Re: More Political Stuff

[Ali Abdin <aliabdin aucegypt edu>]

* Sean Middleditch (sean.middleditch@iname.com) wrote at 21:05 on 25/08/00:
> > * Havoc Pennington (hp@redhat.com) wrote at 17:41 on 25/08/00:
> > > > Also the issue with StarOffice.  I've used StarOffice a couple times,
> > > > along with ApplixWare, and my God did they ever suck horribly.  Is
> > > > StarOffice REALLY going to be the official GNOME desktop?  Why can't we
> > > > develop our own software?  We have Gnumeric, and AbiWord could be great
> > > > too if it got worked on more (its development seems Gods-awful slow to
> > > > me).  We have Dia, and GIMP, etc.  What true point is there to using
> > > > StarOffice?  I mean, options are nice, but there needs to be one
> > > > official office suite, and I honestly think GNOME needs its own, not a
> > > > borrowed office suite that isn't that good to begin with.  Porting the
> > > > code to GNOME-libs and bonobo would probably take more time than just
> > > > writing our own: I know I find development a hell of a lot easier than
> > > > porting code to new API's.
> > > > 
> > > 
> > > All we are doing with StarOffice is working with Sun to develop a new
> > > office suite, using the best code from existing GNOME Office apps and
> > > also StarOffice. Probably we will end up using most of StarPresent,
> > > for example, but Gnumeric may replace StarCalc. This is all still up
> > > in the air and is a technical issue to be resolved by the GNOME Office
> > > and Sun hackers.
> > 
> > The press release didn't come out 'too good' but thats too be expected. Sun's
> > press released implied that StarOffice would REPLACE GNOME Office. That is not
> > true. The two codebases would sort of 'merge'. For example - currently there
> > is no _RELEASED_ 'presentation' program (yes, there is achtung and MagicPoint
> > but as far as I know they are not ready yet). It might make sense to adopt
> > StarPresenter then. But everyone is still waiting for Sun to make its code
> > release - so please have patience (they are in the process of removing all
> > the code that they can not release (due to licensing issues)).
> > 
> 
> OK, I see.  I guess I was horibly mislead, then.  Not replacing Gnome
> Office with StarOffice makes me feel much better.

Yes - many people on gnome-hackers didn't like the Press Release 'drafts' and
tried to explicitly not 'commit' the GNOME project to using/taking on
StarOffice. Unfortunately the Sun press release made it sound that we were
commited.

Like I said - everything will be evaluated when the code comes out.
 
> > Some projects can also 'co-exist' - For example I consider AbiWord to be a
> > nice 'light' word processor. StarWord (or whatever it is called) would be much
> > bigger/powerful.
> > 
> 
> Hmm.. having to have two word-processors installed for the average user
> is a bit overkill.  I get irritated when Linux distros start shipping
> more than one CD of ust binaries... it shouldn't be needed.

You don't need to have two word processors installed. Its called choice - You
pick and choose :)

Personally I like have a 'light' word processor and a heavier one.

> > StarOffice will not be the same as it currently is. For example they will switch
> > to the Gtk+ widget set and make it Bonobized.
> > 
> 
> Still, it will take a LOT to make it not suck.  Just making it a bonobo
> component doesn't really mean StarOffice gets better, it just means
> developers have the option to embed "suck" into their apps...

Using bonobo will make it 'suck' less. That is instead of using their own
internal 'embedding' stuff they would be using bonobo. There are advantages to
this.

Also - please remember that they are GPLing their Office Suite. This probably
means A LOT more bug-fixes to their suite.

I tried StarOffice a long time ago - I didn't like it. It seems to implement
its own Window Manager/Desktop for example. Part of the 'porting' to GNOME I
would guess is to remove these ugly features (i.e. make each app 'standalone'
- do not create a 'desktop' as there already is one (Nautilus)) etc. 

Of course you may not see some of these things as soon as they release the
code. It will require work - The sun engineers will be doing the work with
contributions from outside (a la Mozilla)

> > Also please remembr that GNOME Office is really just 'magic pixie dust'. It is
> > really just the GNOME hackers saying 'this is a good app - it should be in
> > GNOME Office'. Just because it is no longer part of GNOME Office, it does not
> > mean you can not use it. It also does not mean that people will stop hacking
> > on it.
> >  
> 
> I understand this.  But what about the new user?  I've heard from a lot
> of Windows people who've tried Linux/UNIX that they hate the office
> tools they had to use... referring primarily to StarOffice and
> Applixware.  The only one I see them like is WordPerfect Office, but my
> Gods did they screw up by using WineLib... it was a serious waste of
> $100, I'll tell you that...
> 
> These new users don't want nice alternatives, they want the standard to
> be the best.

[snip]
 
> > > Re: the SDL/Sawfish problem, just send in bug reports, and someone
> > > will fix it eventually. John Harper is typically pretty responsive if
> > > he can reproduce the problem (try mailing him a Loki game maybe ;-)
> > 
> > Sorry, but SDL and Sawfish work perfectly together for me. I've played an SDL
> > version of clanbomber just fine.
> > 
> 
> It's the full-screen apps with OpenGL: UT, Heretic II, etc.  I don't
> know anyone else who had this problem, but none-the-less, there IS a
> problem.

I can play UT fine. I play it a lot - in fact I am stuck at the final
'Champion' level. No problems whatsoever. I did try running it from GNOME but
performance sucked. What I do is run 'xinit', and run the UT binary. I did try
running 'xinit' then in the xterm I did 'sawfish &' and then I ran UT it
worked fine.

My clanbombar game was also fullscreen (and I play that with GNOME running
too) - I get no problems.

It may be a problem with your set-up (since you also complain of X lock-ups).

> EMU10K1 driver had an odd problem that only 3 people ever reported
> having (me being one of them, lucky me) but it was found to be a problem
> in the driver and was fixed.
> 
> > > > Also, gnome-libs and gnome-core does have a lot of cruft
> > > > for backwards-compatibility sake.  Will GNOME 2.0 strip all the crap,
> > > > since it wont need to be backwards compatible anyways?
> > > > 
> > > 
> > > It will strip things few people are using.
> > 
> > A lot of the old stuff will be moved into a 'libcompat' library. 
> > 
> 
> Hmm.. I thought there would be a GNOME 1.x and GNOME 2.x, incompatible
> development platforms?  That's what I read anyways... Nice thing about
> asking on this mailing list is I get live answers.  ^,^

Yes - they are two totally different incompatible development platforms. :)
But for gnome-libs I think a 'libcompat' will be provided - libcompat is
basically 'deprecated stuff'. It is there for you to use but it is
'disappearing'.

It is not going to be a 'full compatibility library' so GNOME 1.x binaries can
run with GNOME 2.x libs.