Kurt Fitzner (kfitzner at excelcia period org) wrote:
> It is posted at:
> http://www.excelcia.org/modules.php?... er=0&thold=0

i must say, it's a well-written piece, and on the face of it seems to make
some valid points. there's a few comments i would like to make, though.

first, you start out with a quote from the slackware 7.0 announcement,
state that it is pretty clear Pat never used gnome as his desktop, and then
you say "This might seem irrelevant, but this is a key point." however, i
do not see why this would be relevant at all, and furthermore, i do not see
where or how you make clear that it *is* a key point.

besides, whatever Pat's reasons were for announcing kde and gnome in this
manner five and a half years ago is anyone's guess. AFAIK kde was started
first (and not all that long before slack 7.0 came out), and gnome was
started later in reaction to the proprietary status of Qt. perhaps kde at
the time was simply more mature and more widely used, and the formulation
simply reflected this.

then you seem to be making two main points in support of your argument that
gnome should be officially included in slackware. the first is that having
it included in the distro for so long amounts to a commitment made by Pat
to his users, and that once this commitment has been made, it should not be
broken.

from a business point of view, there is something to be said for this. it
is, however, much more true for businesses that are not based on open
source. if microsoft were to drop support for windows explorer (by which i
assume you do not mean internet explorer, for which they *have* effectively
dropped support these past few years...) there would be no way for users to
obtain it, because it is a proprietary MS-product.

gnome, however, is not a proprietary Slackware Inc. product, it is open
source and freely available. the packaging of gnome is therefore to a large
extent just a service that Pat provided, and any commitment that this
service may have generated will not be as strong as the commitment
generated by e.g. MS providing explorer.

i'm not saying that the decision to package gnome and include and keep it
in the distro for so long does not generate any kind of commitment to
slack's user base. it does, and in fact, this commitment is probably one of
the reasons why it took Pat four years to decide to drop gnome.

however, pat has made other commitments by releasing slackware: he has made
the commitment to produce a stable, secure operating system that can serve
as a good basis for anyone wanting to build a desktop or server
system. this commitment i'm sure is felt much more strongly by Pat, and if
packaging gnome jeopardises *that* commitment, then obviously, gnome will
have to go.

besides, i think Pat is probably also keeping an eye on his user base. you
talk of 95% of linux users using kde or gnome. i have no idea whether that
figure is anywhere near accurate, but i suspect that however high the
figure is, it is in fact much smaller among slackware installations and/or
users.

your second point is that an officially supported gnome will be of better
quality than an unofficial one. this, too, is something that i'm sure Pat
has realised and considered. and he has come to the conclusion that as long
as *he* is responsible for creating an "official" gnome, this is in fact
*not* the case. as he states himself in the changelog: "There are already
good projects in place to provide Slackware GNOME for those who want it,
and these are more complete than what Slackware has shipped in the past."

so your conclusion seems to be the right one: the best gnome for slackware
would be one packaged and maintained by the community, but in such
cooperation with Pat that he can label it as "official". i'm not sure what
would be the best way to make this happen, but obviously, there is only one
place where it can start: with an email to Pat. don't bore him with all the
details why you think gnome should remain officially supported, i'm sure he
is as much aware of them as you are. just write to him, say you have this
idea, and if he responds positively, then write to the gsb and gware
people, see if they are interested too.

don't be surprised if Pat's answer is not very positive, though. he has
obviously rather high standards for his distro, and it could well be that
for him to be comfortable with calling something official would mean having
to put more work into the cooperation than he is at this time willing to
invest.

--
Joost Kremers joostkremers@yahoo.com
Selbst in die Unterwelt dringt durch Spalten Licht
EN:SiS(9

Joost Kremers's fingers wandered over the keyboard and produced:

> Kurt Fitzner (kfitzner at excelcia period org) wrote:
>> It is posted at:
>>
http://www.excelcia.org/modules.php?... er=0&thold=0
>
> i must say, it's a well-written piece, and on the face of it seems to make
> some valid points. there's a few comments i would like to make, though.
>
> first, you start out with a quote from the slackware 7.0 announcement,
> state that it is pretty clear Pat never used gnome as his desktop, and

- - - - - - < chopped for brevity > - - - - - -

> so your conclusion seems to be the right one: the best gnome for slackware
> would be one packaged and maintained by the community, but in such
> cooperation with Pat that he can label it as "official". i'm not sure what
> would be the best way to make this happen, but obviously, there is only
> one place where it can start: with an email to Pat. don't bore him with
> all the details why you think gnome should remain officially supported,
> i'm sure he is as much aware of them as you are. just write to him, say
> you have this idea, and if he responds positively, then write to the gsb
> and gware people, see if they are interested too.
>
> don't be surprised if Pat's answer is not very positive, though. he has
> obviously rather high standards for his distro, and it could well be that
> for him to be comfortable with calling something official would mean
> having to put more work into the cooperation than he is at this time
> willing to invest.
>

A well thought out and expressed response. Your concluding paragraphs are
right on target.

I believe, also, that the article author (Kurt Fitzner) re-read the
changelog on Slackware.Com regarding the reasons that Pat Volkerding
dropped gnome more carefully and without bias. Also, look at all other
comments that PV has made in the past, on the subject of gnome.

I used to like gnome. I used to have it as my primary disktop when gnome
included Enlightenment as the theme. But, as time went on, gnome was taking
over my system. I mean it. There are many files in /etc/X11 that cause the
system to accept gnome defaults for system wide actions. I do not care to
have any one overrule my preferences without my okay. Further, I find that
gnome is too much of a resource hog and has incompatiblities that I don't
care for.

I dropped installing gnome since Slackware 9.1, and prior to that, have not
used gnome since before 7.0. That is my choice. So if Patrick wants to drop
gnome, I have no qualm with that. I have no qualm if he wants to include
it, either. To install it, that is my choice and I choose not to.

Once in awhile, I still go out and find Enlightenment and build it and
install on my system. This has not been included in many recent versions of
Slackware. Patrick dropped this some time ago. That does not stop me from
finding it and putting it on my system(s). There are some things I still
like about that desktop environment. That is the freedom that I exercise.

My 2 cents.

--
HJohnson
( aka ) HuMJohn AT aerosurf DOT net

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 08:46:00 -0600, Cheapskate wrote:

> Gnome is a POS, it deserves to die, pull the feeding tube from Gnome and
> let that braindead desktop die, I tryed using Gnome and trying to get

Well, that's your opinion, anyway. There are many people who do like
Gnome, and dislike KDE and the others. Amazing, huh?

> Besides it looks like xfce-4.x is kicking Gnome's ass.

LOL! I guess you haven't seen a recent, updated Gnome installation, huh?
The GSB (FRG) project that PV mentioned is the best thing going.

--
If you're not on the edge, you're taking up too much space.
Linux Registered User #327951

"Kurt Fitzner (kfitzner at excelcia period org)" <spammers@go.to.hell> wrote:
> Two Ravens wrote:

>> Why are you telling us? Those who read and post to this newsgroup have
>> no influence at all over what Goes into the next release of Slackware.

> I don't think this is the case. Slackware development doesn't occur in
> a vacuum. It's driven by user needs just like every project.

By this statement alone Kurt, you show your marked lack of knowledge on
Slackware and PV. Those who are also using the argument "but it's his
livelyhood, he should listen to the users wants" are also making the same
mistake. PV develops Slackware mainly for himself. That others like it
enough that he can make a living off of it is just a very large bonus. Not
to say that PV doesn't listen to his user base, but one would need a much
stronger argument than those I've seen presented on the Gnome issue so
far.

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Hash: SHA1

In alt.os.linux.slackware, Joost Kremers dared to utter,
> i must say, it's a well-written piece, and on the face of it seems to make
> some valid points. there's a few comments i would like to make, though.

Indeed, though I disagree with its "findings".

> first, you start out with a quote from the slackware 7.0 announcement,
> state that it is pretty clear Pat never used gnome as his desktop, and then
> you say "This might seem irrelevant, but this is a key point." however, i
> do not see why this would be relevant at all, and furthermore, i do not see
> where or how you make clear that it *is* a key point.

Indeed. Just as a note to the OP, next time don't include things like
this. It came off as a childish bash of Pat V., implicating that he has
always "had it in" for GNOME. You did fail, as Joost points out, to
show where that was at all a point worth making, much less a key point.

> however, pat has made other commitments by releasing slackware: he has made
> the commitment to produce a stable, secure operating system that can serve
> as a good basis for anyone wanting to build a desktop or server
> system. this commitment i'm sure is felt much more strongly by Pat, and if
> packaging gnome jeopardises *that* commitment, then obviously, gnome will
> have to go.

And that seems to be Pat's reasons for dropping GNOME. I personally
would agree with them.

> besides, i think Pat is probably also keeping an eye on his user base. you
> talk of 95% of linux users using kde or gnome. i have no idea whether that
> figure is anywhere near accurate, but i suspect that however high the
> figure is, it is in fact much smaller among slackware installations and/or
> users.

83% of all statistics are made up on the spot to support a point.

> so your conclusion seems to be the right one: the best gnome for slackware
> would be one packaged and maintained by the community, but in such
> cooperation with Pat that he can label it as "official".

<snip>

> don't be surprised if Pat's answer is not very positive, though.

Indeed. Expect to be refused outright. I feel like Pat's mind is made
up on this; however, he may be persuaded to use GWARE or GSB for
Slackware's GNOME under /unsupported. That would lend it some sort of
"official" status, but takes it out of the base (not even in /extra),
and clearly states that it is not recommended by Pat for Slackware.

- --
It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise,
Than for a man to hear the song of fools.
Ecclesiastes 7:5
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Joost Kremers <joostkremers@yahoo.com> writes:

> besides, i think Pat is probably also keeping an eye on his user base. you
> talk of 95% of linux users using kde or gnome. i have no idea whether that
> figure is anywhere near accurate, but i suspect that however high the
> figure is, it is in fact much smaller among slackware installations and/or
> users.

Well, I use neither Gnome nor KDE (though my wife has KDE on her
machine).

My point is that _none_ of the software I use most comes with Slackware,
as part of the distro, though some of it once did.

XEmacs + a relatively up to date Gnus
Openbox
Postfix
Elinks and Firefox (though this last is coming)
A whole swathe of LaTeX packages
Lilypond.
Apsfilter (now relegated to extra, along with good old lprng)

What I get from Slackware is a really _solid_ base which allows me to
build these and anything else that I've so far found I need. Turning
native Slackware into "my system" in a limited way is something I enjoy
every now and then. Proper back ups mean that the bulk of the work can be
carried painlessly across installations. I suspect that many people stick
with Slack not because of its software selection but because the set up
is good?

atb


Glyn
--
RTFM http://www.tldp.org/index.html
GAFC http://slackbook.lizella.net/
STFW http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=e...inux.slackware
JFGI http://jfgi.us/

Realto Margarino wrote:
>>Why are you telling us? Those who read and post to this newsgroup have
>>no influence at all over what Goes into the next release of Slackware.
>
> You're an idiot. If enough people say they want gnome Volkerding
> can't ignore them.

How much do you estimate is "enough" ?

My only guess is that if those people who paid for Slackware ask for it, only
then it has some chance.

--
Milan Babuskov
http://abrick.sourceforge.net

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+Alan Hicks+ wrote:

>>>first, you start out with a quote from the slackware 7.0 announcement,
>>>state that it is pretty clear Pat never used gnome as his desktop, and then
>>>you say "This might seem irrelevant, but this is a key point." however, i
>>>do not see why this would be relevant at all, and furthermore, i do not see
>>>where or how you make clear that it *is* a key point.
>
> Indeed. Just as a note to the OP, next time don't include things like
> this. It came off as a childish bash of Pat V., implicating that he has
> always "had it in" for GNOME. You did fail, as Joost points out, to
> show where that was at all a point worth making, much less a key point.

Indeed, I realize that it's not clear what the point was. I hesitate to
go back and edit the article - it should stand on its own merits I think
- - but I'll try and explain here.

After that note, I went on to say that a person's desktop is a very
personal expression that often much work goes into. The correlation
with the above is that if Mr. Volkerding doesn't use GNOME himself, then
the amount of work lost to his users when GNOME is dropped becomes not a
real, personally experienced issue, but an abstract one. Like watching
news coverage of a disaster is abstract.

To me, dropping GNOME is real. I'm one who has built GNOME from scratch
so believe me, I know his pain. It's not something I'd want to go
through regularly simply to have it on my desktop. But that is
something that a lot of people will have to go through now that
Slackware is dropping it. Either that pain, or the pain of switching
desktops. I'd be happy to offer my time as a volunteer or as a paid
contractor (paid $1 - just to make the contract binding and allow Mr.
Volkerding and Slackware to own all my work) to maintain GNOME. If I
can save other people that pain, I'll do it. All I ask is enough
commitment back to make that work part of Slackware.

If it is purely a time issue, as has been suggested, I can't see a
reason why this wouldn't be acceptable. Frankly, though, I agree with
what appears to be the general consensus here on the chances of any sort
of change of mind on this. I knew even before I wrote that article. I
think when Mr. Volkerding says "I'm not going to rehash all the reasons
behind this...", that he's making it pretty clear that for him the issue
is closed. Doesn't stop me from trying, though. Slackware, to me, has
always been about doing what is "Right" (the capital 'R' style Right)
over what is merely "Popular".

In any case, thanks to all who took the time to read the article and for
the responses back. I'll go back to writing technical articles for
userlocal.com now.

Kurt.
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Two Ravens wrote:
> Kurt Fitzner (kfitzner at excelcia period org) wrote:
>>Precisely. Which is what I am suggesting that everyone who feels that
>>GNOME should continue to be included in Slackware should do.
>
> Have you done so yourself yet?

Absolutely. I emailed info@slackware.com the day I found out about the
"rumours" that GNOME was being dropped (6 March 2005). I emailed Mr.
Volkerding himself once the official announcement came out (27 March
2005), and again today with an official offer to volunteer (or to be
contracted for $1) time to maintain GNOME. I have received no response
to any email.

I didn't really expect any response. As I have posted elsewhere, I have
actually yet to ever receive a response from Mr. Volkerding or Slackware
on any email I have ever sent. Inquiries on making an embedded Linux
port, support requests, suggestions, and one (albeit very minor)
software patch that actually made it into Slackware with no reply.

My guess is that Mr. Volkerding is far too busy to answer personally the
pile of email he must get in a day. Either that or his spam filters
have me pegged.

Kurt.
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Kurt Fitzner (kfitzner at excelcia period org) wrote:

> Two Ravens wrote:
>> Kurt Fitzner (kfitzner at excelcia period org) wrote:
>>>Precisely. Which is what I am suggesting that everyone who feels
>>>that GNOME should continue to be included in Slackware should do.
>>
>> Have you done so yourself yet?
>
> Absolutely...
> I didn't really expect any response...
> My guess is that Mr. Volkerding is far too busy to answer personally
> the pile of email he must get in a day. Either that or his spam
> filters have me pegged.

The point you seem to be making, is that not having got the answer you
wanted, or even any answer at all, you expect to recruit readers of
this newsgroup to assist you in persuading the proprietor to reverse
his decision.
--
Two Ravens
"...hit the squirrel..."