Purpose of this list (was: Is KDE really usable?)

[Adriaan de Groot]

Hi Kimmo,

Thank you for your lengthy analysis; I'll respond to a few bits and pieces.


On Tuesday 24 October 2006 17:08, Kimmo Sundqvist wrote:
> On Monday 23 October 2006 00:43, Lex Hider wrote:
> > Thanks for the feed back. The most appropriate action to take is to file
> > bugs for the problems that you find with KDE.
>
> My two cents on this.
>
> The name of this mailing list has a some kind of holistic ring to it. "If
> there is something wrong or odd in the whole KDE, on the overall KDE
> experience, but you can't put your finger on it exactly, then this is the
> list to discuss things out and find names for problems."


Right, it *does* have a nice holistic ring to it. Originally it was conceived 
as a way to bring new developers -- who want to improve KDE's quality in lots 
of small ways -- into the project. Along the lines of "something doesn't 
work, where can I start to fix it?"

My issue with your description -- which fits pretty well what actually 
*happens* on this list -- is that there's no action involved. There is 
no "what of it?" and no "now we can attack the problem." Judging from the 
posts on this list, the number of core developers (the people who can provide 
useful information on pinning down bugs and who can help you help out in 
fixing the problems) is very small. I do not feel that long discussions about 
what should happen or where bugs are helps much if there's no subsequent 
action. This particular list is pretty much invisible. This is why I tend to 
point people to other lists as fast as possible: once a problem has been 
identified (even just a little) it's better to discuss it somewhere with a 
specific charter rather than a holistic mish-mash.

> I recently used OS X for a couple of minutes. Compared to Kubuntu, what I
> felt using it was the level of integration. OS X Finder feels like one well
> thought out piece. It feels powerful because everything is easily
> accessible, and the user feels that he can try things out and not do
> anything damaging or end up in a situation where it is hard to get back.

.. something for kde-usability, if anything, and something that would be worth 
implementing pervasively. But that means picking it up, creating guidelines 
and then pushing those guidelines, explaining them to developers, etc. It's a 
good life if you don't weaken.

But on this list? We can agree to whatever, if it makes us feel good, but it 
isn't going to have any effect. There still is very much a '"we should" 
means "i will"' culture -- I think that is a good thing.

> Imagine what Finder would look like with NFS and CIFS and whatever
> connectivity included. Imagine, what would be same, what would be
> different, compared to Konqueror? I expect musings on this, as I still
> think this is the "holistic" all around feel and experience mailing list.

Absolutely .. but then what?

I'm pleased by the life that has suddenly grown in this list -- I just hope it 
gets us somewhere. Please remember to talk to the developers once you know 
what you want :)


-- 
These are your friends - Adem
    GPG: FEA2 A3FE Adriaan de Groot
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