[Kdenlive-devel] Kdenlive packaging policies

[Mads Bondo Dydensborg]

mandag 15 December 2008 skrev Jean-Michel Pouré:

> So we need packages:
> 
> @mads: is SuSE providing a build farm? What is the advancement of this
> project?

Yes, however, they explicitly forbid compiling ffmpeg, which have stopped me 
from going this route.

> @dan: do you think it would be possible to build static version of MLT,
> including all ffmpeg stuff staticly.
> 
> The idea would be to provide daily packages.
> 
> I can participate in the project setting-up a farm.
> In France, it is possible to hire computers online for a few bucks.

It think it is entirely feasible to use the build wizard for nightly builds. 
Please note that the GUI part is only really needed to setup the 
configuration - it can run headless from e.g. a cron job when the config has 
been setup. And, it does not need kommander/kmdr-executor at all, when the 
config file is in place. The config file is very easy to write by hand also. 

The greatest obstacle to me is getting all the .spec and .deb files right. 
They more or less need to differ for each distribution, and for many also 
needs to include dependencies outside the std. repos.

Also, doing this will require a lot of man-hours. I do understand the need for 
providing packages[1], but I actually think our time is better spent 
supporting the users that builds from SVN, as they can test the changes we 
make. Beeing very cynical: at this stage, we do not _need_ users that can not 
test the new stuff that jb puts in svn. What we _need_ is users that commits 
patches, really :-)

Getting 1000 new users that relies on packages for their distro (*at this 
stage*) will swamp those of us trying to support them, either through the 
forums, the issue tracker or irc. We will not be able to do it, I think. A 
large number will turn away from Kdenlive, if their experience now with it is 
bad. This clearly is a temporary stage; at some point we will reach critical 
mass and users can start supporting eachother, but I think this it is still 
about 2-3 releases out. Perhaps in 6 months time. If we can maintain a 
momentum with a release every second month, we will get there *very* fast. I 
am very optimistic, but there is some truth to the old saying "grow slow"...

So, while I sympatise with the idea of providing packages, my personal opinion 
is that our effort *right now* is better spent in 

a) providing some of the really needed features (e.g. the spacer tool for 
0.7.1)
b) providing some of the really needed usuability (e.g. easy 
crossfade/dissolve - automatic audio crossfade on transition - render dialog)
c) hardening the code (too many people gets the impression that Kdenlive 
crashes too much. Many of them have a point).

This is my personal opinion really. Jb and Dan may be more optimistic?

Regards

Mads

[1] I spent *many* hours creating the wizard exactly because I wanted to make 
building Kdenlive doable for more than hardcore hackers.

-- 
Mads Bondo Dydensborg   mads at dydensborg.dk   http://www.madsdydensborg.dk/

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