Re: GNOME 2.0 Schedule - agression.

[George <jirka 5z com>]

On Mon, Oct 15, 2001 at 08:17:22PM -0400, Michael Meeks wrote:
> 
> On 10 Oct 2001, Iain wrote:
> > And if we're releasing gnome 2.0, but it's not going to be any better
> > (user wise) than gnome 1.4 (and lets be honest, it's not)
> 
>         It think this is a myth. It will be better, there are loads of new
> features in Gtk+ that will make it seem prettier and snappier. The look
> certainly changes - you can 'see' it's Gnome 2.0 :-)
> 
>         It also seems pretty inevitable to me that people will add new
> featurelets / fix things as they port their code. There are also misc.
> little new features like Jacob's new file selector that will make eyes pop
> out and mouths water - in due course.

Well there will be some regressions feature wise, and some improvements.
I think that users will mostly benefit from a 2.2 where the focus will not be
on the platform (since that will obviously be frozen) and app authors can
focus on the feautres and usability of applications rather then porting.

> > and then releasing gnome 2.0.1 (or even 2.2) a few months later, then
> > why not delay the gnome 2.0 release by a month?
> 
>         Delaying the release is not feasible / a good plan. Time to market
> is impossible; in fact you say:

I must be out of my mind, I agree with michael :)

Yes, we need to get 2.0 out AS SOON AS POSSIBLE.  I believe the biggest
"feature" of the desktop will be apps not written by us.  Unless we do a
release, not many people will be keen on porting their apps to the new
libraries.

Not to mention that even if 2.0 is "only as usable" as 1.4.  That's quite all
right.  There are some definate improvements, and 1.4 can be still installed
alongside if there are programs that are still missing from 2.0.

> > Polish is useless if no-one is using it.
> 
>         which is very true - we need to get the stuff out, preferably now,
> but optionaly by Christmas and delay is not an option.

We need to get stuff out 2 years ago.  I think that's when I first heard the
original "plan" for gnome 2.0.  We have already slipped so horribly it's not
even funny.

Slipping longer isn't good for users.  Users, gasp, use their computers.  And
they can't use it with software that 'will be ready in a few months'.  They
can only use software that is out.

>         Even BTW. if it means hard decisions like "ok, we'll look silly by
> not having derivable interfaces until 2.2" or whatever. In fact, I think
> the harder the decisions to cut features we make now, the more incentive
> we have to ensure that we get 2.2 out soon.

Exactly.  Btw, trust me that we won't look silly for having some API
problems.  Why?  Because 99% people are users and they can't give a rats ass
about API.  If we delay anything because of API, those 99% of people will not
see any improvement.  So anything like that can surely wait till 2.2.  And
even UI improvements.  Just because the UI is not perfect doesn't mean that
it's not usable.

> 	Beware advocates of fast release cycles that want everything
> perfect for this release :-)

Perfection is best left to perfectionist, we just want to write a nice
desktop environment.

George

-- 
George <jirka 5z com>
   Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior
   to all others because you were born in it.
                       -- George Bernard Shaw