[kde-community] RFC: Distribution outreach program

[Thomas Pfeiffer]

On Mittwoch, 3. Februar 2016 10:46:26 CET Nicolás Alvarez wrote:

> 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.

Again: This is not about shaming anybody. I, personally, have two goals:

First (and foremost): I want to improve the communication with distributions 
and try to help them make our software shine on their platforms. I have 
already seen some quite interesting and likely useful ideas coming up in this 
thread that might help with this goal. I really see something useful coming 
out of this collective brainstorming.

Second, I want to give users who are deciding which distribution to use some 
further information. 
How well our software works on a distro is just one of any number of criteria 
which users may employ in their decision-making. I assume that the 
aforementioned distro policies do exist for a reason, and hopefully that 
reason is in some way (directly or indirectly) relevant to users (otherwise it 
would mean that the distribution does not care about users, which would make 
it a bad decision for any user).
I don't want so shame distributions, but if their policies negatively affect 
their user's experience with our software, I want users to know that (instead 
of thinking it's our fault). This then allows users to make an informed 
decision about whether their experience with KDE software or the purpose of 
the distro policies that conflict with that is more important to them.

It's really all about information and transparency. I, as a user, want to know 
the advantages and disadvantages which different distributions have for me. 
As a home user, getting the latest and greatest from KDE is very important to 
me, so I choose a distribution that delivers that.

If I had to choose a distribution for an organization with hundreds or 
thousands of installations, things like stability, maintainability and support 
of and for the distribution in general would be much more important for me, 
and therefore I'd very likely make a different choice for that.

I'm a bit disappointed that my idea is construed as "KDE vs. distributions" by 
some people in this thread. It really isn't, which is why I am happy about all 
people that welcome my general idea even "with their distributor hat on".

Cheers,
Thomas