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Microsoft Reaches Out To Blender
dmbasso writes "Continuing its strategy to support FOSS application on the Windows platform, Microsoft mailed the Blender developers asking how they could help improve the experience of Blender users on Windows. Groklaw puts it in perspective using Steve Ballmer's own words."
That's easy, release the source.
+1 IDisagreeSoHeMustBeATrollOrAnAstroturferOrAShill
Will it Blend?
I'm gonna fucking kill yo... err... how can I help your project?
Those who advocate genocide deserve every protection afforded by law, and none afforded by common human decency.
"Bite my shiny, metal ass."
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 is the magic number.
"Blender's interface is actually quite intuitive" ... that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
here's the thing:
If you can't figure out what stuff does without a video tutorial, then it is *by definition* not intuitive.
I've used 3D application since the late 80's (started with Sculpt-Animate 4D, and have used *many* applications since), and Blender's interface is one of the worst I've ever seen. I'd say it's worse than ever Caligari (the first version) in that at least with Caligari I could actually navigate.
I tried learning Blender recently, and downloaded a video tutorial. The guy presenting it repeatedly used the word "intuitive" - even going so far as to say something like this:
"The buttons don't work the way you'd expect, but once you get used to it, it's really intuitive."
If you don't get how hilarious this is, then you don't know the meaning of the word "intuitive".
"Microsoft is slowly shifting toward a more open standards based approach to its file formats. The ISO standard Office Open XML is an example of the direction we are moving towards."
So you're moving towards bribery and pollution of international standards bodies and open mockery of the idea of open and standard formats?
Sorry, but after that I would have told him where he could shove it.
From what I have read of the original posts on the Blender site, it looks like the Blender project will tell Microsoft to go away.
After the OOXML fiasco — Microsoft must truly be deluded to think this is a good example of their openness policy — it is only right that the Blender project, knowing what would happen to them in the end, should reject Microsoft.
The thing that gets to me is how can a *proprietary* company ask an *open source* community to help make the *open source* work better on the *proprietary platform*. I mean doesn't that strike people as... stupid? Why not the proprietary company just... *read* the source code for themselves? Don't they have enough money to *hire* developers to work on blender? Why do they think that people who provide their own free time should work to support their *proprietary* platform, which by their own business model is built on charging people for the privilege of using their OS?
What, it's ok for MS to charge people to use their software, but it's not ok to expect MS to shell out some money for other people's software? MS wants the software for free?!?!
Result: people might have better experience working with those formats when they use Blender on Windows. -> That would make it more attractive to use Windows as underlying platform (if support for those file formats matter to you).
In other words: give a competitive advantage to using Windows, make it less attractive to move to a FOSS operating system.
Ok, you know what. I doubt there is any convincing you because like so many other people, you've already made up your mind based on what you've heard.
So don't use the word intuitive then because its probably the wrong word to use when talking about 3d software. Let's say this instead, once you've really spent some time learning Blender's interface, you will start to think that a lot of other 3d user interfaces have it wrong. At least I did. I used Imagine for years and I thought Imagine made a lot of sense, but after using Blender for 3 months and actually spending time to learn it, I'm so much faster at creating objects in Blender than I ever was in Imagine.
I think what has happened, is that the myth that it is hard to use has preceded the application. Blender is not the only software with this problem.
Exactly so. If Microsoft really wants to improve the software... then commit your own programmers to the project and put your improvements back into the community.
$nice = $webHosting + $domainNames + $sslCerts
B.S. With the exception of your mother's nipple, you have never ever used an intuitive interface. There is no such thing. Have you ever seen someone try to "intuit" how to use a mouse without even having seen it being used? "Hello computer?" When you say "intuitive", you merely mean "similar to whatever I'm used to". Frankly, efficiency and discoverability are what you should focus on.
Based on the snip that Ton posted, I get the impression that MS doesn't comprehend what Blender is, or how it works. File formats? That's low on the list of Blender's issues with Windows. Never mind that OOXML's status as an ISO standard is debatable.
If MS wants to support Blender (and lots of other FOSS software) on Windows, they need to put real effort into supporting OpenGL. FOSS developers don't generally bother with supporting DirectX and OpenGL, and most of the time supporting Windows at all is an afterthought.
But, MS won't do it because that would make it easier for games to be developed for Windows and anything else.
http://antitrust.slated.org/www.iowaconsumercase.org/011607/3000/PX03020.pdf
That's MS's philosopy about "open" standards in 1999, and it's their philosphy in 2008.
Balmer's play may backfire. Read the Groklaw post. It is about trying to outsmart Linux by making sure that "open sores" runs wonderfully on Windows, so nobody needs Linux.
The problem is that, once people start using OO, Firefox, etc., they will eventually realize that they can run that exact same software on a free OS.
The shock of changing the OS and the office suite is a lot. However, if you can transition one little piece at a time, Windows is in trouble.
"-1 Troll" is the apparently the same as "-1 I disagree with you."
I just don't think most of the people here understand the difference between 'easy to use' and 'easy to learn'. Blender looks like a really interesting tool, but a lot of people have unrealistic expectations for making complex tasks simple. Having used 3ds Max in a production environment for four years, what's 'intuitive' now is far different from what it was when I started.
The problems with the interface for beginners is that not much is apparent - for example, I could create a cube/cylinder/monkey, and with a bit of fiddling managed to make it red and clear, I could sometimes move random nodes. But this was essentially it.
The problem comes due to the heavy reliance upon keyboard shortcuts and unnamed icons, which once learned are certainly efficient and easy to use, but they don't facilitate easy learning. This is a very large and often neglected aspect of learning something as complex and just plain *weird* as 3D modeling and animation: Documentation! Say what you will about the 3ds Max interface (I like it for poly modeling) but the documentation and tutorials are some of the best I've seen for a good introduction to 3D. I found Blender daunting when I last tried it because there really was a shortage of available tutorials and other documentation.
Good documentation will carry a mediocre interface better than poor documentation will carry a great interface.
MS normally reaches out to developers through the paid developer channels. As a result, OSS developers were ignored by Microsoft. Microsoft creates a new position to reach out to them, and contacts them saying, "How can we help? Is there a file format problem? We're working on making our file formats more open, is there something that we can speed up that would help," and you all make snide remarks.
If file formats are not a problem, than a simple, "We're fine for now, but when the issue comes up, I will pass your contact information on to developer with trouble, here's my vCard, let's keep in touch," would be fine.
Microsoft isn't passing any judgment here. Windows competes with Linux in the marketplace, Blender is an application that runs on Windows and Linux, the company that makes Windows reaches out offering to help because they want Blender to run really well on Windows.
It's not about Microsoft WANTING the software for free, the Blender guys GIVE the software away for free, to Microsoft and everyone else. This is simply Microsoft realizing that their competition with Linux and other Open Source PROJECTS doesn't mean that other applications should be supported as well as other third party developers. I'm sure that Microsoft gives Adobe support because they want Adobe products to run as well or better on Windows as Mac OS X, now they are offering support to Blender.
The Blender guys may not need/want that support, but this is Microsoft "getting it," and Slashdot users NOT "getting it." The software marketplace is not proprietary vs. open source, it's not non-Free vs. free, it's product area by product area. I find it unlikely that Microsoft would offer support to the Open Office guys, because OO running better on Windows hurts their market leading Microsoft Office product, but other areas that Microsoft doesn't compete in, they can offer them support.
I would expect MS to be willing to support The Gimp writers as that program gets better, because Microsoft is indifferent between users running Windows/Photoshop and Windows/Gimp, and would like EITHER scenario better than OSX/Photoshop, OSX/Gimp, or Linux/Gimp.
"The buttons don't work the way you'd expect, but once you get used to it, it's really intuitive."
If you don't get how hilarious this is, then you don't know the meaning of the word "intuitive".
I've never used Blender and can't comment on whether or not its UI is intuitive. I intend only to reply to your comments about the meaning of "intuitive".
To an extent, I agree with you. However, being "intuitive" doesn't necessarily only mean that it's immediately obvious how to use it. Sometimes your initial perception of the basic UI concept doesn't match that of the developers, but once you shift your perception accordingly, then it become intuitive.
Basically, you may encounter a UI that makes no sense to you. Then you learn how it works, but each time you go to do an action, you have to stop and think about how to do it, and rely on memorized steps. This is not an intuitive interface.
On the other hand, you may encounter a UI that makes no sense to you, but once you grasp the UI's concept, you find that you don't have to rely on memorized steps, they just make sense based on your new understanding of the UI concept. That's a UI that has become intuitive.
In other words, it's intuitive to a person who understands the concept. All you have to do is learn the concept.
"You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war." -- Albert Einstein
Anybody who thinks that Blender is too complicated should probably read up on expert interfaces. Doing 3D modelling is not something you can pick up in a couple hours, or learn in a week even. Expert interfaces are fine on tools like Blender where you would expect the user to be able to devote a large amount of time to learning how the tool works, as long as the time spent learning the tool allows them to do the actual tasks more quickly. Blender is like the CLI. It's not entirely obvious from just messing around how to use it effectively, but to the experienced user, it can be quite powerful.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
Why would you limit emacs to three dimensions?
t
You've clearly never seen how much time and effort new mothers put into teaching their babies to breast feed. It's difficult enough that most hospitals offer classes.
I know, I was surprised too.
So much for intuitive interfaces.
You got it completely backwards.
It is the GPL license which induced a lot of people to contribute to the Linux kernel instead of a BSD-licensed ... BSD system, which predates Linux by decades.
The fact that because the BSD license did not guarantee that one's contribution will not end up being sold back to the contributor by some greedy fuck, is what turned a majority of contributors away from BSD and other similar licenses. It is why a vast majority of FOSS is licensed under the GPL.
See above. If it were not for GPL, a "most recent" Linux kernel would be still a version 0.6 curiosum found in cob-web covered corners of Usenet and the most widely known Linux-alike system would be BSD with a fraction of a following of today's Linux. It is the GPL which made all the difference. And we have an empirical proof for that: BSD and its forks.
Skipping for the moment the fact that the Linux kernel is developed using the GNU toolchain and that no Linux system can even boot without a whole core set of GNU libraries and tools, it is the GPL which allowed for the growth of Linux. If linux were to be re-licensed to MIT or BSD today, probably (judging by their words on LKML) 80% kernel developers would drop out of the project instantaneously.
Yes! How dare these bastards stop you from taking their shit and selling it for your profit! I mean the chutzpa they have! Lazy unemployed beggars all!