Re: Proposing libgdata as a new desktop module

[John Carr <john carr unrouted co uk>]

On Thu, May 7, 2009 at 7:27 AM, Philip Withnall <philip tecnocode co uk> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I would like to propose libgdata as a new desktop module for GNOME 2.28.
> libgdata is a GLib-based library for accessing online service APIs using
> the GData protocol — most notably, Google's services. It provides APIs
> to access the common Google services (at this stage, only Google
> Calendar, YouTube and Google Contacts; PicasaWeb support is in the
> works), and has full asynchronous support. You might have already heard
> a little about it on my blog[1]; a little more information is available
> on its l.g.o page[2].
>
> libgdata 0.2 was released a few weeks ago, and a 0.3 release will be
> made in a few more weeks' time. Until version 1.0, there are no
> guarantees as to API stability, with errors in the API being corrected
> with each release.
>
> libgdata will not introduce any new dependencies; it depends on only:
> * glib-2.0 >= 2.16.3
> * libxml-2.0
> * gio-2.0 >= 2.17.3
> * libsoup-2.4 >= 2.24.0
> It can optionally depend on libsoup-gnome-2.4 for GNOME integration
> (such as automagic proxy support).
>
> libgdata uses GNOME resources exclusively: Bugzilla, git, damned-lies
> and GNOME FTP.
>
> The library is already in use in the Totem YouTube plugin, and I'm in
> the process of porting evolution-data-server to use libgdata[3]. As a
> consequence of being used in Totem, the library is already packaged for
> Fedora 11[4].
>
> As far as community is concerned, libgdata is mostly there. There is
> full API documentation, and the few strings which can be localised, are.
>
> libgdata fits (I think) nicely into the GNOME 3.0 vision, allowing
> tighter web–desktop integration. It doesn't use any deprecated libraries
> or API. There were two SoC projects this year which were related to
> integrating Google services in applications, and I have high hopes that
> libgdata will be able to help in that area.
>
> libgdata is licenced under LGPL 2.1.
>
> The project started in January 2009, and has already had two
> person-years invested in it, according to Ohloh[5]. I suppose this
> should be taken with a pinch of salt, but it gives the general idea.
>
> If libgdata does not make it as a desktop module, for whatever reason,
> it needs to be listed as an external dependency, due to its use in Totem
> and upcoming use in evolution-data-server.
>
> Regards,
> Philip Withnall
> Maintainer of libgdata
>
> [1]: http://tecnocode.co.uk/2009/04/07/libgdata/
> [2]: http://live.gnome.org/libgdata
> [3]: http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=580021
> [4]: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=493432
> [5]: https://www.ohloh.net/p/libgdata
>
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>

Awesome :) +1 here.