[Thunar-dev] Help needed? -> next steps

[Brian J. Tarricone]

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Benedikt Meurer wrote:

> Brian J. Tarricone wrote:
>
>> Benedikt: Ok, it's time. We've been very patient. You
>> disappeared for two months, without any information as to your
>> position or your intentions. I understand that sometimes we get
>> burned out on things (in fact, I'm an expert at getting burned
>> out on things), but, to be blunt, you've been very rude in not
>> letting us know your plans. As Auke so simply put it: "please
>> explain now."
>
> My feeling was (and still is) that the latest happenings on
> thunar-dev were/are no longer in-line with the initial goals: More
> and more features were requested...

Fine.  You were running the project, so put your foot down and draw
the line.  I shouldn't need to tell you this: you're already a more
than competent project leader.  Personally, I thought we were at a
pretty good stage, at least with the UI (in that it was mostly settled).

> ... nobody seemed to have any interested in development...

It's hard to get people interested without code.  It sucks, but that's
generally how it is in the OSS world, and it's usually the project
leader that has to do some initial work.  I see that you've been
committing to libexo during the past week, and it now has ExoMimeInfo
and ExoMimeDatabase.  This is good, but I think if real concrete work
had started earlier, and had been more public, people would be more
interested in development.  At the very least, we (or you) could have
clearly defined some of the interfaces, and asked people to implement
them.

> ... instead names were discussed extensively...

It was a topic.  Maybe it went on a bit too long, but it happens.  If
you want the discussion to go in a particular direction, you have to
push it that way.  Complaining about it in your head isn't going to
get you anywhere.

> ... or sentences like "let's start by translating Python to C" came
> up, etc.; all this is not in-line with Thunar's goals.

All I recall on this was someone offering to take the python mockup
and "translate" it to a C implementation.  Not really the right way to
start the project, IMO, but it was someone who was interested in doing
some work, exactly what you say was lacking.  What this guy needed was
to be pushed in the right direction, not to be ignored for not
"getting it".

> Somehow Thunar was hyped too much already. People who know me are
> aware that I don't give a damn for hypes. Hypes are for the masses.
> I prefer quality.

Agree.  But right now we don't even have quality: we have vapor, and
an uncommunicative project leader.

> Since nobody knows what Xfce's goals are exactly (and no,
> lightweight is not really a useful goal here, as it's more of a
> result of good design, and thereby the result of reaching a goal,
> rather than a goal of it's own), it's hard to tell whether Xfce's
> goals are in-line with Thunar's goals (one of the things about
> Xfce, that are very frustating for me).

My "goals" are similar to Olivier's.  I want to work on things that I
personally find interesting and enjoy.  I don't care about taking over
the world, I don't care about "productising" Xfce, and I don't have
to: this is my hobby, not my job.  As you mentioned, you have a real
life.  Well, I do too, and I'm not going to waste my spare time on
things I don't enjoy.

> So, Thunar's goals are clear. If Xfce's goals don't fit, we'll have
> two different projects, as I won't spend any spare time on just
> another file manager.

Fair enough.  I personally think Thunar's goals are admirable and
worth trying to achieve.  I don't like forks unless there's a good
reason, but I still haven't heard anything that makes me believe that
dicking around waiting for Thunar is a great idea.

> PS: I dunno about you, but I for myself have a real-life, that
> sometimes requires me to spend one or two months on a project, with
> little to no spare time (atleast no spare time to waste for
> endless debates).

That's a pretty weak excuse.  If you honestly can't find 5 minutes out
of one day in two months to send off a short email saying "Hi, sorry I
haven't been around, but I've been busy with XYZ and I probably won't
have time for Xfce for another N months, and I'm thinking I may want
to take a break anyway", then you have some huge problems, dude.  We
all have lives too, but just because we're at the other end of an
email address or IRC channel, instead of sitting across a table at a
restaurant, it doesn't mean it's not inconsiderate to just drop out of
existence when people depend on you.

    -brian

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