Re: Proposed module: tracker

["André Rüdiger" <andre ruediger googlemail com>]

On 1/10/07, BJörn Lindqvist <bjourne gmail com> wrote:
> On 1/10/07, Kjartan Maraas <kmaraas broadpark no> wrote:
> > > Chicken and egg problems are not solved by waiting another release cycle!
> >
> > There's nothing hindering epiphany developers in creating a branch where
> > they can depend on tracker to make this happen. They could merge the
> > branch to HEAD at the time tracker is accepted into the desktop.
>
> I bet that the Epiphany developers does not think it is worth their
> time if Tracker doesn't get included in GNOME...
>
> But maybe if Tracker received a "semi-blessed" status? Not ready for
> inclusion now, but scheduled for GNOME 2.20 (or even 2.22). That would
> create a nice target for the Meta Tracker developers.
>
> --
> mvh Björn

I'm pretty exited about what's going on on the tracker front, although
I don't think it's (!!!) time for inclusion into GNOME has come.

The inclusion of an indexer/metadata-store is inevitable in the long
term but instead of debating why or why not include tracker we should
work out a plan to include it (maybe for 2.20).

So here goes the plan:

1. Identify candidates that could use the tracker features. I think of
- Rhythmbox (and Banshee) could use it as a replacement for there
music libraries.
- gThumb (and F-Spot) could manage the metadata of pictures on the machine
- Totem could use it to find Movies quickly
- Evolution, Ekiga and Gaim could store contacts in the tracker db
and find them again
- Nautilus could use it for tagging/previewing
- [insert preferred use case here]

The more applications the better.

2. Maintain a tracker-enabled branch and check if tracker works for them.

3. Define an API, that is sufficient for these target applications.

4. Let tracker/beagle/[your favourite indexer goes here] implement this API.

5. Decide again if it's ready for inclusion.

6. Be happy.

Since t-s-t is the only application that users tracker the benefit of
including it will not outweigh the problems that will likely occur.

But please stop that discussion and start solving the real problems.
Look at avahi which went this route and is now enabled by default in
Ubuntu.

What do you think about a GNOME Goal for 2.20?

Sorry for bad English and thanks for reading.

Regards,
André