[kde-guidelines] Current activity on this list

[Thomas Pfeiffer]

In order not to move away the thread about the search HIG off-topic,
here's my reply to the other point Heiko raised in his mail:

> PS: It's a pity that usability gets less attention in the last time.
> So to all readers of this mailing list: Please join the discussion! A
> simple go ahead would be nice at least... ;-)

I can only speak for myself here, but KDE usability as such does not get
any less attention from me in the last time, to the contrary: I
currently spend a lot of time in the VDG forum and the Plasma mailing
list to keep an eye on the usability aspects of Plasma Next and of all
the ideas currently brewing in that forum, making sure they comply to
the HIG and looking out for cases where additional HIGs (such as this
one) are needed.
That means that I sadly have less time for the core HIG work at the 
moment, though.

What I've heard from Aurélien and David is that they're currently hard
at work to get KDE Frameworks 5 and Plasma Next out the door, so
their focus has shifted as well.

I hope that when the first releases of these two gargantuan projects are
done, we'll all have more time for HIG work again.

A further plan is to integrate the Visual Design and Usability groups
much more tightly (personally, I'd prefer to just merge them into one
user interface group), so we'll have more people who may be interested
in HIG work, especially in the visual aspects (Alan Lake should be
sending an email to this list concerning integration of visual design
guidelines soon).

So yes, the HIGs do not get as much attention as they deserve at the 
moment, but hope is certainly on the horizon!

Cheers,
Thomas