Re: Gnome 3 vs scientists (ie., external monitor problem)

[Adam Williamson <awilliam redhat com>]

On Tue, 2011-05-31 at 11:01 -0400, Adam Tauno Williams wrote:

> Would be a dream come true to have a site where you copied the string
> from lspci output, enter your software version(s), and check a few boxes
> as to what does work / doesn't work / you-haven't-tried.  And make it
> searchable.  
> 
> The true problem is the above would only be useful if a large number of
> people used it [entered their data].  Creating a centralized repository
> of anything is something Open Source has demonstrated it cannot
> accomplish.

There have actually been a few efforts along these lines in the past.

The biggest problem with them is that they go stale very quickly: people
make entries then don't update them. So the HCL will say that card X
doesn't work, when in fact the driver was fixed six months ago and it
works fine. Or it'll say that card Y does work, but actually there was a
regression and now it doesn't.

I've never seen any such list manage to keep properly up to date and
accurate, it may well simply not be possible. Entering the 'software
version' works around this to some extent, but a) if all the entries are
for releases that are now a year out of date then you're not learning
anything useful, and b) few users are actually qualified to identify
these accurately; how many of you know all the components that are
actually key to video card functionality and can accurately give the
appropriate versions for all of them on your system, bearing in mind
distribution backports?
-- 
Adam Williamson
Fedora QA Community Monkey
IRC: adamw | Fedora Talk: adamwill AT fedoraproject DOT org
http://www.happyassassin.net