[kde-community] KDE Mission - let's do this! : Feedback on survey draft

[Alexander Neundorf]

Hi,

I'm just commenting on stuff which hasn't been mentioned somewhere else 
already...

On Friday 20 May 2016 20:45:06 Thomas Pfeiffer wrote:
> On Freitag, 20. Mai 2016 00:14:36 CEST Alexander Neundorf wrote:
...
> > Section "To promote the development of Free software in general"
> > ---------------------------------------------------------------
> > 
> > There's the option "...provide ... libraries which  facilitate the
> > development of ... Qt applications".
> > Personally I agree with this point, but not necessarily  as "promote ...
> > Free software", but as a useful tool for developers, also for proprietary
> > applications (... to pull also those developers into KDE).
> > Can we make that somehow into a question ?
> > Maybe
> > "Should KDE libraries target mainly
> > * free software developers
> > * both free and proprietary software developers" ?
> 
> The reason why I listed libraries only under that aspect is that I wanted to
> make sure that all aspects of the mission relate to the vision.
> 
> Is getting new contributors for our libraries (and by extension to KDE in
> general) the reason why we make them available for proprietary applications
> as well?
> In that case, how does that relate to our vision?

More contributors to our free libraries -> more and better free software -> 
more freedom.
 
> > Misc
> > ----
> > 
> > * I'd like to have a point like "reliable, backwards compatible and
> > stable"
> > somewhere. Maybe in "How important are the following aspects" ?
> 
> Ok, I can add that to the user experience point.
> I'm not sure if "backwards compatible" is clear enough, though. Backwards
> compatible regarding what? Data formats?
> And what is the difference between "stable" and "reliable" in this regard?

You don't need to add it literally.

For me "reliable" includes more than just "not crashing". For me, it also 
means I can rely on that the software will be the there in the future, and 
that the software respects the time and effort users have put into learning 
it/working with it, and continues to work with the documents, configurations, 
scripts, etc. the users have created using the software, instead of requiring 
them to recreate documents from scratch, etc.


> > * Would it make sense to have two additional levels, like "absolutely
> > must"
> > and "not at all, never" ? (I would consider many points very important,
> > but
> > a few exceptionally, absolutely must).
> 
> Hm. I could change the labels for the extremes to "Not useful at all" and
> "Essential". Not sure if the scale should be extended to 7, though.

Do as you think. :-)
 
> > * I'm not too happy with the "How should KDE treat Free vs. Proprietary
> > OS" section.
> > E.g. for Windows and OSX vs. Linux and FreeBSD I would say "equally",
> > which
> > translates to "make Windows and OSX first class targets" (while they are
> > second class right now).
> > OTOH, does Android count as Free or proprietary ?
> > And, when asking focus on Android or Plasma Mobile, I would actually say
> > getting KDE applications onto Android is more important, since that we
> > millions of users can quickly benefit from all the advantages (freedom,
> > control, etc.) KDE provides.
> > Could the survey ask something like
> > "How should KDE treat the following OS
> > - Linux
> > - FreeBSD
> > - Other BSDs, Hurd, etc.
> > - Windows
> > - OSX
> > - Mobile Linux (Mer, Plasma Mobile ?)
> > - Android
> > - did I forget something ?
> > with the two options "important" and "not so important"
> 
> This sounds like it's interesting to find out, but I'm not sure if it's the
> right scope for the Mission. Do we really want the mission to be so detailed
> that it mentions the importance of specific operating systems?

I understand your point.
But I still don't like the current question that much.
E.g. I do agree that ideally Free OS should be used by everybody.
But voting "Free OS are more important for KDE than proprietary" basically 
implies that e.g. Hurd is more important for KDE than Windows. But if we want 
to become more "relevant", then Windows is certainly more important than Hurd.

After all, this is just a survey, not a poll.
A conclusion like "Free OS should be the main focus" could be deduced from 
such a detailled question, while keeping the question itself mostly free of 
politics.
 
> > * Related to the target OS, should there be a question something like
> > "What do you consider more important for a KDE application running outside
> > the Plasma desktop, e.g. on Windows, OSX, Android:
> > - that it integrates well with other KDE applications on that platform and
> > works as similar as possible to running under Plasma
> > - that it integrates as good as possible with the desktop environment it
> > is
> > running in/it tries to fullfill the expections of users on that platform
> > ?"
> 
> Interesting question, but again: Should that be part of the Mission?
> I'd like to keep this survey on the same level as we want the mission to be
> on. Details which are interesting but out of scope for the mission should be
> asked in a separate survey.

Well, the result may be useful nevertheless...

 
> > * should there be a question asking what kind of application spectrum KDE
> > should try to cover ?
> > Something like
> > - anything that is free and useful
> > - applications with a state of the art user interface (typically a GUI)
> > - applications that cover as much as possible of the everyday needs of a
> > home user" ?
> 
> Not sure. Can't that already be derived from the question about the target
> audience?

Well, maybe.

Alex