[kde-community] RFC: Distribution outreach program

Nicolás Alvarez nicolas.alvarez at gmail.com
Wed Feb 3 13:46:26 GMT 2016


> On Feb 3, 2016, at 10:16, Martin Graesslin <mgraesslin at kde.org> wrote:
> 
> On Wednesday, February 3, 2016 9:44:13 AM CET Nicolás Alvarez wrote:
>>>> On Feb 1, 2016, at 15:31, Cornelius Schumacher <schumacher at kde.org> wrote:
>>>> On Monday 01 February 2016 13:04:37 Sebastian Kügler wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> I'm not against automated testing at all, I just think it doesn't work at
>>>> the highest level and bears pitfalls of distros gaming the system, or
>>>> people actually care more about the number of points they get than the
>>>> actual user experience.
>>> 
>>> I think we have to readjust the perspective here a bit. I really
>>> appreciate
>>> Thomas' initiative because there definitely could be better collaboration
>>> between distributions and KDE. We have the common goal to get our software
>>> to users in the best possible shape. We shouldn't see that as a gaming,
>>> blaming, or judging, but we should see this as an opportunity to work
>>> together in a better way. How this is then expressed to the public is a
>>> second thought, and should be decided together with the distributions.
>>> 
>>> So defining and discussing criteria which make up a good experience,
>>> listing and communicating requirements, talking to each other about what
>>> is missing, what needs to be fixed, and where it should be fixed without
>>> playing upstream- downstream-ping-pong, sharing and possibly aligning
>>> roadmaps, all these things and more could happen through the distribution
>>> outreach program. This would be really wonderful.
>>> 
>>> In essence I think this is about better communication between KDE and
>>> distributions, so that we can productively work on what needs to be fixed,
>>> avoid misunderstandings, and keep a common momentum.
>> 
>> Here is an idea that shouldn't be novel but I have yet to see mentioned.
>> 
>> If you see a distro doesn't package KDE software correctly, doesn't
>> integrate with the system, doesn't provide a good user experience for
>> whatever reason... file a bug on the distro's bug tracker. Instead of
>> putting the distro on a user-facing "they don't do things good enough"
>> list.
> 
> You haven't seen this one proposed, because it just doesn't work. Do you 
> really think nobody reports bugs about incorrectly packaged stuff? Or that we 
> don't talk to the distros? Do you know how often we get answers like "well I 
> would like to, but we have $POLICY". I could give you examples like outdated 
> Qt in Kubuntu, broken cursors on Fedora, missing Wayland in openSUSE Leap, no 
> way to suspend in Devuan, etc. etc. - I could name you a $POLICY issue for 
> each distro.
> 
> Sorry once you have done this for years, you realize this approach doesn't 
> work. Personally I'm pretty fed up with the state our software is in, in 
> various distributions. I'm sick of having to take the blame for it. This 
> approach hasn't worked, we need to look for new ways.

So we're going to shame them into complying by leaving them out of a list? They'll pay attention to our wiki more than to their policies? Several people in this thread mentioned distro policies as a reason why this won't work, in fact.

-- 
Nicolás


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