Re: Questions

[Gregory Casamento]

Doc,

On Monday, March 7, 2016, Doc O'Leary <droleary@2015usenet1.subsume.com> wrote:
> For your reference, records indicate that
> Gregory Casamento <greg.casamento@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > When someone wants to submit a patch that's one
> > thing, but if someone expresses a desire to add more then they become
> > responsible for it.
>
> And yet I see bugs dating back to 2003 that are still unassigned.  If
> someone has taken responsibility for the involved classes/frameworks, why
> aren’t these issues being resolved?  If nobody is taking responsibility,
> it makes GNUstep a very hard thing to recommend to people.

So?  So what if they're not resolved?  Some of them may have been addressed but not marked as fixed in the bug system.  Please, if you will, go to the gnome big list and let me know if it's empty.  You are drawing a strawman argument in the sense that you are assuming we don't care because you can find bugs which isn't true at all.  

> > This is plainly beyond the scope of a mission statement.  Also saying we
> > are "bringing Cocoa to other platforms" clearly implies that there is a
> > path.
>
> I disagree.  Maybe it’s because the US is in a big election years, but I
> have *zero* trust today that anyone has a plan for anything they say
> unless they explicitly state said plan with a fair degree of detail.  It
> may not be as pithy as a shorter “executive summary mission statement, but
> my argument is that a full plan is *necessary* to organize the modest
> resources the project has available to meet the stated goals.

It's too bad that you disagree.  You yourself said that a mission statement needs to be short and understandable.  The one I mentioned is just that.   Was it not you that mentioned Kennedy?  I'm sorry you can't see the implications in the statement.  Perhaps you should review it and think about it at length.  If not then I would be happy to walk you through the reasoning. 

 

> > > We can’t just ignore the big gorilla in the room (Apple), either.
> >
> > Sure we can.  We can mention we are compatible with something by name.  As
> > long as there is not a possibility of brand confusing we are clear in the
> > legal sense, so there is no sense making a huge deal about this.  In my 20
> > years on this project there has not been a single stirring of the fruit
> > basket. ;)   I don't expect one now unless we become wildly popular which,
> > given how things are going, I believe that Apple is the absolute least of
> > our concerns. 
> You misunderstand my mention of Apple.  It’s not to highlight them as a
> threat, but as a potential resource of development talent given their
> status as the world’s primary Cocoa platform.  Outreach doesn’t appear
> to be part of the plan, and that remains a huge problem for GNUstep.

I've been saying on this list for years that cocoa devs are our primary target.  I have even worked for a few companies to help make this happen.  

The plain truth of the matter is that most cocoa development shops are not interested in porting their apps. I have talked with many and they see it as extra overhead they don't need since they feel as though they are doing well enough or, alternatively, they are relying on another cross platform environment like Java or something similar. 

Only very few have opted for ObjC on platforms outside of Mac. 

 

> > The mission statement I gave is very short, understandable, and crystal
> > clear such that anyone with a primary / grade school education would be
> > able to follow it.
>
> And yet in a decade when ObjC interest has exploded, it doesn’t appear
> GNUstep has taken advantage of that.  So, based on the evidence,
> do you *really* think you’re getting your message out there clearly? I
> argue that setting specific goals, and measuring progress against them,
> is both far more scientific and far more clear than something that is
> meant for children.

Interest in GNUstep has increased in the last decade.  The reason this hasn't spread to us as much as expected is that 99% of the interest in ObjC has occurred on the iPhone/UIKit based platforms.  I pushed for a UIKit implementation base on GNUstep to no avail.   I also started on an implementation of sorts.  It was not picked up. 

It should be mentioned that we are missing a similar opportunity with swift.  I am currently doing this myself.  Those who are capable of helping me are free to join me at any time in the effort. The GNUstep fork of the swift repo is on github and is not private. 

 

> >  http://mediawiki.gnustep.org/index.php/Writing_portable_code
> >
> > This page details both directions.  The issue is that it is not linked to
> > on the site so it is not immediately obvious how this should work.
>
> No, the *real* issue is that nobody knows for sure if it is an accurate
> representation of the current state of GNUstep.  The issue is that code
> still comes first, documentation *may* follow, and then it seems that
> things are often left to rot.  I would argue, for example, that in makes
> no sense in 2016 to be talking about NeXT anymore, except as a historical
> excerpt.

I fail to see how we should assure them that it is current and accurate.  Your assertion is somewhat circular in the sense that unless you actually try to use it you may not know if it's accurate and indeed we may not know of there is a problem unless someone reports a problem.  You cannot simply say "prove to me it's accurate a priori"

 

> That’s why I say this is a problem that cannot be fixed by just
> committing more code.  It needs an organizational shift, which should
> means a frank discussion on what the real vision of the project is
> going to be over the next 10 years (hell, I’d even take 4 years).

I've given you a mission statement and where the project is heading.  I'm the project lead.  I should know, right? ;) 

> nobody on the inside wants to talk about the heart of the matter, and
> that makes most people on the outside decide to stay on the outside.

I am perfectly willing to discuss this.  Most of your time on his thread has been devoted to convincing us that we should discuss this amongst ourselves.  I believe that after all of these posts we would all love to actually discuss it rather than discuss and complain about how it's not being discussed. By all means.... Please give us an idea of what you think GNUstep should be. The floor on this mailing list is open. Have at it. 

 

> --
> "Also . . . I can kill you with my brain."
> River Tam, Trash, Firefly
>
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Yours, 

--

Gregory Casamento
GNUstep Lead Developer / OLC, Principal Consultant
http://www.gnustep.org - http://heronsperch.blogspot.com
http://ind.ie/phoenix/