Plasma Active App Store Notes

[Laszlo Papp]

Hey,

Thank you for your answer. See my answer below inline.

> * the adds-on app (which is quite specifically not an "app store")
[...]

It is ok from OCS point of view. We have a "Content" service for this
topic. Content can be used for any type of content collaboration; let
it app store, adds-on app, image sharing, music album collaborations
and so forth. For instance we use this protocol in Gluon currently for
game content which is not really like a app-store material.

> * nobody else is working on something quite like this.
[...]

We had these types of services at maemo times for downloading various
content types.

> i openly shared my thoughts, which this project has been based on,
> with others as far back as two akademies ago, including with the maintainer of
> OCS, and i got very little interest in return (and in one case open hostility,
> which was quite confusing at the time).

>From the previous link that Shantanu posted, I saw that Frank gave
some kudos about the OCS "integration" bits, and invited you to help
out the Standard for making it better. He was also even about to
invite you to the OCS v2 Sprint. I would also encourage you, if you
miss something, please do let me know. :) For instance, we have a OCS
v2 IRC meeting upcoming: http://www.doodle.com/2pefivcrhe6q3vai#table

> if there was lots of interesting
> development around this topic, i'd understand the confusion around someone
> quietly developing something new. that isn't the case, however.

There is a lot of interesting development around OCS and Collaboration
in general. One would say more and more. It is a more common thing
than tightly relevant to Plasma Active.

[...]
> while OCS is nice for a common bit of sharing glue, OCS is not particularly
> well designed for our needs. it carries quite a bit of social media type
> features that are not irrelevant to our goals, which extend beyond "show a
> list of centrally managed packages".

Could you please elaborate more about what precisely you miss ?

> additionally, it lacks simple features like update checking

If you mean that whether we can add an <oldversion> next to the
already existing <version> and add yet another method to return the
updatable content, then my answer is: nobody requested it yet, but it
is not a problem, and simple addition. If you do not mean that, it is
one function call from client side to do that since the version is
already stored there in the metadata I guess. It could also be a
recommendation from the standard.

> uses XML which is not a great fit for our tools (or the modern web imho)

Right. Meanwhile, I have nothing against XML, please note that OCS
standard was not born recently. On the other hand: there was a guy
requesting adding a JSON interface addition. We accepted it, and I now
even have a GSoC student (who can hopefully get approved :) for
extending attica with that. We also have a server side reference
implementation ongoing. From what I can see: once it was requested we
accepted. It was not a blocker in the end with the XML interface
either since if you use the server/client side reference library, the
precise protocol is hidden for you.

> and has community
> leadership that has proven itself to be open to adoption but not participation
> (at least not particpation by me :).

What exactly do you mean by this ?

> i'm not a big fan of telling others why their project isn't a good fit when
> there is no realistic possibility of it being a good fit. what point would
> there be in doing this, other than to simply spread negative energy? i mean,
> the email would essentially have been "OCS is not what we need. kthxbye."

It is not this dramatic. :) It is always worth asking whether it can
be extended with your wish list. In this special case, speaking of
update checking or json interface, the things you wished were viable
to accept.

> it's because we wanted to have something to show before we go public, because
> we started working on it before we could talk publicly about the tablet
> project and because we don't particularly have the resources to justify our
> technical decisions to everyone who comes along.

That is what Open Governance means to me. Everybody can come to have
the voice heard even in the design phase. This is unfortunately the
first time I heard about this, but I guess I am not alone. I was
introduced to the whole idea at the Plasma Active Three Sprint.

> i appreciate your concerns. i don't agree, however, with your conclusions :)

I agree with you about this point. From the blog post that Shantanu
pasted above, it seems to me you dislike certain things about
opendesktop.org. I am not trying to speak about that, but OCS. I have
not personally realized why it could not technically work out. My
conclusion is that this is something where the OCS community could
collaborate with the Plasma Active community together to make things
better for both communities.

Best Regards,
Laszlo Papp