Re: Evolution 2.0 and GNOME 2.6

[JP Rosevear <jpr ximian com>]

On Sat, 2004-01-31 at 07:32, Danilo Segan wrote: 
> JP Rosevear <jpr ximian com> writes:
> 
> >
> > In order to ensure that Evolution meets the GNOME project's standards of
> > quality and usability, we'd like to propose that the Evolution client be
> > included in GNOME 2.8 and not GNOME 2.6.  The whole proposal is as
> > follows:
> >
> 
> Just one point which should be taken into account.
> 
> Modules have already been announced.  Translators have already devoted
> their time to translate Evolution, because it's a big component of
> what was supposed to be Gnome 2.6 D&DP (it itself amounts to around
> 17% of translations, which is HUGE!).
> 
> With this step, lot of those who don't have much resources will now
> suffer: their chances of getting into "supported" list of languages
> are now much worse, if they spent the time between the Murray's
> announcement and today translating Evolution (and nobody even
> bothered to let gnome-i18n list know about the withdrawal).

I apologize, this was an oversight on my part.  I've forwarded the
original message on to gnome-i18n g o 

> What this actually means?  It means that they'll be discouraged, some
> may even give up.  This is bad, it hurts the community and it hurts
> the Gnome project.
> 
> The work is not really "lost", but the goal which has driven some of
> the translators is now surely harder to achieve.

I hope they don't, Evolution has always enjoyed great support from translators
which we really appreciate, and as you state the work is not really lost, it'll
just appear 3 months later.

> So, what I ask for here:  establish a policy that any significant
> module (in terms of work for other Gnome subprojects, such as
> documentation, UI review, translation, etc.) must guarantee not to
> withdraw once final module list is announced.  This will probably
> make maintainers think twice before really dedicating themselves to
> be in the "official" Gnome, and something like this won't happen
> again. (Though, I don't expect us to have any such large-scale module
> proposed in the near future, comparable to Evolution.)
> 
> Free Software development goes around such rewards such as
> mentioning a language in the Release Notes for the Gnome D&DP. And to
> deserve that, one must translate at least 80% of a desktop -- now
> it's probably pretty clear what effect this can have.

Its clearer to me any how, if this is a large problem, perhaps the release team could
make an exception for this release if any translators dedicated a lot of resources to
evolution only to have it pulled (and causing damage to their 80% rating).

-JP
-- 
JP Rosevear <jpr ximian com>
Ximian, Inc.