Hi,
Without wanting to take away from the current efforts and progress, I
had still wanted to point out that, (when I was writing this email a
week ago), ...
As a casual observer (such as I am) the questions of the questionaire
as you put it were or are very much directed in a certain fashion and
may or would not represent the full spectrum of opinions a user or
users may have.
In that sense it might construe the direction, or a direction, of the
project, in a way that is /congruent/ with what is /expected/ of what
users find important, rather than what the full spectrum of their
thought would be.
What I mean is that the questions pertained only to Ubuntu Gnome's
small part in delivering this product, as compared to the entire
product that is delivered. A casual user will by default not care or
know about the mechanics of the open source world in the sense that
he/she will be able to make the distinction between "Ubuntu Gnome's
part" and the full fledged Gnome operating system as it is presented
to him/her.
Do you see what I mean?
To a Linux enthusiast: Gnome is one product, Ubuntu Gnome is a
distribution or a packaging.
To a casual human being who is in it for the good times: Ubuntu Gnome
is a thing that works in a certain way that would be described by the
word "Gnome", ie. the desktop manager or environment exemplify
exemplifies the entire product for him/her.
That's what the user sees. That's what the user experiences. He/she
experiences GNOME. But since Ubuntu Gnome is not responsible for
GNOME, that creates a bit (and not a small bit) of confusion and a
schism and chasm in understanding and a very weird way of relaying
responsibility elsewhere that is just incomprehensible to a user.
Most people in Linux do not see this schism and this chasm. They
consider it natural because they have been told at some point that it
is. But a regular user is not interested in "the number of
contributors" or "the artwork" per se. He/she wants the entire
experience to be good or to work, which would mean he/she would have
remarks about the Gnome product mostly, because the distinction
between Gnome and Ubuntu Gnome can not be had for someone who is not
well versed in such things.
(A bit the same that a regular Windows user does not really know the
distinction between "Explorer" and "Internet Explorer" which are two
different things).
So a regular user coming to that poll will think "huh?" "these are not
the things I was concerned about". "Oh, it is a community thing. Hmm..."
And so he/she does the best to answer according to that poll. But a
regular user is not even on this mailing list and so would not take
this survey. So the image is coloured already by vast amounts of
experience (and forgetting) most people on this list have.
Nevertheless, Ali/Amjjawad.
I am deeply grateful for the way you are tackling this and leading or
trying to be a leader in Ubuntu Gnome. You lead and enthuse with
compassion, strength, and above all, emotion. You care, and you don't
care to show either. You say what's on your heart and a lot of Linux
people can learn (or remember) from that.
So thank you for being here and being an inspiration to me at least.
I am not even using Gnome, I haven't had a computer for months, now I
have a laptop again and it runs... bababa Windows 7 Professional. And
I want to put Kubuntu 15.10 and OpenSuSE 13.2 on it, just for kicks, I
am getting pretty comfy in Windows. Never been that comfy in Linux, as
far as I'm concerned.
Anyway.
I must say also that the atmosphere here, although there are not many
posters, is a lot better (more of a hobby project) than Kubuntu. I am
not on the Kubuntu users list but have been for some time on the
Kubuntu dev list. I was banned from Kubuntu forums for being too
argumentative and not putting up with the sense of superiority that
the "idiots" (who know everything) like to portray in a sense of not
wanting to hear anything negative about their product or Linux in
general.
It is very hard in this world (the open source, or Linux world) to
offer some feedback that is along the lines of "you know, maybe you
should think about this a little more." People like to portray that
they are so awesome, when in effect....
For example, and I think this goes the same for Ubuntu Gnome. There is
no Kubuntu documentation whatsoever really. You are directed to Ubuntu
documentation, but Ubuntu documentation is equally badly written and
with a political objective.
Kubuntu is just a small team who do all the work. Yet they don't
really invite community to cooperate. They wan't contributors, but not
community. By contrast, when I was with OpenSUSE years ago there was a
wiki and it was fun to edit it, and I could have my own page without
any issue, and so on. I have not even seen that type of community
presence with Kubuntu.
Of course, if I would espouse my own views on that Kubuntu wiki, it
would not be welcome. You have to fall in line with the image as if
you are an employee "contributing" to the product, which means you
choose to uphold the Ubuntu and Kubuntu code of conduct, which means
you cannot disagree, etc. etc. There is also not really any Ubuntu community
since it is also a "driven" project.
By contrast the OpenSUSE website has vast documentation, the
contributors on the forums (at least the Dutch people) are a bit of
the same arrogant bastards, but my experience with OpenSUSE is that it
is much more ...thorough or decent or dependable in the sense that
there are just many more people contributing (voluntarily, without
being pushed) which means that not everyone is /rushing all the time/
and people actually have time to write something good.
My impression also with Ubuntu Gnome, as you have told, is that it is
a few people pulling the cart and even those people are overexerting
themselves.
No time, no time, no time.
Part of the problem lies in the attitude towards the goals. And that
depends on whether they feel responsible for the entire user
experience. Whether they can feel comfortable about delivering an
entire product. Or whether the product is haphazard like the efforts
and the documentation and so on.
The Kubuntu people ushered me out because they had too many concerns
about coming across as "awesome" while not really being it. They keep
repeating that line, how awesome they all are, like some sort of
propaganda machine. (I once didn't come out of the house nor watch TV
or anything for 3 months. I was flabbergasted by the amount of Dutch
propaganda on Dutch TV, proclaiming how great we all are..... yeah
right). If you have to say how awesome you are (to each other) then
you are not it.
But any of those thoughts were not welcome on those Kubuntu forums,
sorry to say.
I don't know why Ubuntu is such a difficult beast. There are so many
smaller Ubuntu derivatives but they can live because of all the money
behind Ubuntu. I don't have a sense of community here or there (more
here than there) but the troublesome thing is....
Like the other poster said.
You try to get in, but there is no one to welcome you (except you, perhaps).
And you try to be a contributor, but there is no where you can easily
contribute. The bars are too high.
At Kubuntu they ask for people helping them with code integration or
github integration or migrations or package updates or whatever, which
is like *really specialist work*. Git itself is a thoroughly difficult
beast especially if you don't have to fuck up which is a pertinent
problem in Git from what I have seen :P. Being allowed to fuck up
makes life a lot easier :P.
So how can you contribute? You go to the forums, where you are ushered
out or told you can't have a say in anything unless you get your hands
dirty, for which there are scarcely any opportunities.
Doing package work with Git is really a nightmare. Sorry to say.
Devised and designed by Linus. Says enough ;-).
And then you go to Windows and there is a reasonably nice GUI for Git
from Github that doesn't even exist in Linux ;-).
Anyway.
Having a dependable, nice, easy-to-contribute-to-wiki is really the
hallmark of a good open source system and I've found it lacking in the
Ubuntu ecosphere. Just go to the Ubuntu wiki. There is almost nothing
there!! The wiki has links that lead OUT of the wiki and there is no
information on the wiki whatsoever that I can find. I mean, what the
...fuck? There is no (technical) information anywhere but there is the
ubiquitoes "Get Involved" link.
But you can't get involved because there is no wiki to get involved on.
Really. The utmost basics and they are not right, and when you tell
people they don't want to hear. Any case.
Ali, I am glad we have you at the rudder. Even if it is just some
person, one person, expressing himself, his love and his gripes, that
is enough.
Regards,
And pardon my language.
Bart.
Nevertheless I am deeply grateful for the way you are tackling this
Ali/Amjjawad.
Quoting Ali/amjjawad <amjja...@gnome.org>:
Hi everyone,
Please check:
https://ubuntugnome.org/feedback-time-results/
Thank you!
--
Remember: "All of us are smarter than any one of us."
Best Regards,
Ali/amjjawad <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/amjjawad>
*http://kibo.computer <http://kibo.computer>* - http://torios.net - Ubuntu
GNOME <http://ubuntugnome.org/>
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