O: alot of control ceded to the community in the past year and just need to be taken `-> this needs to be described clearly. Which are the areas where ppl can contribute? E.g. package maintaining is very unstructured. first of all there has to be a mentor process, clear package guidelines, followed by a review process. Every approved packager should be able to do package reviews, afterwards, despises which 'package group' he/she is packaging for. Mentoring is necessary for the Ambassadors project as well. T: next gen is not interested in low-level stuff such as OSes any more, so we'll get an old community ... `-> Maybe not an OS community but at least a Ruby one :) S: boosters team `-> clearly communicate what they are doing or hide it completely from the public. What's happening now is quite worse. (e.g. website updates not announced, will the wiki content be moved over via script or manually, as saigkill already started to move the weekly news manually, how is wiki i18n handled in the future). All that could be avoided with communication. If necessary, one needs to be hired blogging about what boosters are doing, regularly. A FAQ for the website renewal would also help. So nough said for today (which is only a minimal subset of my ideas :)) Best Regards Marcus -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

22 58

Re: [opensuse-project] Blogging and visibility
by Shayon Mukherjee 02 Jun '10

02 Jun '10

On 06/02/2010 04:15 PM, Javier Llorente wrote: > On Miércoles, 2 de Junio de 2010 08:22:25 usted escribió: > >> On 06/01/2010 10:46 PM, Javier Llorente wrote: >> >>> Hello listmates, >>> >>> Some people already blog about their work on openSUSE. However, >>> > others > Ohk ! >>> prefer to be silent about their work. So in that case, I suggest having a >>> member of the same team blogging about that person's work on his/her >>> personal blog or on an openSUSE/Team blog and then request to have it >>> aggregated on the appropriate planets. The idea behind this is giving the >>> openSUSE/Team (replace team with KDE, GNOME, etc) more visibility. >>> >> Hello, >> >> Well thats sounds good.But I would like to present this thing in a >> different manner .Say - Not one person blogs about the other person's >> blog (of the same team) and make it available on the appropriate >> planet.As there are two things which I feel should be noticed and taken >> care of >> >> 1) Its not a good idea to have too many planets.Also how would it look >> if there are Wiki Planet,Booster Planet,Marketing Planet and so on (no >> offense) :-) .But Yes KDE and GNOME are okay . So instead of this - one >> place is fine that is planet.o.o . That said personal and official blogs >> to be aggregated there (which is being done now, but needs more, right?) . >> > I didn't say anything about creating multiple planets ;-) > Sorry , my bad ( I read wrong then) :-) > > >> 2) It would be good if one person blogs for the entire team (instead of >> a single person). This way every team will be able to publish its work >> report and if there is something in specific of an individual to be >> posted, then it can be done accordingly. >> > That's another possibility. > Yeah ! > > >> So, I hope by this way Javier's goal of giving openSUSE Team more >> visibility will be a success . >> (But thats what I feel, I am open for comments and feedback) ;) . >> >> > Thanks for your feedback! > You are welcome. > Cheers, > -- Regards SJ (Shayon) openSUSE Member http://en.opensuse.org/User:wwarlock http://shayonj.wordpress.com/ -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

1 0

[opensuse-project] openSUSE Strategy Meeting - wrap up
by Bryen Yunashko 01 Jun '10

01 Jun '10

As in michl's post announced a the openSUSE Board and some other community members met the past weekend in Nürnberg to have a comprehensive 2.5 days face to face meeting . The meeting was attended by Bryen Yunashko, Andreas Jaeger, Jan Weber, Pascal Bleser, Michael Loeffler and Pavol Rusnak (Hendrik Vogelsang and Rupert Horsttkötter were unfortunately unable to join) and lead and facilitated by Kurt Garloff.We'd like to tell you what we've done, what the outcome is and what the next steps should look alike. We had tons of very fruitful discussions and are much clearer about the strengths of openSUSE and how to create a strategy around those. Beside of the usual meeting things (introduction, ground rules, goals of the meeting) we wrapped up the stuff we did over the last months during our weekly IRC meetings. So we concentrated on our users, the strength and weakness openSUSE has, the competition we face and our expectations for future changes in the way we use computers. When building a strategy, you acknowledge that you can't be the best everywhere, you can't be everything to everybody, if you want to be successful, so you need to choose your focus - the already existing strength might be a good start to focus on. Therefor we went through the SWOT analysis and summarized the the strengths we do have: * openSUSE distro works out of the box, comes with good hardware support and is known for good quality (stable and usable but not outdated) * openSUSE distro has areas in which we stand out such as YaST, zypper, tool chain etc. * openSUSE offers an ecosystem of tools around the distro such as openSUSE Build Service, openFATE, Bugzialla, Hermes etc. * we have and attract a technical savvy audience * high market share in Central Europe * Stable funding by Novell * Boosters team with their mantra: Grow community by enabling community * We're the only distribution out there supporting multiple desktops out of the box * Linux is a growing market To go down the path of a strategy we brain stormed competitive advantages which are things you can do better then your competition or things making you unique. After the brain storming we had around 40 single competitive advantages which we then grouped to clusters to find a focus. We found 6 clusters and a number of competitive advantages we couldn't put into one cluster or which had relations to more then one cluster. We then tried to name them and create strategy statement around them. A strategy is a sentence or two describing what you want to achieve by excelling at what to serve whom. We can tell you that's a tough task and we had a long discussion if such a statement isn't too narrow for the openSUSE project. As the strategy statement only highlights the competitive advantages (and some of the most important activities directly connected to them), it is not a good description of all the things we do in such a broad project and with such a broad community. We thus decided not to use such narrow statements as the primary description of our proposed future strategy, but to come up with more descriptive and elaborate proposals. Where did we end up? We ended up having 3 possible strategies which should be worked out to our community in smaller groups during this week and be published on June 8 for further discussion. The strategies are currently in a very raw format but we'd like to share the headlines already with you: * openSUSE the home for developers (distro, tools, apps) * openSUSE the base for derivatives of any kind (eg. openSUSE Education, openSUSE XYZ) * openSUSE for the mobile world (be the glue between mobile services (clouds) and mobile consumers) After we've published the proposals we'd like to have this discussion open for 30 days, use the feedback to enhance or possibly change the proposals s and then having a vote by openSUSE members which strategy is the right one to go with. For that the openSUSE Board will define a pass criteria so we have a clear winner. That's it for today. We had an exhausting weekend but the outcome is pretty good and more stuff, way more detail will be there soon to define together the path openSUSE should take in the future. Please stay tuned to June 8 when we will present our proposals to the community and open up for 30 days of public discussion. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe(a)opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help(a)opensuse.org

1 0