[Desktop_architects] Printing dialog and GNOME
Alex Graveley
alex at beatniksoftware.com
Tue Dec 13 12:56:31 PST 2005
Shit! I guess I need to get the website up now :-)
Luckily, it's in GNOME CVS as "gimmie" already, if people are interested.
-Alex
Mike Shaver wrote:
> On 13-Dec-05, at 1:05 PM, Aaron J. Seigo wrote:
>
>> out of morbid curiosity, what is the source of your interest in the
>> Linux
>> desktop?
>
>
> I'm not sure why that curiosity is morbid, or why my interest is itself
> interesting, but I'll bite nonetheless.
>
> I'm interested personally in the Linux desktop for many historical
> reasons, certainly: I've been following GNOME since basically before
> it existed, and was involved with Ximian in various ways that I'm sure
> kept the acquisition price down nicely for Novell.
>
> Philosophically, I'm interested in the Linux desktop because I'm into
> open source software for economic and social reasons. I could go on
> and on, but I'm sure everyone else on this list could as well.
>
> Practically and professionally, I often ask myself why I'm interested
> in the Linux desktop, because I try to be pragmatic about that sort of
> thing, and I have a very hard time justifying using the Linux desktop
> on a day-to-day basis. I'm sure everyone at the summit saw my
> Powerbook, the switch to which was a heartbreaking moment in many
> ways. (In other ways, most of which were listed at the summit, it was
> a great relief.)
>
> I think that, at its best, the Linux desktop can go places that
> Microsoft and Apple will not be willing to go, in terms of user control
> over their data, their communication, and their computing experience.
> (From the obvious DRM examples to just having localizations for
> communities which are too small to be economically supported by MSFT or
> AAPL.) I think the Linux desktop is at its best when it promotes
> experimentation, big bold ballsy gambles, and lets market evolution
> pick the best results with bloody claw and gleaming fang. I think it's
> _not_ at its best when it is beholden to gods of a HIG, enterprise
> requirements, what Microsoft has done with its products, or even (more
> controversially) the expectations of the users it inherited from twm.
> The economics -- physics, even? -- of the Linux desktop are
> fundamentally different from those of Windows or OS X, and I think we
> (those who are interested in the Linux desktop for their own reasons)
> would do well to take advantage of those differences, instead of trying
> to stamp them out so that their offering is easier for <some group> to
> swallow.
>
> If I had to write the "project cooperation" document, I would probably
> write one line: "don't cannibalize". Create, don't convert. Compete
> against non-consumption. Most of the world hasn't chosen an operating
> system. <Insert Doc Searls and a rental car company here.> If we laid
> all the dialogs out end to end we could pave a road to software
> nirvana. Rah rah. Make it _easy_ for people to do totally new stuff,
> like Gimmie, and then promote the hell out of it. If it sucks, find a
> new one. The Linux desktop should be what lets you do what you _can't_
> do elsewhere, not the one where you can do _most_ of the stuff you can
> do elsewhere, but with better software licensing terms on some of it.
> (The licensing terms make a lot of cool shit possible, don't get me
> wrong, but it's the shit that's made possible that makes users excited.)
>
> The rest of the Mozilla world would probably be mortified to read that
> they were represented at the summit by such a nutcase, so please don't
> attribute my craziness to the broader community.
>
> I don't know if that makes any sense to anyone else, but, in my
> defense, you _did_ ask.
>
> Mike
>
>
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