Re: Gnome 0.99.8 - a success story <- I agree

[mawarkus t-online de (Matthias Warkus)]

+++ Fri, Feb 19, 1999 at 10:19:48AM +1100 +++
Wayne Schuller e-mails me. Film at 11. Reply right now, after the break.
> I installed the 0.99.7 series on my home pc recently (a fresh RH 5.2 install).

For me, installing 0.99.8.1 was a breeze. Of course it took long -I've
yet got to see a set of libraries that takes longer to build than
gnome-libs, while GTK+ is a close contender-, but it was worth it. If
it wasn't such a lot of work and hogging the machine, I'd rebuild it
in another tree and then try to figure the performance difference the
egcs optimisations make-

> So good jobs guys... I just hope the app developers can get their
> stuff ready in time while the bug stomping is going on...  Is Gnome
> 1.0 going to come out with lots of v0.5 apps?   I think this is not
> a great time for 'version number humility'... There are many apps
> (for example: gedit) which are close to or worthy of 1.0 version
> numbering... I always thought 1.0 meant "this app has basic features
> and is very stable"... but alot of developers seem to define 1.0 as
> "when my app does every bell and whistle I dreamed it would"...    

You have a point, but actually, who minds zeroes before the period?
It's just a matter of perception. It's of concern for marketing. :)

> Of course the power belongs to the individual developers, but it
> would be harmful to lose some potentially large user base simply
> because of differing assumptions on what v1.0 means...  (ie: an app
> is actually v1.0 quality according to the user, but they don't try
> it because they misinterpret what v0.5 means)

I think what Gnome 1.0 needs most is polish. I.e., all the .desktop
files need to be in place and translated. All the translations that
ship with 1.0 need to be complete and correct. All the menu entries
need appropriate pixmaps (the panel applet entries, too - gkb is the
only one featuring a pixmap AFAICS). Stuff like that, you see? 1.0
should really be 1.0. Even if Gnome has to go into 0.99.10 and 0.100.1
- or even 0.100.25, who knows? The points is, ship when it's ready.
Completely ready.

What is more, I hope Gnome 1.0 won't ship before GTK+ 1.2, and I hope
the GTK+ engines will have their act together, then, too - there still
is at least one bug in the Metal engine (the blue background in
scrollbars behaves in strange ways).

> Maybe a more controversial example is Enlightenment... v0.15????
> It's better than alot of other WM's out there....

But still buggy. Very buggy (had half a dozen segfaults and one deadly
X lock-up to date, with an 1999-02-17 snapshot).

mawa
-- 
I think the OS market will rather be like the Maglite market than the
Ford market.
                                                               -- mawa