Interview With The KDE And GNOME Release Managers

An anonymous reader writes "It has to be tough, keeping projects as big as GNOME and KDE organized, but that is the job given to those projects' 'release managers.' In an interview on Linux and Main, KDE's Dirk Mueller and GNOME's Jeff Waugh discuss their wacky, devil-may-care, hell-bent-for-leather, zany, fun-filled world -- the shadow, as T.S. Eliot put it, between the idea of a release and its reality."

Comments

Release manager for Gnome?

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't that job going to be obsolete in about a year anyway with the advances KDE is making?

Re:Release manager for Gnome?

[A Clockwork Orange]

I'd hope not, since I prefer Gnome to KDE, mainly because it runs better on my PII-366 laptop, and I don't need all the "flashy" extras. Doing most things from the command line, I don't really care about having a "pretty" desktop.

Re:Release manager for Gnome?

[Anonymous Coward]

I've always preferred KDE over gnome. maybe it was because with kde you just download qt and the 5-6 base archives (games, base, utils, etc), and make install, whereas with gnome you have to download and install 50 or 60 oddball libraries, many of which don't configure properly.

Also, I consider gtk to be ugly. That's my biggest complaint with gimp (obviously I'm not a graphics professional!)

However, I actually prefer gnome + sawmill over kde3. I think kde is better integrated, but it has too much of a "fake windows" feel (i like windows 2k, too!)

Hoever, I think kde and gnome are both obsolete. OS X has unix underpinnings, and Microsoft Unix Services For Windows 3.0 makes win 2k/xp full posix compliant, and includes all your favorite unix command line tools (including gcc!). We're actually phasing out most of our linux desktops in favor of win2k and usf! (We're still keeping some linux boxes for compatability testing and to run our samba/pop/smtp/web server).

Re:Release manager for Gnome?

[minaguib]

In that case get FluxBox or something similar.

Re:Release manager for Gnome?

[stilborne]

what flashy extras, prey tell? i don't know where KDE got this "it's just pretty" thing from since it is one of the most useful environments around. in fact, i seem to remember in the days of kde1 that it was heralded as "ugly but at least it works". now that its not butt-ugly it gets thrashed for that. heh... ingrates.

and if you are serious about the CLI, then take the other replier's suggestion: use something truly minimal. recent blackbox builds are very nice, and the bb* tools are keeping pace as well.

Re:Release manager for Gnome?

[thesadmac]

KDE runs absolutely fine on my old G3/233. You can turn off all the stupid animations you know.

First Strong Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Come on fhqhwgads!

Re:First Strong Bad

[Anonymous Coward]

Dear Strong Bad,

How does this slashdot weblog pack so much ghey into so small a space? Thanks,

Jason Strumfeld,
Aslich Texas

Re:First Strong Bad

[CmdrStkFjta]

Dear AC,

Please forward all ghey posts to cyborg_monkey.

swak,
CmdrStkFjta

Yet another interview? When will slashdot run...

[Anonymous Coward]

an interview with the goatse guy!

hehe

[Anonymous Coward]

Sweet, first to reply

Yes?

[r_j_prahad]

Frist psot?

Kill my karma, scumbags, but this is the first time I've ever seen a blank screen when I hit "post comment".

Re:Yes?

[Biffer4810]

> Frist psot?

Yes. You have psoted frist.

maybe first post

[Anonymous Coward]

probably not, you stupid 20 second day thing, die already

What do they do for real money?

[YoPt]

Please tell me this is not "The Day Job".

(sigh)

[Anonymous Coward]

www.bakla.net
www.bakla.net
www.bakla.net
www.b akla.net
www.bakla.net

*sigh*

YOU BUY IT!

Re:(sigh)

[Anonymous Coward]

First thing I thought: damn!

Second thing I thought: I'd still fuck her.

Re:(sigh)

[Anonymous Coward]

I love the way she's making me feel..this is too good to be true, is it fake or for real? Bakla's completely and utterely the love of my life, this love cause we're going to be husband and wife..

cut scene to prom night

"Wait put in my ass first!" That was kind of strange but it wasn't mine to judge, so I hit it from the rear smudged all up in fudge. I reached from behind, started fingering her clit, but she stopped me before I started rubbing on it. Bitch, won't let me hit? Sure, but first you gotta suck my dick.

Bakla was a man, you know what I'm saying.

But I sucked his dick anyway. Nah, I'm just playing.

Re:(sigh)

[xdfgf]

You shouldn't steal from Ken Kaniff

I have a question

[Anonymous Coward]

Gnome and KDE seem to be geared towards windows migrating ppl. They all emulate the same basic look and feel. My question is, is there any project of the same calibre (of would be soon), that does a native look and feel (modern and cool, like in movies) for Linux/BSD's ?

Thank you.

Amma Fui

Re:I have a question

[nsideops]

I agree. I would like to see and "experemental" desktop, even if it's just for fun. As crazy as you can get while still being workable. It can be compleatlly experimentall and even have a HUGE learning curve. It would be fun to just have this strange looking thing for a desktop that does everything you could imagine and looks great while it's at it, even if you have to switch to kde to get any real work done, I would play with it and love it.

Re:I have a question

[dotgod]

3dwm is an interesting 3D window manager project (not an X11 window manager though)...definitely a bit different from the "same basic look and feel"

Re:I have a question

[paladin_tom]

I agree. I would like to see and "experemental" desktop, even if it's just for fun. As crazy as you can get while still being workable.

I think making a new window manager, like BlackBox or FluxBox, is as crazy and experimental as you can get. Making a system as big as a desktop work is a huge job. Keep in mind that a desktop environment consists of not only a window manager, but a set of libraries (QT/KDELIBS for KDE, GTK for GNOME), which are a huge job in and of themselves. Add in the need for core apps (since no one but no one will use a desktop that doesn't come with solitaire), and you've got a huge project, that people won't want to take a huge risk on.

Also, you don't need to emulate Windows using KDE/GNOME. Their default configurations just include a panel at the bottom of the screen with a K or a foot where the Windows Start Button is. The user is free to change this.

Finally, I must point out that a third major desktop environment is the last thing Free Software needs right now. We're already fractured by the fact that developers (both Free and commercial) must choose whether to base their apps on QT or GTK. Many major projects choose to target neither: OpenOffice, Mozilla, Kylix, and Adobe Acrobat Reader, for example. A better option would be for KDE and GNOME to move to a new user interface, while keeping their libraries intact.

Re:I have a question

[Anonymous Coward]

yeah, fvwm95.

Re:I have a question

[paladin_tom]

My question is, is there any project of the same calibre (of would be soon), that does a native look and feel (modern and cool, like in movies) for Linux/BSD's ?

Amma, the destops you see in movies look cool on the screen, but that's their only good point. Their user interfact is horrible. Movie producers purposefully give computers on movies a "computerish" look; for example, movie computers often have green text (a la the text in The Matrix, when Neo sees it), which has been obsolete for years -- it's hard on the eyes.

Movie destops also have an excessive amount of animation. Trust me, you'd hate any desktop that worked that way -- it'd run like absolute molasses.

The user experience I've had that most closely resembles a movie desktop is application built using Flash, like you find on web sites and enhanced CDs. These apps try to emulate the look and feel of movie desktops.

Re:I have a question

[jbolden]

Have you tried windowmaker (part of the gnustep desktop)? Its not as full featured as KDE or Gnome but it runs their apps fine, is much more light weight and doesn't feel like windows at all.

Re:I have a question

[Osty]

Movie destops also have an excessive amount of animation. Trust me, you'd hate any desktop that worked that way -- it'd run like absolute molasses.

Kinda like Mac OS X, eh? Yeah, yeah, it's getting better, but it's still pretty slow compared to other operating systems with less flash.

The user experience I've had that most closely resembles a movie desktop is application built using Flash, like you find on web sites and enhanced CDs. These apps try to emulate the look and feel of movie desktops.

Interestingly, most of those movie GUIs are built using Macromedia Director (or similar), so building the same thing out of Flash makes sense. I wouldn't be surprised if some of those movie web sites actually took most of the code directly from the mock-up made for the movie itself. It shouldn't be difficult to do.

Personally, I like usability with a bit of flash. Something like Window Maker, while very useable (it should be, since it's based on NeXT), is rather boring. Enlightenment, while flashy, isn't that useable in my opinion. In that vein, I'm pretty happy with Windows XP. It's themeable (link is down at the moment, but according to the notice it should be back up in a half an hour -- I doubt that, but check back in a day or two), so I can get my eye candy, but it's also very useable. Say what you will, Microsoft has spent a small fortune on useability testing, and most of what they've done works well. Brush it off as familiarity if you will, but there are concrete examples of Windows useability getting better (small example: the Start button now has infinite borders, just like the Apple menu in Mac OS -- throw the mouse down to the lower left and click, you'll get the start menu).

Re:I have a question

[Dave_bsr]

i read this online, that XP is whoohoo great. everyone i've talked to who's actually used it either says "whah? its different from anythinge else?" or "yeah...XP kinda sucks." Overall, i've gotten >10 nays and one yay. It's fine that you like it...but my personal data-polling (my most trusted source) tells me that XP isn't that hot. Usability testing's great. just give people something that makes reasonable sense, and let them learn it.

Re:I have a question

[yamcha666]

I understand the above post's fact that it would be very difficult to create another set of libraries along with a desktop environment.

Yet the parent asks why the 2 major desktop environments look like Windows.

So why couldn't one (or a group of developers) combine both of these statements and create a window manager with a "modern and cool, like in the movies" interface that is compatable with either the GTK or QT libraries or both, (plus or minus patches for this window manager to make it compatable with the GTK or QT libraries)?

Though I am not a heavy developer, the concept of this wouldn't be difficult. It would be like rebuilding fluxbox to make it run KDE apps 100% natively instead of using a "transparency layer (?)" just so you can use KDE apps in fluxbox (or WindowMaker or IceWM etc).

Re:I have a question

[Arandir]

Let me take your unwritten assumptions in order.

Assumption: The goal of GNOME and KDE is to convert Windoze users.

Truth: There are as many goals for these projects as there are developers. The goal of converting Windows users is definitely on the list somewhere for some developer, but overall it is very low on the totem pole. Much higher are the goals of "scratching my itch", "improving the desktop I use", and "writing my application in this awesome development framework I've found."

Assumption: Windoze users will be more comfortable in a cloned Windoze environment.

Truth: There are two kinds of Windows users. Those that can't stand change and those that want to get away from that crappy desktop. Nothing is going to please the former but the genuine article available only from Microsoft. The latter don't want that article, which is why they're leaving.

Assumption: GNOME and KDE emulate the Windoze look and feel.

There is some resemblance between GNOME/KDE and Windows. But it's superficial only. Take a second glance and there's no comparison. The Windows desktop is ugly and very low in usability. On the other hand, both GNOME and KDE have great usability and look good. There is no comparison between Kicker/Panel and the Windows taskbar. There is no comparison between KWin/Sawfish and the Windows "window manager". There is no comparison between Konqueror/Nautilus and the Windows Explorer. Etc, etc, etc.

Assumption: There is a native look and feel for Linux/BSD somewhere if I can find it.

Truth: There is not a native look to Linux/BSD. Trust me, I've checked. That's because there isn't *a* native look, but multiple native looks. Among them are GNOME and KDE.

There is no centralized authority over the *Nix look and feel, so there will never be just one, no matter how hard Redhat tries.

Assumption: The desktops in movies are modern and cool.

Truth: They sure look modern and cool, but they also look like usability nightmares.

Re:I have a question

[AvitarX]

Not just the start button, but the entire task bar has infinate bounds. It's about time though.

Re:I have a question

[alanwj]

Finally, I must point out that a third major desktop environment is the last thing Free Software needs right now. We're already fractured by the fact that developers (both Free and commercial) must choose whether to base their apps on QT or GTK. Many major projects choose to target neither: OpenOffice, Mozilla, Kylix, and Adobe Acrobat Reader, for example. A better option would be for KDE and GNOME to move to a new user interface, while keeping their libraries intact.

I disagree with the implied opinion that Free Software would be hurt by the development of another major desktop. The choice of which libraries to use when developing a new program seem not to have as much to do with what desktop environment you expect people to be using as it does with what a developer finds most comfortable to use and is best aligned with thier software licensing philosphy.

I say this because, as a KDE user, I can't think of a single instance in which a program written to use GTK has ever failed to run correctly (where 'correctly' is defined as 'the way it would run if I were using GNOME').

What would another desktop environment mean? It would mean I would have another choice. If it is better (for me) than KDE, I'd use it, if not it would be unlikely that I would have trouble running programs designed for its libraries. At worst it would mean I would have to have another set of libraries on my machine.

One somewhat valid objection to a new desktop environment would be that we could make our current desktops even better if the developers of our hypothetical desktop focused their efforts on one of the existing options. However that makes the often false assumption that said developers would actually spend their time in that manner were they not off creating their own desktop. Also this brings to mind cliches about too many chiefs.

In any case, I don't particularly feel as if I'm in any way entitled to make demands on how developers spend thier time if I get to benefit from their work at no cost.

Okay. I'm done rambling.

Alan

Re:I have a question

[Osty]

Not quite the entire taskbar. The systray area still requires precision mousing, but then you're generally not going down there very often, and when you are you're probably trying get a tooltip (say, of the time and date), and so will be moving the mouse around carefully. The Quick Launch bar (and therefore, probably other toolbars) also seems to not have infinite borders. And of course you can change the size of the taskbar so that you end up with multiple rows of buttons, at which point only the "bottom" (assuming taskbar at the bottom, of course) row has an infinite border. But hey, at least some of it works! Now if only I used the mouse that much, rather than hitting my Window key, alt-tab, Window-R, Window-M, etc . . .

Re:I have a question

[msevior]

You want to try Enlightenment 0.17.

Re:I have a question

[Laika]

you should check out fluxbox... Since I started using gentoo, I run a KDE session along side my standard KDE, just select at login with KDM :)

Re:I have a question

[gopla]

I was just testing, my login

Re:I have a question

[Anonymous Coward]

They don't really look like "windows", they look like WIMP GUIs. They look like MacOS and OSX and Windows and everything else.

Re:I have a question

[dpryo]

The window manager Enlightenment looks pretty sci-fi, and is very configurable. This is a screenshot of the current CVS version of E.

Re:I have a question

[FrankNFurter]

I doubt that he can wait until 2005 when e17 beta 1 is released...

Re:I have a question

[Anonymous Coward]

I like the transparent panel quite a lot, but my god, GTK makes everything else look like shit.

Re:I have a question

[IamTheRealMike]

Also, you don't need to emulate Windows using KDE/GNOME. Their default configurations just include a panel at the bottom of the screen with a K or a foot where the Windows Start Button is.

Actually this isn't true of GNOME any more. The default layout is as far as I can tell unique. You can see a screenshot of it here.

There is a bar across the top Mac style (though that's the only similarity to the mac), and a taskswitcher with desktop switcher at the bottom. There are two menus, Applications and Actions (which makes sooo much sense I can't help but think, why did nobody think of this before?). You can add your own applets to the panels, or add your own. It's not only extremely flexible, but very intuitive as well.

Having said that, I wouldn't recommend GNOME2 for new users yet. I'm using it now, and it's interesting as much for what it lacks as for what it's got. It's clearly a fantastic foundation to build on, and I await the 2.2 release with interest. Hopefully Nautilus won't suck then.

But anyway. The old bottom panel with the foot system has gone (unless you use RedHat) - I suggest you check out those screenshots of Jimmacs. They are too sweet. And nothing like Windows or the Mac, or KDE.

Re:I have a question

[rseuhs]

KDE with different settings.

Re:I have a question

[PainKilleR-CE]

Overall, everyone I know (myself included) that's given XP a chance has liked it. The things that make it great are the details, and therefore tend to be small items that people don't think about until they go to another OS (even previous versions of Windows) and realise they're not there. Basically I look at it as Win2k with more compatibility and a lot of little feature improvements (like ID3v2 tags and other metadata as sortable columns in detail view, images placed in a folder used on the folder image in thumbnail view (irreplaceable for browsing ripped MP3s), the recently-used-apps column on the new start menu (plus pinned items), etc.).

Re:I have a question

[jfx32]

Kylix uses Qt as a base for its widgets.

Re:I have a question

[sphealey]

They all emulate the same basic look and feel. My question is, is there any project of the same calibre (of would be soon), that does a native look and feel (modern and cool, like in movies) for Linux/BSD's ?

Sure, I'll get right on it. Could you just take a minute to define what the new look and feel should be?

The fundamental problem in UI design is that since the "ah ha!" insight that created the WIMP interface and the desktop metaphor, there hasn't been another key insight or breakthrough. Having once seen an actual Star workstation in action I can attest that a Star user wouldn't have any difficulty using the current Mac or Windows interface - they are fundamentally the same. Everyone agrees that we need something better than the W95 desktop - its just that no one can figure out what that is.

sPh

Re:I have a question

[Anonymous Coward]

You can pretty much configure those desktops to
look whatever you like. Just that the default setup
might look like windows is imho a good thing.
Its not a coincident windows look like it does, much research are done on user interfaces.
Poke around at http://themes.freshmeat.net to see
what you can do with various desktops...

Re:I have a question

[RQuinn]

Assumption: There are two kinds of Windows users. Those that can't stand change and those that want to get away from that crappy desktop.

Please don't assume that just because you think your enviroment is surperior, that everyone is either on your side, or a stubborn fool.

Believe it or not, some of us who have used KDE & GNOME & Windows, would still choose the Windows enviroment, not because we resist change, but because it's what works for us.

Re:I have a question

[pr0t3uS]

I like the transparent panel quite a lot, but my god, GTK makes everything else look like shit.

That's why you can choose from over 400 diferent GTK themes.

Re:I have a question

[jonadab]

> (modern and cool, like in movies)

You apparently have seen different movies than I have. The movie
desktops I've seen don't provide any facility for launching apps,
switching between apps, or anything else useful. They usually
consist of one big screen-filling dialog box containing options
for performing impossible feats, such as trying all the
possibilities for a sixteen-character password in thirty seconds,
or uploading a fatal virus to an alien computer system about
which nothing is known. Also, they have about 160x50 resolution,
which is anything but modern and cool.

Re:I have a question

[I_redwolf]

www.enlightenment.org

Re:I have a question

[Anonymous Coward]

I haven't used gnome or kde yet (do they run on OSX? ) but I think there are a lot of things wrong with that screenshot's interface..

First of all, the desktop icons... they look... weird. It's some weird angle on the icons. Also, the shoadow on the bottom of the icons don't make sense. The shadow on the front of the folders should be eliminated.

Also, in the 'gfx' icon, I don't see what the slide should mean. The toolbar icons should be made a bit larger, or the toolbar itself should be made a bit smaller. Users are too apt to miss the button.

Finally, the text rendering on the taskbar(which is not unique, but win95ish) looks weird. Look at 'Keyboard Accessibility Control'. The text should probably be squeezed or truncrated, but instead it clashes with the icon.

Oh yeah, the 'applications' menu, sounds macos-classic-ish, but I can't tell since I haven't actually seen it.

Re:I have a question

[Arandir]

Okay, question then. Without referring to the availablity of applications (which is a separate issue) or the difficulty in installing and configuring the underlying operating system (another separate issue), why do you prefer the Windows *desktop* over the alternatives?

Re:I have a question

[Anonymous Coward]

Erm - I don't think you really understand *nix, do you? You'll be amazed, but you actually *can* run KDE apps in fluxbox, or any other window manager. Obviously you need the libraries that they use, but that's like saying that you need the openGL libs to run openGL apps.

Although I really would like it if KDE and Gnome apps had the ability to compile with *only* QT or GTK respectively. The last thing I want are 50 million kdeinit processes running around!! It's one reason why I've now completely removed KDE and Gnome ...

Re:I have a question

[Anonymous Coward]

My advice is to use a combination of the ROX desktop/filemanager (rox.sourceforge.net) and IceWM as the windowmanager (www.icewm.org). (Use enlightenment if you want a more "futuristic" look - although I warn you, your productivity will suffer as there is no better way to view your active tasks than a taskbar ...) The result is very, very, very fast, very customisable and very user friendly - ROX shows just how badly both the KDE and Gnome filemanagers were designed.

Re:I have a question

[szap]

Interesting. But for the same exact reasons 1D commandline hasn't died out to the 2D desktop and can be more productive, the 2D desktop could be more productive than the 3D window manager.

On the other hand (no puns intended), the command line needs the keyboard. The desktop needs the mouse, even though the keyboard alone can be used. Which brings us to the 3D desktop. Without a faster interface (e.g. data glove), the mouse might not be the ideal interface for it.

Food for thought: how many people would prefer the trackpad over the rubber joystick on the notebook for extended desktop work?

Re:I have a question

[Anonymous Coward]

There is some resemblance between GNOME/KDE and Windows. But it's superficial only. Take a second glance and there's no comparison. The Windows desktop is ugly and very low in usability. On the other hand, both GNOME and KDE have great usability and look good. There is no comparison between Kicker/Panel and the Windows taskbar. There is no comparison between KWin/Sawfish and the Windows "window manager". There is no comparison between Konqueror/Nautilus and the Windows Explorer. Etc, etc, etc.

heh, way to back up your statements.

Re:I have a question

[IamTheRealMike]

I haven't used gnome or kde yet (do they run on OSX? ) but I think there are a lot of things wrong with that screenshot's interface..

I believe you can get them running on OSX, but why bother? They are seriously crippled on that platform due to lack of full POSIX compliance, and people buy OS X largely for the GUI. Anyway. Let's deal with your criticisms

First of all, the desktop icons... they look... weird. It's some weird angle on the icons. Also, the shoadow on the bottom of the icons don't make sense. The shadow on the front of the folders should be eliminated.

These folders are, fyi, SVG icons so they can be scaled to any size. Because this shot was of an early beta of GNOME2, not all the icons had been converted, hence the 2 different styles (both of which I think look quite nice really). I don't know what you mean about the shadows, the icons look fine to me. This really seems to be merely a personal aesthetic issue, which is fine, that's why we have icon themes.

Also, in the 'gfx' icon, I don't see what the slide should mean. The toolbar icons should be made a bit larger, or the toolbar itself should be made a bit smaller. Users are too apt to miss the button.

The slide - who knows? It was a demo of the different folder decorations you can have. There's no need to use it, if you don't think it's appropriate. The toolbars are fine, I use them all the time and you don't have to click directly on the image, as long as you're close it works OK.

Finally, the text rendering on the taskbar(which is not unique, but win95ish) looks weird. Look at 'Keyboard Accessibility Control'. The text should probably be squeezed or truncrated, but instead it clashes with the icon.

That was a minor bug that has since been fixed. I'm using it now, and the buttons are fine.

Oh yeah, the 'applications' menu, sounds macos-classic-ish, but I can't tell since I haven't actually seen it.

I've used Classic a bit, I don't recall any Applications menu. At least on the mac I used, everything was started either from the finder, or DragThing.

The point was not to hold up that particular screenshot as UI perfection itself, but to demonstrate that gnome has a fairly unique look to it.

Re:I have a question

[Y2KBugs Bunny]

My personal data polling suggests that you're a fucking wanker. Additionally, stop talking to retards.
Use an operating system before you bash it; do you say Linux is so great because your Lunix-hippie friends say it is?

Re:I have a question

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey little boy: You're the fucking wanker. I'll bet I'm also older than you and make much more money -- but that's irrelevant. What really matters here is that I'm so much more intelligent than you are.

You Canuck-half-breed-homosexual-teenager-disturbed little fuck: Get help.

Greenpeace, lefties, and slashdotters lie.

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't believe the bullshit. In the past few weeks I've read so many comments from jackasses talking about the ice on antarctica melting. The opposite is true. See for yourself.

http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov/topstory/20020820souths ea ice.html

hell-bent-for-leather

[rob-fu]

They're Judas Priest fans? Sweeeet!

sorry...couldn't resist :-)

Re:hell-bent-for-leather

[Anonymous Coward]

Arggh!! Stupid Judas Priest!! My roommate wakes me up with stupid "breaking the law!" every morning. Judas Priest fans should be shot!

Re:hell-bent-for-leather

[Anonymous Coward]

My roommate wakes me up with stupid "breaking the law!" every morning.

It could be worse... your roommate could be anally violating you. After all, all Judas Priest fans are faggot cock munchers who want to fuck Rob Halford.

Re:hell-bent-for-leather

[Anonymous Coward]

Nicely said. I think Judas Priest fans are extremely tasteless in music. I mean, I like rock and heavy metal so I have a high tolerance for most rock bands, but what Judas Priest produces is totally unlistenable. I hesitate to even call it "music." Why they still have a following till this day is beyond me. Maybe it's all a terrible curse.

Let me be specific in my applause.

[buswolley]

I applaude the work of leaders, teams ,and freelancers, who have given their free time(and a lot more) to a project that will mean so much to poor communites around the world. These poor communities now have access to technology that can uplift and enrich their lives without breaking their wallet. perhaps .. technologies such as these will do much to ammend the huge discrepancy between rich and poor. Thank you, in the purest sense possible.

Free and commercial release processes

[ColdChrist]

One of the things that's interesting about this article is how closely related the release process for free software is to that for commercial software. Commercial products have many things in their genesis that free products do not, but when it gets to be time to produce a clean release "the aim of the release process is to finish software, not to develop it." Waugh cites that quote from Havoc Pennington as applying to Free Software, but in fact it applies to both. It's a kind of convergent evolution into a niche; the ecological imperatives of product survival force projects to adopt these mechanisms in order to be successful.

The really interesting question is where does this convergence start? Are the reward systems, involving kudos and problem-solving pleasure for free software, and money for commercial software, fundamentally different? I suspect they're not, and that there is much less difference between an open source project and commercial product development than is sometimes thought. I'd guess that the more successful examples of each strongly resemble each other.

Re:Free and commercial release processes

[Anonymous Coward]

Think for a second about how works on free vs. commercial projects.

For the most part, the people working on free projects are a self-selected group of motivated talented people. For commercial projects - well - you probably remember doing 'group projects' in school.

The rewards for free software are small, and not at all required for existance (unlike say, a pay check). As a result, anyone who is not interested or talented enough to contribute leaves. For commercial projects, this just isn't the case.

Re:Free and commercial release processes

[iuyterw]

Think for a second about how works on free vs. commercial projects.

I did, and I realized it's the same people.

sounds interesting

[SweetAndSourJesus]

So do you want to come back to my place and...you know...manage my release?

I have pizza bagels and blue kool-aid.

Re:sounds interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

I Like Blue Kool-Aid And This.

AC To The Limit!

[Anonymous Coward]

Come on fhqhwgads!

There is help!

[stox]

Dear Mr. Dirk Mueller and Mr. Jeff Waugh:

The ACME Sales Corporation is proud to announce a solution to your problems. The XJ19 Laser tatoo removal kit. It will even remove the "Sucker" tatoos clearly emblazended upon your foreheads. How did you get conned into taking these jobs? Cat hearding is easy in comparison to the tasks you each wield. For only $99.95, and three sacrificial rubber chickens, we will gladly send you our kit.

But seriously, thanks for all the fish!

Re:There is help!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd buy your "tattoo" kit if you could spell it. At least you spelled it wrong both times. I'll give ya $5 for trying. ;)

Re:Yet another interview? When will slashdot run..

[Anonymous Coward]

here's a mirror, in case it gets slahdotted:

BME: When did you first realize that your ass could be the source of pleasure?
While watching porno films I saw women getting dick in their ass all the time and they seemed to like it a lot, so I thought I'd give it a try.

BME: What was it like the first time you stuck anything in your ass?

I was about twenty at the time the first time I tried it. The first time -- actually most of the first year -- I took no pleasure from it. But, I knew that the porn stars seemed to enjoy it, so I stuck at it and grew to love it as well.

BME: Why did you start putting larger objects in?

I saw gay films where men who were taking whole arms up their ass were getting pleasure from it. I learned to take pleasure from stretching my ass, and the wider I opened it, the more pleasure I took.

BME: How quickly were you able to move up to bigger items? Do you have a training regime?

It took me about two years to be able to take a wine bottle, and four years to take a 32cm ball. Recently I've been able to take a big ball, much bigger than the bottle. To pass that level I had to first train my ass with bigger bottles, like 1.5L pop bottles. There were a number of painful sessions with a lot of blood and ass-hurt for about four days after each session.

Because I am not comfortable writing in English, I will tell you my personal method in French.

BME: Thanks, I'll do my best to translate it for the readers. (Note: The following answer was translated by BME -- I apologize for errors in the translation.)

When I first started, I was using small bottles of shampoo. After that, I tried small apples, and then bigger ones. At this point I'd put a year of stretching in, and bought myself a large dildo.

My method was to dilate my ass as often as I could -- every day, even if just for a short while. Before starting it's important to use a large dildo; use it to both warm up and clean your ass, so make sure you stick it up all the way. When you find that you can take this large dildo without any work-up or preparation, then you know that you're ready to take it to the next step.

Then, in each session, to get your bottom prepared, put in a big cucumber. Soon you'll arrive at a point where even the biggest cucumbers you can buy at the grocery fit easily in your ass. Now you're ready to get serious. Buy a small Coke bottle, and use that in your ass. When that passes in and out easily, move on to bottles of wine. Once you can take wine bottles easily, you can move on to even bigger things.

If at this point you're having trouble with the 1.5L Coke bottle (just try not to force it out because the bottle is very hard), you can also have slower stretching fun with candles. Try putting them in one by one and seeing how many you can fit in -- at this time I was putting in about fifteen at the same time. The candles are great because they allow your anus to stretch very slowly.

Once the 1.5L Coke bottle can enter your ass, train every day or two (use a large dildo first, then the bottle every session). Most of the time I use Vaseline, but don't do what I do in this case. I think that the best lubricants are the ones you can buy for this in a sex shop.

When the 1.5L bottle is passing easily, go out and buy plastic balls that start at a diameter a little bigger than the bottle. Play with those, and with time, and a little luck, you'll arrive at my level too. (Don't feel bad if you're just beginning -- when I first started, I could barely shove a finger in my ass).

What I'm going to tell you now is very important if you plan on doing extreme sessions and taking large gauge. Do not bandage your ass. Do not tighten your buttocks. Try not to get an erecection -- you want the blood to be in your ass lips, not in your cock. It's not easy, but it's important that you think of nothing and empty your mind. It's absolutely necessary that you concentrate on your breathing. Don't think of the pain; know that it will pass. The real secret though is to breath -- and remember, without the pain, it's IMPOSSIBLE TO TAKE THE BIG ONES!

BME: What does it feel like? Is it sort of like getting fucked by a really well hung guy?

I want to make it very clear that I'm not gay -- I LOVE WOMEN!

BME: I'm sorry -- I imagine people must make this mistake all the time?

All the time, yes. Frankly I'm getting fed up with it.

BME: But you didn't tell me you'd gotten the idea for the bigger play from watching gay porn?

Yes, but the gay aspect never aroused me -- just the ass part. The films only helped show me that men enjoyed anal play as much as the women did.

I just want to find a woman who wants to play fisting with me (to fist me, or to let me fist her). I'm searching for one or two or more women to join me in my play -- I want them to stretch my ass with four hands at the same time while my body is supported. If there are any French women reading this, please write me -- it's my dream to do this performance.

Back to your earlier question, playing with a very large object feels a lot like having to take a shit very urgently. Even though you feel like you need to shit, that's just your imagination, and you can get extreme enjoyment with your ass so full.

BME: Do you like the way your ass looks when it's all purple and blown out?

Not at all, I prefer it when my ass accepts the stretching without any damage.

BME: Have you ever bled from the bigger objects?

Maybe eight or ten times I've had blood, but it was mostly because I didn't use enough lubricant.

BME: So... how big do you think you can go?

I'm looking for a bigger ball right now. I want to push my stretching as far as my body can physically support. I go slow though, because I never use drugs or anesthetics of any kind; I prefer feeling all the pleasure and the pain!

BME: What's the difference between pleasure and pain?

When I reach the limits of stretching, the pleasure and pain merge into the same feeling -- the pleasure this brings is amazing! Just two days ago I managed to put in a ball 37cm around (that's almost 15"). The feeling of pushing that out of my ass was indescribably pleasurable. Next time I do that I'm going to be sure to video tape it -- I'm sure I could probably even make money with that one!

BME: What are some of the objects you've stuck up your ass?

I've stuck up two big cucumbers at the same time, 1.5L and 2L Coke bottles, balls of all sizes, every size of wine bottle, lots of big butt plugs, etc.

I had a lot of trouble taking the 2L bottle because it doesn't fit in the ass gently. I can take a bigger ball, but a big rubber ball deforms to fit the shape of the ass -- it doesn't get smaller, but it's an easier fit.

BME: After a session, how long does it take for your ass to go back to normal?

Just five or six hours usually.

BME: Does it hurt afterwards?

No, not at all, but for the next few hours I can feel the ass's big lips.

BME: Are there permanent effects?

Yes -- my ass is bigger than ever!!!

BME: Do you need to wear a diaper? Does everything still work?

I'm not a baby!!! Everything is normal for me. All of the "anal destruction" I've done was done by me with care, and my ass is as normal as yours is... Although sometimes when I'm taking a crap it's huge because I've now got the capacity to really stock up. My digestion is trouble free though, and I've had no problems at all.

BME: What sorts of emails do you get from your fans?

Well, I don't know that many people online, but mostly admiration, asking for advice, and I've met a few other ass stretchers who've sent me pictures of their stretching.

BME: If someone wants to starting putting bigger things up their ass, how should they get started?

Take it slow. Start with little toys, and take your time growing your ass.

BME: Have you told any of your friends or sex partners about your ass play?

Oh, no! Up until now it's been TOP SECRET!

The KDE bitches need to quit bitching!

[Anonymous Coward]

The KDE guys need to stop with the crybaby shit. They sound like a bunch of whining jerks. In reading the list of things RedHat fixed (and I do mean fixed), they should happily accept most of the things as positive for KDE. The list contains several fixes that are for standardizing the desktops which are supposed to be done anyway. There are changes which may not be to their liking, but get over it. Mandrake and others have always packaged their own KDE stuff, but when RedHat does it, they start screaming! They are rightfully afraid they are going to lose in the desktop wars (which is what they are despite all the hippie-love everyone can win bullshit that has been going on lately). KDE chose early on to make a usable desktop and build it on a questionable foundation, now that has come back to bite them in the ass and they are pissed. Look only at yourselves, don't piss & moan about it and start porting your apps to the better desktop.

Re:The KDE bitches need to quit bitching!

[Anonymous Coward]

redhat=microhat

f00king dumbass.

null=teh suck

I can associate with this !

[StArSkY]

As a project Manager I can really associate with these guys..

I became a release manager at the company where I used to work by volunteering... it nearly gave me a heart attack after 18 months.

Release dates are set at standard intervals becasue theat's the way it has always been done ;)

Scope changes to meet time available ;) If it looks to tough to finish in time, delay it for the next release.. I have seen releases with 50 updates and fixes scaled back to 10-15.

Time to code ! bah no release manager has time for sleep, family or counter-strike..

and all of the above explains why I now do Business Continuity rather than release management ;) Mind you I would recommend it to anyone who wants to see how project teams, communities and stakeholders react to what happens with software releases. As the release manager you are one of the few who ever gets to see all sides of the argument.

Re:I can associate with this !

[Anonymous Coward]

If you ever watch the MTV Video awards or any show on MTV for that matter, it really is like watching "Tarzan". However, Tarzan was raised by apes so gradually he started to mimic the apes as far as behavior. These white kids obviously weren't raised by apes but you would swear they were whenever you see them acting (or better yet pretending) as if they were a bunch of nigger's with their ridiculous speech patterns and hand gestures.

It really is laughable. It is as if the evolution of the human race is going back to apes instead of the other way around. Another thing why do nigger's always thank god in their acceptance speeches. If god is so good why the hell did he make these nigger's so damn ugly and stupid?

The lie was that forced equality would elevate the black race and not damage the White Race. The obvious truth is it did not elevate the black race but dragged the white race down to nigger level.

When will KDE or Gnome "r0x0r" as much as PWM?

[Anonymous Coward]

C'mon, it's on every Slashdotter's mind.

MOD PARENT UP!!!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

That's the most informative post I've ever seen here on Slashdot.

Somehow, I'm not surprised he's French.

Anyone who believes in the "Greenhouse Effect"...

[Anonymous Coward]

...is a terrorist. Plain and simple.

Damn *I* wanted to troll tonight

[Anonymous Coward]

But the editors beat me to it. FUCK!

Ask them

[Anonymous Coward]

Ask them to go out together and get fu***ng drunk. Maybe they will have sex together, jump off a cliff, rob a bank, or, even, start merging KDE and Gnome.

Let Gnome 3.0 and KDE 4.0 be the same!!!

Like on Jurassic Park...

[kentyman]

"This is a Unix system... I know this!"

"I think I can get Jurassic Park back online."

Re:Like on Jurassic Park...

[marko123]

In the book, the screen shots looked more like a mac.

Re:Like on Jurassic Park...

[luphus]

That's because it was a mac ;)

I remember their "live video feed" being a quicktime movie. You could even see its cute little position control slide accross the window as movie played. Crays indeed...

And while we're on the subject, one of the most annoying puter interfaces I had the displeasure of seeing on the big screen was from Swordfish. Good lord. Honestly. Other than that, it was a fine movie :)

nwp

Re:Like on Jurassic Park...

[adadun]

Well, it wasn't strictly a Unix system - it was an IRIX system.

Re:Like on Jurassic Park...

[Anonymous Coward]

More annoying than fake computer interfaces on movies that make a sound for absolutely everything, are the people who use the word "puter". You sound like an eight-year-old girl when you say that.

New KDE UI?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is sort of off-topic, but have you noticed that KDE is looking more and more like a Mac OS ripoff? Take a look at this and tell me that the centered panel, glassy icons/scrollbars/buttons/menus don't look quite a bit like Aqua. The thing is, they still managed to (imho) keep it butt ugly. Compare this to GNOME which has become much less ugly (the default GNOME 1.x skin looked like a bad Motif/Windows combination) and more unique.

Yes, it's skinnable. No, 90% of users will never change the skin. If more than 10% will, then GNOME/KDE still have a long way to go (96%+ of windows users never change the color scheme; 75%+ never change the wallpaper)

Re:New KDE UI?

[SteelX]

No, 90% of users will never change the skin. If more than 10% will, then GNOME/KDE still have a long way to go (96%+ of windows users never change the color scheme; 75%+ never change the wallpaper)

Now, I would really love to hear where you got your stats from.

Re:New KDE UI?

[Anonymous Coward]

Now, I would really love to hear where you got your stats from.

No you wouldn't, he probably just guessed.

Re:New KDE UI?

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.stardock.com/

I would beg to differ. Go make up stats somewhere else...troll.

Re:New KDE UI?

[stilborne]

good thing that isn't KDE's default look, then. we'd be pretty stupid to released a centered panel as default, since that would rob us of using the corners ala Fitt's Law. no, what you have there is a screenshot full of optional stuff (keramik, translucent menus, centered panel, etc..) not the default set-up.

nice attempt at trolling though.

Re:Anyone who believes in the "Greenhouse Effect".

[ljaguar]

Not even a wide eyed and innocent child who loves you unconditionally?

Re:Anyone who believes in the "Greenhouse Effect".

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe in the Greenspan effect; but, not unconditionally.

kde and gnome

[fred133]

Being responsible as a release agent for anything
like KDE or Gnome has got to eat a BIG hole in your daily time line, I have a few moments in my day to help friends with small problems out of my normal daily work cycle, I can't imagine the time it takes to get involved in a project of this magnitude. My Hat is off to you. I have a small job as a SMT operator/prgmr,eats up 8-5 real fast, my brain even faster!

NOW FOR YOUR READING PLEASURE, BREAKING THE LAW

[Anonymous Coward]

There I was completely wasting, out of work and down all inside it's so frustrating as I drift from town to town feel as though nobody cares if I live or die so I might as well begin to put some action in my life Breaking the law, breaking the law Breaking the law, breaking the law Breaking the law, breaking the law Breaking the law, breaking the law So much for the golden future, I can't even start I've had every promise broken, there's anger in my heart you don't know what it's like, you don't have a clue if you did you'd find yourselves doing the same thing too Breaking the law, breaking the law Breaking the law, breaking the law Breaking the law, breaking the law Breaking the law, breaking the law You don't know what it's like Breaking the law, breaking the law Breaking the law, breaking the law Breaking the law, breaking the law Breaking the law, breaking the law Breaking the law

Re:NOW FOR YOUR READING PLEASURE, BREAKING THE LAW

[Anonymous Coward]

Blah.

Mozilla did it better

[sohp]

KDE and Gnome releases are fine, but compared to the Mozilla build/release process, managed by the enigmatic Leaf, they are 2nd class. Mozilla developers created their own tools to do it, too. Mozilla is cross platform, continuous builds, bug tracking integrated with version control, and they released regularly on a five week cycle (now quarterly), and daily build and smoketests. And once again, Mozilla is cross-platform -- Linux, Windows, and Mac OS 9/X.

Sorry to crash the party, but I have yet to see KDE or Gnome approach the bar that Leaf and Brendan Eich set high.

Re:Mozilla did it better

[RzUpAnmsCwrds]

"bug tracking"

What can I say: the world's buggiest code required the world's best bug tracking software.

(this is not an insult - Mozilla has become a respectable, stable browser)

Who here remembers M7? It's so cool to watch a browser progress from it's early primitive roots to what it is today. Amazing.

Bravo, Mozilla developers - for developing the world's best browser.

Re:Mozilla did it better

[JoeBuck]

Mozilla is a single application suite; it is small compared to either KDE or Gnome.

Re:Mozilla did it better

[Rentar]

Mozilla is a single application suite; it is small compared to either KDE or Gnome.

True, but this is only more reason to use advanced release management and QA tools. I'm not sure if KDE or Gnome has continuous builds or something, but I doubt it (at least I've never seen them) and in this respect it's true that they can learn a lot from Mozilla (or even use some of their code ;-).

Re:Mozilla did it better

[Rob Kaper]

Developers like me do continious builds all the time, many are running the latest CVS code as primary desktop or alongside a stable release.

With a developer base in the hundreds of active people, there is little need for automated builds. Mozilla's developers base is way smaller, so they need a more automated QA system.

Furthermore, KDE does not provide binaries itself at this moment, although there are packagers who will probably do the necessary QA themselves.

Re:Mozilla did it better

[tswinzig]

Mozilla is a single application suite; it is small compared to either KDE or Gnome.

This is a joke, right?

I mean, there's even a company that is using Mozilla to create a nice interface for Linux machines. How exactly is this different from KDE/Gnome?

It's every bit a platform as KDE or Gnome: It provides a user interface via xml, scripting language support (javascript), the ability to write add-ons for it, and it includes an html rendering engine, a complete email program, an WYSIWYG html editor, an address book, and (soon) a calendar/scheduling program. And anything it gives up in size to KDE/Gnome, it makes back due to the cross-platform complexities.

Re:Mozilla did it better

[luge]

Um, GNOME does all of those things (except smoketesting, which we hope will be coming soon). We release on a regular 3 week schedule (with 6 month major releases), we use bugzilla religiously, and we use tinderbox and release daily snapshots on multiple platforms (via both ftp and Red Carpet.) So... frankly, you don't know what the hell you're talking about :)

P.S. Leaf and Brendan would probably consider you a troll. I sure do.

Re:Mozilla did it better

[sirinek]

Now if only the KDE team would fix all the bugs in konqueror, particularly its poor handling of javascript, dhtml, and inline plugins.

Its an awesome browser otherwise.

siri

Re:Mozilla did it better

[sohp]

Other old hands will tell you war stories, I'm sure, but a developer being able to build and run the latest code is not the same as continuous integration on a designated integration station with an automated build and smoketest.

With a developer base in the hundreds of active people, there is little need for automated builds.

That's about as scary an assertion as I've ever heard from a developer on a large software project. Quite the opposite, the bigger your team, the more you need that automated build and smoketest. But I thinkJoel can say it better than I.

Re:Mozilla did it better

[Rob Kaper]

Quite the opposite, the bigger your team, the more you need that automated build and smoketest.But I thinkJoel [joelonsoftware.com] can say it better than I.

Joel's main argument for an automated system is:

"A tester finds a bug in the code, and reports the bug. The programmer fixes the bug. How long does it take before the tester gets the fixed version of the code? In some development organizations, this Report-Fix-Retest loop can take a couple of weeks, which means the whole organization is running unproductively. To keep the whole development process running smoothly, you need to focus on getting the Report-Fix-Retest loop tightened."

I still believe (based on experience) that this is not a problem for KDE. There is a very large group of people who build KDE from CVS or CVSup sources and have instant availability from the patch, which was quite possibly also sent to the respective bug report system (and mailed to the originator) and project mailinglist.

My experience tells me KDE is not one of the development organizations where this is a problem. Patches spread quickly within the KDE community itself, every major release (6-9 months) is followed by several minor releases with bugfixes only (every approx. 6 weeks, unless an urgent fix requires a faster release).

Maybe Mozilla did not have such an active community, but fortunately KDE has and it seems to work.

Of course there are some automation tools, such as build scripts in kdesdk, but those are still there to be used by end-users themselves. A community also scales the variety of compilers, platform and dependency versions over a much broader area than any automated system could. It would be a mere impossibility to maintain that variety.

Re:Mozilla did it better

[Anonymous Coward]

Mozilla certainly has good tools for continuus integration and so on.

But one things that really sucks with Mozilla is their schedule: how have they done to release 1.0 after 4 years of work ? Netscape has completely lost the browser battle and Mozilla may be one of the reason for it. If you can not beat microsoft by the distrubtion of IE, you can by the feature and stability of your browser. If you have one.

Mozilla clearly should have delayed many features to be able to produce a good browser _soon_ . Many things are cool in mozilla, but they are not really needed. They should have focused and improved things later.

If KDE had gone the mozilla way, it wouldn't have been released before KDE 3. But KDE 3 itself would have never seen light because it is very difficult to attract people and test a project that is not released.

Mozilla may suceed in the future, but it comes very very late.

BREAKING THE LAW, BREAKING THE LAW

[Anonymous Coward]

There I was completely wasting, out of work and down
all inside it's so frustrating as I drift from town to town
feel as though nobody cares if I live or die
so I might as well begin to put some action in my life

Breaking the law, breaking the law
Breaking the law, breaking the law
Breaking the law, breaking the law
Breaking the law, breaking the law

So much for the golden future, I can't even start
I've had every promise broken, there's anger in my heart
you don't know what it's like, you don't have a clue
if you did you'd find yourselves doing the same thing too

Breaking the law, breaking the law
Breaking the law, breaking the law
Breaking the law, breaking the law
Breaking the law, breaking the law

You don't know what it's like

Breaking the law, breaking the law
Breaking the law, breaking the law
Breaking the law, breaking the law
Breaking the law, breaking the law

Breaking the law

Um no..

[majestynine]

..movie operating systems have bad useability?!..

Ive never had problems with my movie operating system. Say... you want to hack someone? Simple!

Step 1: Open 'Elite Hacking Utility' in the 'Extras' submenu of the startbar.

Step 2: Enter the IP Address of your target, or click 'Hack Previous Download Stream' to hack the last server you sent data to. Then click OK

Step 3: 'Elite Hacking Utility' will automatically determine which OS the hackee is running, and then will prompt you if you wish to proceed. Click OK to continue, or Quit to exit the program.

Step 4: The hackee computer is running "Debian Linux." If you press okay, Elite Hacking Utility will hack through any firewalls and give you full access to that computer, using simple translators to convert anything to the file types supported by the OS. You will then gain complete access to their computer and all their files. You have not owned them! Although Elite Hacking Utility is a very safe program, there is a rare chance that the hackee could make a counter-attack, that Elite Hacking Utility may be unable to stop. To proceed, click OK, to choose a different IP address, click Back, to exit the program, click Quit, if you need assistance, press the Help key on your keyboard or choose Elite Hacking Help from the Help menu.

Simple!

Re:Um no..

[Roblimo]

5. Run "Guess Password" utility. It tries the sytem user's address, phone number, variations on wife or girlfriend's name, and several significant dates in the user's life, plus the ever-popular "rosebud." The current version of this utility only works correctly when the bomb countdown is almost at zero.

I believe an improved version of this utility, one that isn't bomb countdown-reliant, is supposed to be included in KDE 4, but of course that's up to the release manager.

- Robin

Re:Um no..

[PainKilleR-CE]

and don't forget that it even works on alien navigation and communication systems, even if your host computer has problems communicating with earth-born operating systems.

MOD PARENT UP! FUNNY!

[Anonymous Coward]

lol
Thats what the movies would have us believe :)

Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[unsinged int]

They keep mentioning it in the article and I must admit I have no idea what that is. My best guess would be it's some crazy abbreviation for installation.

...which usually includes docs, i18n, etc. as well as maintainers...

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[jjoyce]

Internationalization. It's abbreviated "i18n" because there's an "i", 18 more letters, then an "n".

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[themophead]

"il8n" is shorthand for the word internationalization. In this context, making KDE and Gnome work for the parts of the world that don't speak English.

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[JabberWokky]

It's all the translation strings for every language. If you write an app for yourself, you can just write it in the language you use. If you want it to be used around the world, you have to provide a seperate translation for every single string: the menus, buttons, documentation, mouseovers... everything. In an open source project you then have to run it past seperate language maintainers to proof read all the translations.

KDE has very impressive i18n tools (Fire up kbabel and take a look if you're running KDE right now), and I'd assume that any major project (Gnome, Mozilla, etc) all have nice tools as well. Unfortunatly, due to an oversight in Unicode, KDE's support for tlhIngan Hol uses the english alphabet.

--
Evan

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[wgmari]

In this context, making KDE and Gnome work for the parts of the world that don't speak English.

You mean like America? ;P

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[roie_m]

Internationalization.
There are 18 letters between the I and the N.
There's also l10n, which stands for localization.

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[GauteL]

Yes, and basically because Internationalization (did I get it right?) is an incredibly long word that is extremely easy to misspell. Especially for the people involved in the process, because they mostly do not have english as their main language, which in fact is the reason for i18n in the first place.

Gaute

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[puppetluva]

i18n literally stands for "internationalization".

It is so hard to say repeatedly, that people shortened it to "i" 18 letters then "n". hence i18n.

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[Anonymous Coward]

And yet again, you manage to write a long, boring plug for the KDE project without actually answering the guy's question properly. i18n is internationalization - there are 18 letters bwteen "i" and "n" and because it is long-winded it is abbreviated to i18n. [Now you can insert explanation of internationalization here]

There, that wasn't hard was it... and not a single instance of me prostituting myself to plug any shitty project I'm involved with. Asshole.

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[Abreu]

Let me think... Quebec, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, half of Panama, Venezuela, Colombia, Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay and Argentina

v.s.

Rest of Canada, USA, Belize and half of Panama...

Yup, it seems that most of America doesnt speak English (at least as a native language)

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[Dirtside]

Two references: kbabel (babel fish, H2G2) and "tlhIngan Hol" (Klingon language, Star Trek).

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[Anonymous Coward]

actually, unicode decided not to encode the klingon characters for several reasons. the movie producers don't use them consistently and the creators drew two very different alphabets, neither of which is widely used by the fanfic community which uses the latin transliteration. this is documented on the proposed characters page.

proposal to encode klingon

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[Anonymous Coward]

I remember when I was five I asked my dad why We lived in North America (Canada), but not America. He explained to me that North and South America are continents and that together they are referred to as "The Americas", and that America is a shorthand version of the "United States of America".

I was five and able to understand it, and I would assume you are at least 14, so you should be able to get it.

Sometimes the human nature isn't completely logical, if you can't comprehend or live with these quirks then you really have no chance of fitting into our society.

I guess Antartica and Asia will now be referred to together as "A", but that wouldn't matter anyways because Asia doesn't exist, it is only part of Eurasia; and the continent of Austrailia has to be called Oceaina.

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[JoeBuck]

Amusing, but in many ways modern American English (especially the English spoken by backward folks in rural areas, like Appalachia) is closer to the English Shakespeare spoke than modern British English is. For many words that Americans and Brits pronounce differently (e.g. "schedule"), the American version is the older one, the one formerly used in both countries.

The story is similar in France vs Quebec: it is the French who have changed the language more.

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[Anonymous Coward]

He's not involved with KDE. He was just talking about the project he most knows about.

Fucking Microsoft lover.

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[jameslore]

Australasia definately should be called Oceania, if only because we have huge problems convincing Americans that we're (New Zealand) not part of Austrailia (not to mention that we speak English down here).

The last thing we need is a even bigger Austrailia ;-)

Re:Can someone explain what "i18n" is?

[Abreu]

Anonymous Canadian Coward writes:

Sometimes the human nature isn't completely logical, if you can't comprehend or live with these quirks then you really have no chance of fitting into our society.

The fact that I understand it does not mean I condone it.

aint it ironic.......

[tanveer1979]

that the story has MS visual basic ADvert right in the middle?

Sorry for OT trolling but kinda thought it to be real real ironic considering that Kdevelop is direct competitor of MS programming environment.
Moving back online to the topic, I felt the interview a bit more general with very general questions with even more general answers.
I guess more hard hitting interview is the need of the hour with the interviewer baying for blood ;-) just like larry wall!
Better still get both of them together and lets have a flame war about wether KDe or Gnome is better. Too radical... I guess not i would really like to know what the KDE developers and leaders really feel for Gnome and vice a versa.. some interesting interview will be that!

Re:aint it ironic.......

[jonathan_ingram]

I would really like to know what the KDE developers and leaders really feel for Gnome and vice a versa.. some interesting interview will be that!

Most of them don't have any opinions either way - the main KDE/Gnome developers normally run an exclusively KDE/Gnome desktop, and so don't think about the other desktop at all. They're a very good example of convergent evolution. There *are* some times when something passes from one desktop to another, but they're relatively infrequent (for example, the Gnome 2 icons are *very* influenced by the KDE 2 ones, and in the other direction the KDE file manager got an improved look-n-feel after the release of Nautilus).

Re:aint it ironic.......

[LMCBoy]

Kdevelop is direct competitor of [the] MS programming environment.

No, it isn't.

Most importantly, KDevelop is not a commercial product, so it has nothing to compete for. Sure, it's nice if lots of people use it, but ultimately it matters not at all how many "customers" KDevelop has. As long as there are interested developers, the project will thrive.

More obviously, KDevelop targets only unix apps; MSVB targets only windows apps. They're in completely different "markets".

Re:aint it ironic.......

[Anonymous Coward]

for example, the Gnome 2 icons are *very* influenced by the KDE 2 ones,

Sorry, but that's just bullshit. I have to wonder whether you have ever even seen Gnome 2.0.

Re:aint it ironic.......

[Anonymous Coward]

which is why they both suck. portable software is good.

Re:aint it ironic.......

[Anonymous Coward]

search for "gnome2 screenshots" in google using i'm feeling lucky. it redirects you to http://www.gnome.org/~aldug/gnome2/screenshots/.

Click on a random one (e.g, http://www.gnome.org/~aldug/gnome2/screenshots/gno me2_rocks2.png)..

I'm sorry but everything besides the Nautilus desktop icons look very KDE-influenced to me. Don't blame them, because the gnome1 icons were pretty dark, clunky, and unusable (imho, jimmac > tigert).

Re:aint it ironic.......

[Anonymous Coward]

No, KDE icons are isometric shite. You are mistaking a more extensive use of color for being alike - and for your information, the main look for the next gen of gnome icons existed long before KDE 2 did.

Re:aint it ironic.......

[Anonymous Coward]

And for what it's worth: the KDE icons are a straight rip-off of Windows XP.

Bug tracking

[m_ilya]

the world's best bug tracking software

Bugzilla is way far from being the best bug tracking software. For example just compare it featureset with RT.

Re:Bug tracking

[mnemotronic]

Uhhh. So you refer to a one paragraph blurb which you wrote, and call that a comparison?

Where's the comparison with Merant Dimensions, some of the Rational products, or TeamTrack???

Where's the beef???

Re:Bug tracking

[m_ilya]

My point was just that bugzilla is hardly "the best world bug tracking system". Thats all. I'm not suggesting that RT is the best (though sometime ago I did review of all opensource Perl bug tracking systems and I found RT to be the best).

Re:Anyone who believes in the "Greenhouse Effect".

[thesadmac]

Hehe... Dilbert.

Interesting quote

[friend]

I found this quote interesting:

Any organization or person is welcome to contribute to KDE, and anybody is permitted to distribute modified versions of KDE under the permissions granted by the individual licenses of the KDE components.

This should be food for thought for all the KDE zealots who have their panties up in a bunch over the latest Red Hat beta. ;)

Try ion

[Anonymous Coward]

Try ion. Forget the eye candy. This is the vi of X window managers. You can't get more *nix than that.

What this article is pointing out...

[Erwos]

I think what this article is really pointing out is that you _don't need to be a coder to contribute to open source_. I know that people who code on open source projects constantly say that, but other, non-involved people don't seem to understand that improving documentation, testing, PR, scheduling, and the other "support" tasks are damned important to a good open source project. A room full of coders will not get you a good open source project!

-Erwos

Got a URL for that?

[smartfart]

The flash app of which you speak --- may we view it? Grazi.

Re:Got a URL for that?

[paladin_tom]

The best example I can think of is the "Enhanced CD" part of the Enterprise soundtrack. The site for the new Star Trek movie is a decent example, too.

Re:Got a URL for that?

[Theom]

Sure!

Rasterman said

[Anonymous Coward]

Linux desktop is dead...now please move on...us Mac os x users need more applications..a port of visio 2002 would be nice:)

X11 + KDE + Gnome + Motif + XUL + ?

[Abreu]

In principle I agree with you, but playing Devil's Advocate let me ask:

Now we have to install 2 complete desktops just to run most Linux GUI applications.

How much disk space will we need if we have to install 3 or 4 desktops just to run a couple of apps?

Re:X11 + KDE + Gnome + Motif + XUL + ?

[Anonymous Coward]

You don't need to install a "complete desktop" in order to use apps from that environment. All you need are the base, core libraries (kdebase, kdelibs, gnomecore). Depending on the app you want to run, you may need to add a few more lib packages (or, in the case of GNOME, about 17 dozen more packages just to get a simple calculator app working).

Re:X11 + KDE + Gnome + Motif + XUL + ?

[Abreu]

Thanks for proving my point, AC.

Berlin project

[axxackall]

Look at Berlin Project.

And if you like it then read here:

Berlin is a windowing system derived from Fresco, a powerful structured graphics toolkit originally based on InterViews. Berlin extends Fresco to the status of a full windowing system, in command of the video hardware (via GGI, SDL, DirectFB or GLUT) and processing user input directly rather than peering with a host windowing system. Additionally, Berlin's extensions include a rich drawing interface with multiple backends, an upgrade to modern CORBA standards, a new Unicode-capable text system, dynamic module loading, and many communication abstractions for connecting other processes to the server. It is developed entirely by volunteers on the internet, using free software, and released under the GNU Library General Public License.

haters want me capped in chrome, it ain't easy

[Anonymous Coward]

USA! USA! We're #1! We're #1!

First I'm a Chink!

[Y2KBugs Bunny]

No, no... I'm certain I'm wealthier than you.
Were you contracted at $40K a year when you turned 16?

By the way, how's your AOL? Can't mommy and daddy pay for anything better?

I betcha wish you could remember when you came out of your mother's pussy... after all, that's the last time you'll ever feel a woman's genitals.

Care to add any more hyphenated lameness to your already played-out insults? Playing the race card really doesn't work well for you... we Chinese are seen in much higher light than you backwater hicks.

And for the last time, I'm not thespoogeawards. I am, however, Blind Linux.

Re:First I'm a Chink!

[Anonymous Coward]

from one chink to another, methinks u typed your link wrong. For anyone reading these hilarious discussions, he means Blind Linux.

Re:First I'm a Chink!

[Anonymous Coward]

No, no... I'm certain I'm wealthier than you. Were you contracted at $40K a year when you turned 16?

Nope ... and I doubt that you were either.

we Chinese are seen in much higher light than you backwater hicks.

Hmmm. I don't know about being a backwater hick, but I'll agree with you about the Chinese: the lights in the takeaway place I go to are awfully bright. No doubt that's so they can see what they are doing to properly prepare my meal.

PS: The cleaners where I bring my shirts has bright lights as well. No wonder you people squint all the time!

Re:First I'm a Chink!

[Y2KBugs Bunny]

Oh, I was. Summer term, through to the week before classes resumed. So really, I only saw about 6K a year at that time.
No doubt that's so they can see what they are doing to properly prepare my meal.


I'll give you credit where it's due for that one. That was funny.

Post something non-anon for once... I'm curious as to whether you're normally a + karma, or a troll as well.

No: You're Just Clueless, That's All

[Anonymous Coward]

Pay attention, now: he who quotes numbers first loses. I'm not impressed, btw. I invented water when I was 16, and continue to receive royalties from it. See how easy it is to make up something that is totally false?

The two of you arguing is rather comical and sad at the same time, but enough is enough. I'm much older and much more technically experienced than either of you turds, so I win. Now disappear, Y2KDipshit and your boy-toy anonymous friend of yours.

Re:No: You're Just Clueless, That's All

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey -- Y2KDipshit (I like that very much, btw) is my troll bitch. Go find your own, dickhead.

Re:No: You're Just Clueless, That's All [y2k]

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not making this stuff up. 40K is a comfortable Canadian salary... quite good for a student. I was only able to work 2 months of the year, but it was great money at the time. Be it through the Canadian PS's "1 in 5 from a visible minority" quota, or through adequate qualifications,I got the job.

I will not reply to your posts in future, cockface. 2D is at least entertaining. You're just... gay.