Hi Boudhayan,
On 01/12/2015, at 1:05 AM, Boudhayan Gupta wrote:
> We've suddenly been having an influx of MacPorts specific patches,
It is best not to use that word ("influx") - it has racist and xenophobic
connotations, which I am sure you do not intend.
Besides, the patches are not "MacPorts specific": they are patches to KDE
or Qt software to make it function properly on the Apple OS X operating
system and desktop. One of them was applied downstream many years
ago by two MacPorts developers.
I believe it is current thinking, in the KDE and Qt communities, that such
patches should be pushed upstream rather than being confined to MacPorts,
which is just one provider of FOSS software on OS X. That creates a win-win
situation where KDE and MacPorts developers can co-operate on writing and
reviewing such patches, other providers of FOSS on OS X can benefit and
MacPorts developers are relieved of the chore of editing the patches every
time the corresponding KDE software changes.
The "suddenness" you see is because one guy has recently reached the
stage where he can build and patch KF5 and Qt5 software independently.
I gave up trying to do that back in March this year, largely because of lack
of help from knowledgeable Frameworks developers.
You might as well speak of the "sudden influx" of Baloo patches in recent
times… :-) … It's a consequence of "new development"...
> and most of them have ended up generating some sort of controversy because
> what I perceive to be some differences in envisioned use-cases.
>
> Unless I'm much mistaken, the "full KDE experience", if I may call it
> that, is intended to be provided on Linux, BSD, Solaris(?) etc where
> you can install and run the Plasma Workspace as your primary desktop
> experience. In these cases, Plasma takes over system and session
> functionality, and we need all these invasive code that reaches deep
> into the system APIs.
>
> On platforms where the "full KDE experience" isn't available, my
> assumption is that we're supposed to provide application bundles
> (.application on Mac, bundled .exe installers on Windows) which
> include the application and all its dependencies in one single
> package. These applications are supposed to behave exactly like other
> applications on these platforms - there should be no difference
> between how say Keynote presents itself on Mac to how Calligra Stage.
I don't think anybody is considering implementing the full Plasma desktop
experience on Apple OS X. Why would you? Apple has its own desktops.
And anyway, if Plasma is what you want, you can use virtualisation or dual
booting to set it up. You can even dedicate your Mac to Linux. It's Intel
inside after all.
> MacPorts seems be going on a tangent that no KDE developer is
> interested in - trying to get as much of the "full KDE experience" as
> possible on a platform where it's clearly going to be very half-baked
> and unusable (pretty much a gimmick) because we really can't latch on
> and grab that kind of low level system and session management stuff in
> OSX anyway.
By "half-baked and unusable" do you mean a Help->Report Bug... menu item
that does not respond, a KCrash that itself crashes, a DrKonqi that does not run
and does not produce a crash-report, an application that does not load its
plugins
or applications with unreadable black-on-black buttons or user-messages.
All of those I have fixed in KDE 4 on Apple OS X in the last year or two. The
final DrKonqi problem affected KDE 4 on LInux and also Frameworks. My
patch was carried forward into Frameworks (actually Plasma workspace)
by a Linux developer of KF5.
However, there are many, many more problems in kdelibs4 and KDE 4 utilities
or background processes on Apple OS X --- and they have been around for
years in some cases.
One person on MacPorts is now trying to fix some of them in KF5, because the
KDE Core Developers are no longer interested in supporting KDE 4 software.
Do you want to slam the door in his face?
> I'm of the opinion that we shouldn't be admitting invasive
There you go again with the emotive terms… :-) "Invasive" is something
like a heart transplant or a colonoscopy… :-)
> MacPorts/Fink (or even KDE on Windows) patches that attempt to reach a
> goal of running a full Plasma session on any such platform (or even
> attempt to package-managerise KDE on such platforms). But this is a
> community, and it should be left to decide what it wants on its own.
> That said, we should really lay down official policy soon before
> discussing the current MacPorts patches any further, because pretty
> much every thread is devolving into heated arguments that's taking up
> developer time as well as making them feel not happy.
I am a KDE developer of 13 years' standing. I am also a computer programmer
of more than 50 years' experience, during which time I have programmed
and designed operating systems and device drivers, pioneered the use
of minicomputers, PCs and windowing systems (Xerox Star workstation),
been a manager in two academic computer centres, been Technical
Director in a 50-man software company and spent 18 years self-employed
as a consultant and systems architect, during which time I helped design
and build some major Government systems.
I am now 77 years old, but I still have a few marbles… :-) I have elected to
program for fun in my retirement: KGoldrunner, KSudoku, Palapeli, Kubrick
and KJumpingCube. Maybe you have enjoyed playing some of them… :-)
Now let me tell you this.
I am not going to stand any of this "official policy" rubbish. Who do you think
you are? You are writing from a position of ignorance when it comes to
implementing KDE software on Apple OS X, as indeed are most of the KDE
core developers I have encountered in the last year or two.
In my experience, the only way to solve the problems with KDE software,
as implemented on Apple OS X, is to institute day-to-day co-operation
between a small number of MacPorts and KDE developers, not "policies",
patches, reviews and endless email threads. That small group should ask
each other questions about their respective systems until there is a good
understanding of how problems are arising and how they can best be solved.
But don't look to me. I have sought such co-operation many times in the
last year or two, but now I have given up.
I am too old to be spending the few years that may remain to me trying to
get the KDE Community to support its own software, as implemented on
Apple OS X.
Regards,
Ian W.
>> Visit http://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/kde-devel#unsub to unsubscribe <<
