Re: [Evolution] Evo 2.24.3 bug list, by personal priority.

[Paul Smith <paul mad-scientist us>]

On Mon, 2009-02-23 at 16:09 +1100, Nick Jenkins wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> A few weeks ago, I read how on this list how someone (maybe poc?) used
> to post their list of Evolution bugs that annoyed them, with their bug
> numbers / bugzilla links.

I think you're thinking of me.

I think this is useful although I did try to limit mine to my top 5-6
"really can't use this utility properly" bugs, and also to limit them to
things which are really obviously bugs, and not just "I wish Evo would
work differently", where other people may disagree.  In my experience
the more you add to your wishlist the less people feel inclined to read
it all and work on it.

However, it can't hurt!

> * Bug 558363 - Evolution: Appointments reminder window lost on logout +
> login (reminder data loss) (Evolution)
>   http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=558363
> * Bug 558493 - Evolution: Reminders for Appointments due when the
> computer is turned off are lost / never shown. (Evolution) [not sure if
> this still happens in 2.24, need to check]
>   http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=558493

I find these funny, because Evo used to work exactly like this.  And,
people complained because after a long absence, when they started Evo
they would get hundreds of popup windows announcing reminders for
meetings that were long past... it entailed a lot of hunting and
clicking to locate and get rid of them all and really, what was the
point?  Those appointments were gone; it's not like you can get them
back.  So, bugs were filed and Evo was changed so that it no longer did
this.  People were happy.  But I guess not everyone :-).

I agree that a better fix to the original problem would have been to
have a single window with a list of reminders so that it was easy to
select and dismiss them in a group, rather than having individual popup
windows for every reminder.

> * Bug 551470 - Evolution: do not insert "-- " (dash dash space) at the
> start of signatures. (Evolution) [Marked as WONTFIX, but as mentioned
> previously cannot agree with this resolution]
>   http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=551470

Speaking in general, not about this bug in particular or even about
Evolution, but a dismissive attitude towards RFCs will not get you very
far with FOSS software.  Microsoft refugees may find this shocking ;-),
but standards trump personal preferences and "the user", _every time_.
There is simply no contest at all.  Standards are what make the entire
ecosystem of FOSS possible--even the small and "silly" ones--and as such
they create an extremely high barrier.  It's no longer in the realm of
personal preference.

Comments like "Foisting a de-facto standard on users which clashes with
their corporate culture, and which they cannot turn off [...], does not
seem like a winning strategy for user-satisfaction & product-adoption to
me." are simply not compelling to us.  Of course we would like to see
the software used as widely as possible, but we aren't selling it.  More
users doesn't mean any more money, and "corporate culture" is not
important to us, as a concept.  The reality is that there is a FOSS
culture, which is standards-based and has a very long history (much
longer than any corporate IT history), and meeting the needs of that
culture is far more important to a free software package... because
without that, you have no free software.

That being said, obviously we're interested in usability enhancements,
and of course all things being equal we want to enable people to use the
software the way _they_ want to use it--that's what FOSS is all about.
I'm just warning you that trying to argue that some aspect of Evolution,
or any FOSS package, should be changed to violate an RFC just because
that's how it's done in "corporate culture", will not make a winning
argument.