[kde-community] Plasmoids and Apps - was - Re: Applications in KDE Generation 5

[Aaron J. Seigo]

On Monday, January 20, 2014 18:29:16 Martin Sandsmark wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 20, 2014 at 11:10:06AM +0100, Aaron J. Seigo wrote:
> > namely duplication of effort and inconsistency due to multiple
> > implementations of what is from a use case perspective the same thing.
> 
> This would be all well and good if it wasn't for the gross regressions it
> would suffer.

Yes, you don’t have to believe me.

> You argued the exact same thing for the screen locker.

Er, no, actually. That was a completely different decision matrix that bears 
zero resemblance to this one. The screen locker was about consistency with 
other desktop shell components, the application issue is about deduplication 
of effort.

> But what you're
> arguing is a kind of false dichtomy. You would think that instead of two
> half-assed solutions we would get a single superior implementation, but
> instead we get a single inferior one.

I disagree; ultimately the code will decide who was right, though with stop 
energy like this I can imagine the experiment never being undertaken at all.

> > For things like kcalc, the things the desktop components are not good at
> > are irrelevant; the things it *is* good at could radically improve its
> > UI.
> The thing I'm unable to discern is how it would radically improve its UI.

For one: by having a nice paper-tape presentation of the calculation with 
history. Rather easier to do in a visually pleasant way with QML.

> The current kcalc UI is very good, I often use it for stuff like bit
> fiddling, etc. I can't say the same thing for the calculator plasma applet.
> But please feel free to prove me wrong and make the plasma calculator much
> better than kcalc.

I would expect a QML UI on top of the kcalc logic would be a far more sensible 
approach. Not sure why you would think we’d go at it from the other direction.

> But I'd argue very strongly to not replace kcalc until
> the replacement is visibly better.

Agreed, or at the very least has parity.

-- 
Aaron J. Seigo