A Plasma Vision draft

[Olivier Churlaud]

Hi,

Le mardi 27 septembre 2016, 18:24:36 CEST Jens Reuterberg a écrit :
> This is actually fairly tricky because what is needed is a metric to work
> towards: sayiing "fast and stable" is not very exact.
> 
> But you raise fair points - how do we ensure that it doesn't exclude anyone?
> To me a vision is a statement of intent, but not a boundary beyond
> practical choices. "Should we pick Y or X, we can only pick one?" Should be
> something that you can answer with it. In this case "Does one of them help
> professional users? Pick that!".
> Not "I want to do Y!" and then someone going "No you can't because X and Z
> would be more for professional users".
> 
> One is a boundary, the other is a vision I feel. We can't make a few
> sentences work as a complete boundary - that would take a way longer
> document. This is more like the header for a longer text, a statement of
> intent or coming things but it can't be something that defines complete
> usage.
> 
> Still, you bring up good points - but how can we realize them as a vision?
> How can "fast/stable" function except as something that would work for
> everyone, all DE's etc?
> 

My understanding of the vision is "what do we want". So if you say "Plasma 
targets professional users", it means "we do not care at all about the 
others".

I might be wrong, but it seems to me that what you want to say to the world is 
"we have the most reliable, proof of that: our products are used by 
professionals". So when reading this, I really think that the vision is about 
reliability, efficiency and good experience. Your target is just a way to access 
to this quality, so it's more part of your strategy.

Now I must be clear: in my mind the vision is shown everywhere when you speak 
about the product. To me, it should be used as a marketing weight to say "this 
is who/what we are". If you have that in mind, you don't want to have in big 
on the front page of your website and on your stickers "for professional 
users", because people will exclude themselves. I'm more afraid of this 
(people excluding themselves) than of people excluding others.

However, if you don't see the vision as what I just presented, it means that 
we don't speak of the exact same thing, and in this case I don't have anything 
against the current formulation.

Cheers
Olivier

> (also added plasma-devel since the thread is made for plasma-devel the reply
> got weird though halfway through)
> 
> /Jens
> 
> > IMO, the first step is to get rock-solid stable, performant (whatever you
> > call that in English) and productive desktop, so that everyone says: "I
> > want to use that". This is, to me, a nice vision.
> > 
> > 
> > Also, most of my friends (often using Ubuntu+Unity) told me "KDE
> > (understand Plasma) is the most good looking desktop out there those
> > days". Don't look boring, please (Office=boring). Also when I think
> > office, I think excel + word + firefox. You don't need a nice desktop for
> > that, anything would  be ok. Geeks and private people have more needs.
> > 
> > Disclaimer: I might have had one beer to many, and I mostly speak with my
> > kind of user case in mind, and try to extrapolate. I'm not always using
> > Plasma at work, but I think it's the best at home, and as a geek as well.
> > 
> > > If on the other hand this is a real worry, and an issue then the
> > > discussion
> > > shouldn't be what the vision statement should say but if it should say
> > > something at all. Which is not something negative but an actual option
> > > :)
> > 
> > I agree with that, but I don't agree that my point of view doesn't say
> > anything: see above.
> > 
> > Cheers
> > Olivier
> > 
> > > On 26 September 2016 18:33:00 CEST, Olivier Churlaud
> > > <olivier at churlaud.com>
> > 
> > wrote:
> > > >Le lundi 26 septembre 2016, 15:12:08 CEST Thomas Pfeiffer a écrit :
> > > >> On 26.09.2016 13:27, Olivier Churlaud wrote:
> > > >> > Hi,
> > > >> > Sorry if I come late, I wasn't aware of this thread...
> > > >> > 
> > > >> > Le lundi 26 septembre 2016, 12:56:25 CEST Jens Reuterberg a écrit :
> > > >> >> "Plasma is for people using a computing device in a professional
> > > >
> > > >context,
> > > >
> > > >> >> where productivity, performance and privacy are essential"
> > > >> > 
> > > >> > I find that the "is for people .." kind of restrictive. I agree
> > > >
> > > >that you
> > > >
> > > >> > need to have a precise target audience, but don't freak out other
> > > >
> > > >people.
> > > >
> > > >> > If this is your vision, it should be the first big sentence that
> > > >
> > > >people
> > > >
> > > >> > will read. Normal users might say, 'uh, I want games as well, and
> > > >> > listening to music and editing videos: it's not for me'.
> > > >> 
> > > >> We could replace "is for" with "focuses on" if necessary.
> > > >> On the other hand, the stricter a vision is, the more useful it
> > > >
> > > >becomes to
> > > >
> > > >> focus effort. With the above vision, if someone complains about bad
> > > >
> > > >gaming
> > > >
> > > >> performance in Plasma, we can just ask "Do you play games in a
> > > >
> > > >professional
> > > >
> > > >> context? If not, then sorry, your usecase is not what Plasma is made
> > > >
> > > >for."
> > > >
> > > >> Editing videos, though, for me is a classic example of a professional
> > > >> context. Not everybody edits videos professionally, but if Plasma
> > > >
> > > >works
> > > >
> > > >> well for those who do it professionally, it should also work well for
> > > >
> > > >those
> > > >
> > > >> who do it privately.
> > > >> 
> > > >> It's really a question of "Do we dare scaring some people off in
> > > >
> > > >order to
> > > >
> > > >> focus more on our target audience?"
> > > >
> > > >This is, actually, what I'm afraid of. I wouldn't dare, but I'm not a
> > > >"real"
> > > >plasma developer, so I'm not to make the decision :)
> > > >
> > > >> > I wonder if the professional context is important. To me plasma is
> > > >> > productivity, performance and privacy. To achieve this, you target
> > > >> > professionals (more mission-like).
> > > >> 
> > > >> Again, depends on how much we want to focus.
> > > >> 
> > > >> > Some ideas, that still sound wrong to me, but less (I don't like
> > > >
> > > >the "for
> > > >
> > > >> > people"):
> > > >> > "Plasma turns computing devices into productive, performant and
> > > >
> > > >private
> > > >
> > > >> > tools"
> > > >> 
> > > >> We had "performant" in our original draft, but then it was pointed
> > > >
> > > >out that
> > > >
> > > >> it is not a proper English word.
> > > >
> > > >I saw that, the word was underlined in red on kmail :)
> > > >
> > > >> > "Plasma is for people for which productivity, performance and
> > > >
> > > >privacy are
> > > >
> > > >> > essential"
> > > >> 
> > > >> If we don't want to define our target audience in the Vision, then
> > > >
> > > >this
> > > >
> > > >> would be a good alternative. Then again, aren't those important for
> > > >
> > > >pretty
> > > >
> > > >> much anybody?
> > > >
> > > >Yes, you are right somehow, but on the other hand, Gnome has more a
> > > >target on
> > > >"beautiful, consistent and modern" (in my opinion, I don't know what
> > > >their
> > > >target is). So I would say that privacy is not essential for everyone
> > > >(MacOS
> > > >users), nor performance (a lot of people just want things to work, and
> > > >are not
> > > >freaked out by waiting 3min that Windows boots).
> > > >
> > > >> > "Plasma aims at enhancing the productivity, performance and privacy
> > > >
> > > >of the
> > > >
> > > >> > user experience"
> > > >> 
> > > >> I don't think an experience can have productivity... ;)
> > > >> 
> > > >> > "Plasma: experience prod, perf and priv" ?
> > > >> 
> > > >> That sounds more like a tagline than a vision, but we already have
> > > >
> > > >the
> > > >
> > > >> tagline "Plasma: Getting things done."
> > > >
> > > >You lost part of it. I thought it was "Plasma: Get things done and go
> > > >tauchen?"  :)
> > > >
> > > >Cheers
> > > >Olivier
> > > >
> > > >> > Well just some (bad) ideas...
> > > >> 
> > > >> They're not bad ideas at all, it's really a matter of how much Plasma
> > > >
> > > >wants
> > > >
> > > >> to focus.
> > > >> Thank you for the input!
> > > >> 
> > > >> > Olivier