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Criticisms of KDE 3 Release Process
An anonymous submitter sent in a link to a recent email from the kde-devel list,
criticizing the release process. Hopefully the KDE guys can work out any problems and keep up the good work that we've seen in the past. Update: 03/10 14:20 GMT by M : One of the comments below points out that another KDE developer has made an extensive response to the original criticisms.
After all of the people recently complaining about the possiblity that previously open sourced software might have to succumb to the relentless tide of capitalism, I find it somewhat confusing that they are willing to find fault with KDE.
Right now, KDE looks to be the best hope for Linux to enter mainstream as a desktop OS. A VERY major portion of the impetus for users to not change is a lack of familiarity with the desktop. They don't care how it works, or what it does. They need their computer screen to be familiar to them the first time they experience their new OS. Once they're comfortable with it, they might abandon the "Windows look", but until then it will get users.
KDE could probably use not criticsism, but instead help from able computer scientists who want to see the open source movement triumph
The best part of developing free software is that it is low stress. People tend to get all bent out of shape about it. I think this is a pretty good example of what happens when people get stressed out about something that people are for the most part doing because they enjoy it.
So the KDE guys got together and were inspired to perform lots of last minute hacking. More power to them! So what if the 3.0 release is delayed or has a few issues. I think these three guys who signed the letter were just jealous because they weren't involved in the process.
I don't use KDE, and never liked it, but I have to stand up for the developers here. Just enjoy developing the software and stop bitching because there aren't 'hard freezes' before a release.
int func(int a);
func((b += 3, b));
It's a failing of leadership (if the criticism is true). I think it's important to remember 2 things here:
In light of this lack of management discovery, maybe a couple programers will start to see all the recent criticizm's of software managers (as in recent stories here) may be not as useful as trying to actually support managers of projects (espically OSS ones) a little more.
This is in no way unique to KDE; large development projects sometimes stumble even with the best of intentions by those involved. The Open Source community is unique in that everyones dirty laundry gets aired in public. This can make the process seem unruly, haphazard and chaotic compared to closed development - the truth is that the same kind of conflicts, friction and occasional disasters occur there as well, but hidden from view.
I'm not a KDE user myself (I prefer gnome), but I'm confident and hopeful that the KDE development team will get past these problems and produce another good release. They've done very good releases in the past, and there's no reason for them not to do it again.
/Janne
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
Professionalism is a Good Thing(tm). However what your PHP calls professionalism might just be artificial. Sticking to a release date no matter the state of the code is unprofessional.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
My shop develops web based database software for the Marine Corps in the Okinawa, Japan region. Every application we support is based on a core set of libraries to handle all the ugly parts of talking through ODBC and the mundane parts of HTML Tags.
Although I've been coding for almost 16 years now, I've never been involved as a project manager for something this big. (our main app is rapidly approaching 100,000 lines) We have found through trial and error that code freeze/documentation periods are essential to ensure that we are all still using the same vesrions of the core libraries. This is especially critical for web page design as each page can almost be considered an object with a specific interface. If you change the interface on a page, you just broke every page that connects to that page. I'm sure the various components of KDE are no different.
KDE dev team, don't shoot the messenger! I think this is a fantastic opportunity for you to have your development practices analyzed by the slashdot community. I don't even think you could hire a consulting firm this honest and experienced.
I've dirtied my hands writing poetry, for the sake of seduction; that is, for the sake of a useful cause. --Dostoevsky
1) Packages missing from the release entirely
./configure; make;
Release Candidate != Release
2) Rampant compile problems
Really? Compiles fine here and elsewhere. Of
course, if it doesn't compile for you the proper thing
to do is report the specific problem to
the mailing lists immediately.
3) Last-minute changes to build requirements that cannot be met by
many developers without an operating system upgrade
Hehe, this one was funny. He was complaining
about a requirement for developers compiling
out of cvs to upgrade to gnu autoconf > 1.50.
Those compiling from the release tarballs won't
even be affected, and the "operating system upgrade"
consists of downloading autoconf and
compiling it. Took me literally 3 minutes.
4) Many outstanding bugs
Well sure, all software has bugs, even when released.
Released software shouldn't of course have
critical bugs so when you find them, you
should report the specific problem to
the appropriate forum (mailing lists at this late
date in the cycle) immediately.
This whole thing was just an overation from 3
developers who felt left out when they weren't
invited to the recent KDE hacking session. It's
unfortuate, but the sky is not falling.
The best way to help KDE is not complain but
to download the release candidates, compile
them (yeah, you can do it -
make install), test, and report bugs.
Three developers out of all of KDE's developers criticize the KDE dev process and it's newsworthy?
Now it's guaranteed to be picked up by other "news" sources and generate a bunch of useless controversy. Sometimes when I see what Newsforge (gag) puts out, I wonder if they have a secret agenda to discredit Open Source development. A quote from someone (Tina) at Newsforge about their policy of posting any and everything:
we assume that our readers are smart enough to separate the sheep from the goats
I've gotten this response from them before, and they don't seem to understand the difference between filtering crap and saying that they shouldn't post critical or negative commentary. Yes, by all means, run a negative story if it's important, but don't run crap -- positive or negative. Posting a diatribe by three KDE developers -- folks, that's crap.
In other words "don't look to us for news, because we don't do perform any kind of quality checking or the typical gatekeeper function you'd expect from real journalists. Someone submits it, we'll post it somewhere."
I'm not saying that it's wrong to report on genuine conflicts or negative stories when they're important, but this really doesn't qualify IMHO. When a site purports to be a news site, there should be some quality checking and filtering going on. Stories that are comprised of nothing more than a rant or stories that are obviously biased or outright false should not be picked up -- or at the very least have a disclaimer attached.
Microsoft must love the fact that Free and Open Source software development discussion takes place in the open where everyone can examine and dissect every personality conflict and internal bitchfest. It makes the Linux and Open Source community look like a bunch of fractious losers while no matter what Microsoft PR's department spews everyone marches in lock-step to it.
merely that there are certainly two sides to this issue.
Hallelujah! Now, could someone beat the Slashdot and Newsforge *kaf* "editors" with a cluebat so they'll figure that out?
If they have to post crap like this, the least they could do is give a direct link to the actual mail archive and a link to some of the rebuttal.
your a boring broken record, "linux is shit"
it's just a damn OS, nothing to get upset about.
I use win2k and linux, they are both allright, neither one has turned my machine into a magic box. Linux is neat and isn't as mind numbing as Win2k to use, hell, I'll be damned if I would spend $2000.00 for the privlage of using a mac with OSX on it. so Linux is great in that respect.
For an OS that has been developed by contributers from around the world I would have to say that in that respect Linux is amazing. Win2k on the other hand for an OS that has been developed by one company in a tightly controlled environment should be more stable.
screw it, I'm just babbling now, I need more coffee.....