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A Look at the Compiz and Beryl Merger
invisibastard writes to mention that Linux Tech Daily has an editorial on the merger between Compiz and Beryl. "This state of affairs was a shame. Something that was finally getting the general public excited about Linux, the 3D desktop, was wasting time with duplication of effort and fighting. There were concerns about the long term viability of Beryl. The perception in the community overall was, Compiz = old and stale, Beryl = fresh and exciting. This despite the feeling in the Compiz community that the "real work" was being done by David Reveman and Compiz, and there were exciting things with Compiz core (like input redirection, etc...) on the horizon."
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Server committed seppuku rather than face a slashdotting.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
http://lists.beryl-project.org/pipermail/beryl-dev /2007-March/000371.html
(ok, so that might go down in flames too)
It's really great to see this. One of linux's greatest weaknesses is the amount of duplication that happens. Sometimes it's necessary but a lot of the time the community would be better served by everybody working together instead of against each other. This is one of those times and I applaud the beryl and compiz devs for realizing that and having the good sense to swallow a little bit of their pride on both sides. I'm looking forward to the great things that will come out of this.
I've always pictured the color of OS zealotry as a sort of bright flamingo pinkish hue
corel cache is up here.
http://www.networkmirror.com/9VoYxUYQ4uLdx_2F/www. linuxtechdaily.com/2007/04/editorial-compiz-and-be ryl-merger/index.html
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
Take Compiz's springy windows. It's cute when you play with it, and I thought it'd go great with the whole concept of water that Apple loves. However, when I showed it to a few friends that are not as technically inclined, they said the effect was "distracting." Mind you, these are college students, not grandmothers.
I think eye candy adds to the overall appeal of an operating system, but only if it's tasteful. Take virtual desktop switching—it's great to have a cube rotate, because it establishes what you're doing in spatial terms; however, I don't think anybody who actually wants to use their computer wants to waste time manipulating a cube themselves. I feel that many of the effects in Compiz are too much eye candy with too little usability.
(BIG EGO == GREAT CODER)
(HUMBLE == BAD BAD BAD CODER)
Hey, wait a minute - not only am I a great coder (possibly the best), but I'm also the most humble person you will ever meet!
I got through after a number of retries...
Editorial: Compiz and Beryl Merger
It isn't official yet, but Compiz and Beryl are merging. For the last few weeks I have been following the mailing list discussions on this topic. A lot of the work has been started. It is sort of unofficially announced, so I feel now is as good a time as any to comment. First some back story:
The war between Compiz and Beryl has been entertaining if counterproductive. Originally I planned to interview Quinn (Beryl's unofficial leader) about the Beryl project. That turned into an interview with the team that never really got anywhere. I dropped the ball. My feelings at the time were typical of those in the community. Beryl seemed to be this fantastic project that saved Compiz from being boring and a slave to Novell. They launched a beautiful website. It was exciting to see the frequency of their releases. At the time, I decided to check out Compiz to see what it was up to. It was surprising. Their forums were very helpful and positive. The more I read, the more I realized that I had made a mistake. There was more to the story than I was aware.
The communities were getting along a lot worse than I had realized. People in the Beryl camp dismissed David Reveman (creator of Compiz and XGL among other things) as a bad coder. Compiz dismissed Beryl as hacky code. Personal attacks flew around. Through decisions made with (hopefully) good intentions, like the insistence that Beryl code be GPL (thus unable to move upstream to the MIT licensed Compiz core) or the desire on some Beryl developers part to rip apart the Compiz core and " improve" it, it looked as if the teams were hopelessly split.
Meanwhile, Beryl continued to grow. Resentment grew in the Compiz community. One estimate was that Beryl used 95% Compiz code while taking all the credit. YouTube filled up with tons of spinning transparent cubes and burning windows. Any Digg story mentioning Beryl received a lot of Diggs. Flamewars in comment sections broke out regularly. Things reached a low point when a frustrated Compiz community member hacked the Beryl site.
This state of affairs was a shame. Something that was finally getting the general public excited about Linux, the 3D desktop, was wasting time with duplication of effort and fighting. There were concerns about the long term viability of Beryl. The perception in the community overall was, Compiz = old and stale, Beryl = fresh and exciting. This despite the feeling in the Compiz community that the "real work" was being done by David Reveman and Compiz, and there were exciting things with Compiz core (like input redirection, etc...) on the horizon.
It was a pleasant surprise to see talks of a merge start to show up on the mailing lists. This article by Kristian Hogsberg seemed to kick it off. The talks so far have been bumpy. There are fights about whether to rename the communities. There are heated discussions about what the merger means and where things should go from here. Old wounds have been reopened. There are complaints about the egos of the developers in the forums. At one point, reading a twenty-four page forum discussion, I wondered if the merge was a good idea after all. Little by little things seem to be working out, though. Quinn mentioned in one forum post that the fork was a mistake and regrettable. It takes a big person to make an admission like that.
I have to hand it to both communities. This is a brave and bold step. Not many of us can check our egos, put hurt feelings aside and move forward. The road ahead won't be easy, but the benefit to the Linux community will be immense. Energy won't be wasted on fights and duplication of effort. Confusion over what to use will be eliminated. Hopefully more effort can be spent by the distributions on getting the combined product packaged properly (How many times can I install a distro and the 3d desktop only to have no window borders in KDE?). The discussions I read are passionate. It looks like the project will be a meritocracy,
thegodmovie.com - watch it
Congrats on the first comment... it's a shame you couldn't make it worth the magnetic material it's stored on.
I think that in the Linux world, mergers are a good thing and need to be made across the entire Linux community. Imagine if the Gnome and KDE camps could work together... or how about Mozilla and Opera... or most importantly the package management camps.
Want to bring linux to the mainstream, pick a standard and develop it. Set aside your disagreements and work for the greater good. The world doesn't need another linux distro, it needs everyone working to create a single comprehensive distro.
I hate it when I find a piece of software I want, only to discover there is no binary for my chosen distro. I don't hate it because I don't know how to compile it myself, but because I shouldn't have to.
I hate that I can only seem to get hardware drivers for Suse and Redhat because the vendor couldn't cater to everyone.
And I hate hearing about projects forking because two intelligent people can't come to a compromise.
Choice is good... but only when there is at least one option that meets the need. Too often there is so much competition that none of the products can really fulfill the needs they set out to fulfill because there are not enough developers to go around.
Sometimes the best solution is to stop wasting time looking for an easy solution.
There is always place for multiple projects. Different focus, different personalities even different geographical location. Multiple projects encourage innovations that wouldn't be thought about otherwise.
If you believe that all GNU/Linux users will leap on Leopard when it comes out then you are sadly mistaken. Some of us demand FLOSS (Free/Libre Open Source Software), this is the reason we choose our software. Spangly, OMGPONIES!!!!1 GUI effects are far down on the list of requirements, that something like this is being developed is a sign that GNU/Linux is maturing.
But just because we insist on running open, Free software does not mean we don't want nice effects. It just means we'll do it our way: Freely (and with flame wars, separations, bad blood, complaining, forks etc).
If you love your Mac, that's great, but don't think that because you love it the rest of the world has to. They have different requirements.
I'm going to transform myself into a mighty hawk. Either that or I'll just go and work at Dixons, haven't decided yet.
Springy windows are a neat effect, and tunable so they aren't distracting. You can tune the friction and spring strength so they barely wiggle at all. But they are also incompatible with the window-snap module, which I prefer. A separate but similar effect is the focus-shiver effect, which I find very useful, as it makes the window that receives focus shiver a little, calling attention to it. The really useful window-movement plug-in is transparency, to make windows semi-transparent while dragging.
For a really fun time, try turning on springy windows, turning the spring strength all the way down and the friction all the way up. Then try to drag the window. You can stretch it practically all the way around your desktop cube.
All in all, this reminds me of way back in the day when Enlightenment (the window manager, kdawson, not the metaphysical oneness-with-all thing) first came out. Everyone started making these obscenely complex themes showing off how cool E was. Then it seems like everyone uttered a collective "Meh," and went back to FVWM. I did, anyway.
Beryl/Compiz does have other modules that enhance functionality such as tiling/cascading, and some that are mostly for show but have some use, like trailfocus. Perhaps the most interesting thing is that all the effects are scriptable, so that different effects or placement schemes can be applied to different classes of window
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Let me guess, you think you're a a really awesome coder...
"THERE IS NO JUSTICE, THERE IS ONLY ME." -Death
Personnally I believe the future is not Beryl or Compiz but already existing window managers like Metacity and KWin, seeing how both of them should provide 3d effects in their next version. Once everyone can get their wobbly windows and other useful effects with the standard window manager, no one will care about Beryl or Compiz anymore.
Mada mada dane.
Yes. Merger will be hugely successful and attract a lot of users.
I hate it when the ONLY option I have sucks, which usually happens 99% of the time. Which is why I love Free Software -- I can fork it.
I'm not sure if you were trying to be funny or insightful. But just in case, I must disagree. I happen to work with a guy who is a great developer. Incredibly bright (probably a genius but I've never asked). Has a PhD in Chem E. yet chooses to be a software developer because he enjoys that right now in his life. And I'm not talking just some hacker, he actually knows a crap load about comp sci (theory and all). He's the type of guy (this actually happened) that re-wrote one of our display drivers over a weekend because the third party one had bugs.
Meanwhile, he is the nicest, most humble guy I've ever worked with. And I don't know a single person at work that doesn't get along with him.
Did you know that the default gnome keys are cntl-alt-arrow to move to new workspaces and cntl-shift-alt-arrow to bring the focused window with you? I jump around so fast that any animation just annoys me.
I don't agree that "[the world] needs everyone working to create a single comprehensive distro". Personally, I think choice is good, and that alternatives can compete against each other, each try out different ideas, and stimulate and improve each other.
What does a "distribution" or "operating system" mean to a large number of computer users ? Nothing. They just see it as part of "the way the computer works". So why do we need more than one operating system ? So let's extend your argument to cover operating systems:
I think that in the [computing] world, mergers are a good thing and need to be made across the entire [computing] community. Imagine if the [Windows] and [Linux] camps could work together... or how about [Windows] and [Linux]... or most importantly the [software installation] camps.
Want to bring [computing] to the mainstream, pick a standard and develop it. Set aside your disagreements and work for the greater good. The world doesn't need another [operating system], it needs everyone working to create a single comprehensive [operating system].
I hate it when I find a piece of software I want, only to discover there is no binary for my chosen [operating system]. I don't hate it because I don't know how to compile it myself, but because I shouldn't have to.
I hate that I can only seem to get hardware drivers for [windows] because the vendor couldn't cater to everyone.
And I hate hearing about projects forking because two intelligent people can't come to a compromise.
Choice is good... but only when there is at least one option that meets the need. Too often there is so much competition that none of the products can really fulfill the needs they set out to fulfill because there are not enough developers to go around.
So......pursuing your argument a little further, should we all just use windows ????
Compiz and Beryl are mostly eye candy. I don't see much useful in either. Metisse looks much more interesting. I'm anxiously awaiting the release of Mandriva 2007.1.
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
You see it a lot in government and other large organisations, in the space programme for example. A single direction dictated from above which turns out to be completely inappropriate after billions or trillions have been spent. ESR called it the cathedral, it's just a form of totalitarianism and it's the antithesis of freedom. Choice is good... but only when there is at least one option that meets the need No. Choice is always good. It means that if there's a gap, someone, somewhere will fill it. Without that choice it will take a lot longer to fill. You're essentially serialising the process. The world doesn't need another linux distro, it needs everyone working to create a single comprehensive distro. You should read the mythical man month. More people on a project doesn't necessarily make it faster or better.
Deleted
Contrary to what is claimed, the war between Compiz and Beryl was productive. It did three things:
1) Forced David and friends to restructure his development process to be more like Beryl's
2) Forced Quinn and friends to realize that maybe David was right on some issues
3) Allowed Beryl to experiment with alternative ways of developing Compiz without destroying Compiz's approach.
Okay, maybe the conflict was a bit less civilized that than it could have been, but sometimes you need a good fight to raise the issues and so you can look for ways to solve them. You can't fix what you won't even acknowledge. The approach taken before the split up was disfunctional and didn't give people what they wanted. It's likely the new approach will be a lot better since it'll allow David to focus on what he's best at and Quinn to focus on what he's best at without stepping on each other's feet.
It's a troll. Don't feed it.
Someone with little or no understanding of open-source or free software that reads and posts on Slashdot. Quite possibly, someone from the Microsoft Astroturf Unit who gets paid to troll and spread disinformation (a.k.a. FUD).
It works better on Digg, where they can submit and put stories on the first page. It works somewhat less in Slashdot, because they won't be able to use the first page for their disinformation unless they reach editor status.
http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
Agreed. Looking at the comments on the compiz forum, it seems that compiz will stay compiz and the Beryl brand will be destroyed, to be replaced with whatever they decide on when they merge compiz-extras and beryl. This is too bad. Beryl had (a) a cool mineral-themed branding [beryl/emerald] (b) a fast capable development team (c) strong dedication to GPL licensing and (d) was basically responsible for much of at least my excitement around 3D window managers with their outstanding plugins. And (e) their settings manager was always the better one as well.
Then what happens? They come up with an agreement that destroys the Beryl brand and remerges essentially back into compiz? If they are in their right minds, they will at least insist on keeping the beryl name.
I would consider OSX if it came with a decent package manager and repositories stocked with the same great software I can find in my Ubuntu desktop.
Until then, it's a cute toy that may work for you, but doesn't work for me.
That said, I wish my Linux notebook had better hardware support, but the fact that I can live without multi-touch scroll on the trackpad and a close-to-zero configuration wireless network says a lot about how important the other, deeper, things Linux has to offer are.
http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
Lets throw out some rough numbers. Lets say that window's has 60% of the desktop market share, OSX has 25%, and Linux has 15%. Competition is a good thing i'm sure we all agree on that and 15% of the desktop market share is nothing to laugh at. The problem is the 15% linux has is then divided up. Say Red hat has 4%, ubuntu has 6%, suse has 3%, and other has the rest. Linux doesn't have enough market share to have this much competition. Once most of the main distros have 10-20% of the overall market share then they will be in a better position to compete.
.deb to Ubuntu). I think he is saying instead of having 3 developers per project on 8 similar projects, maybe it would be better to have 8 developers per project on 3 similar projects. To often someone comes along and reinvents the wheel.
I think what the grand-parent was going at is that there is to much competition within linux, and that there needs to be some mergers. He isn't saying that ubuntu and suse should merge together, but maybe it would be beneficial for them to share a package management system, like how Ubuntu and Debian do (ok so they don't share perfectly, but its easy enough to move a
I believe the grand-parent is trying to say that if your a developer and you need features X, Y, And Z, then it might be ideal to add them to an already existing program rather than starting your own. Simply saying: linux is spreading its developers thin would be sufficient.
I would love to take advantage of the eye candy a 3D accelerated desktop provides, but until I can do it with a multi-head setup it won't get used by me. The COMPOSITE extension doesn't play well with the XINERAMA extension. It's a showstopper for me.