Re: Tomboy replacement

["Luis Villa" <luis tieguy org>]

On Fri, Feb 22, 2008 at 10:43 AM, Sandy Armstrong >  >  >  >  Don't
port sticky notes. It's so 1980s. Tomboy is teh awesome.
>  >  >  >
>  >  >  >  Seriously, I am very suprised that no one from the less central
>  >  >  >  languages has tried to port Tomboy to their suggested language of
>  >  >  >  choice (hello, Java people?) as a proof of concept to demonstrate that
>  >  >  >  their language is as useful as C#/Mono.
>  >  >
>  >  >  Why would one rewrite something that works perfectly? ;)
>  >
>  >  I would presume the people working on Java, Vala, etc. feel that their
>  >  language could do it better and/or with fewer legal encumbrances, so
>  >  given that Tomboy is indeed completely awesome I'm surprised no one
>  >  has previously tried to port it, even if the functionality is indeed
>  >  perfect.
>
>  People have attempted ports and from-scratch replacements in languages
>  ranging from C++ to Vala to Python.  Some of these have been
>  publicized, and sometimes we just get folks in #tomboy letting us know
>  they're working on a Tomboy replacement in their chosen language.  We
>  never really hear from them again.

Interesting.

>  I think it's hard, when there is already a working and maintained
>  application, to drum up excitement and motivation to work on a
>  replacement.

Of course.

> The most successful Tomboy "replacements" are apps like
>  Zim and Basket that have a different approach to note-taking, and thus
>  meet some users' needs better than Tomboy does.  They focus on
>  features and results instead of politics.

I wish it were just politics. Microsoft making very public threats to
sue our users and distributors is a very real problem which chills
uptake of Linux generally, and I think belittling that threat as 'just
politics' seriously understates the impact. Shipping Mono, which
obviously is strongly associated (and at this point heavily funded by)
Microsoft, does increase that chilling effect by giving them another
talking point about Linux's inability to be innovative without copying
from Microsoft's IP. This chilling effect is real whether or not the
legal threat would hold up in court- if someone points a gun at you
and says 'I'll shoot', most people will not sit down to quibble over
whether or not the gun is loaded.

I think once Microsoft made the public threats to customers and users
of Linux (combined with Sun's admittedly imperfect move to GPL Java
and the superior momentum behind Free tooling in the form of Eclipse)
I *personally* moved from neutrality on the issue to being pro-Java.
But obviously it is in the end for developers to decide, and you're
right that an installed application base of highly polished
applications like Tomboy is a big hurdle to overcome.

Luis