Re: [Pan-users] Re: Re: Re: Re: Fit image to Window

[Mike Brodbelt]

Duncan wrote:

> No.. Charles has contributed a lot and brought the app a long way from
> where it was with the initial developer.  However, it's apparent that he
> doesn't have a lot (read virtually no) time for it any more, and a new
> lead developer that has the time, talent, /and/ interest, is needed. 
> Unfortunately, it doesn't seem many of those with the first two tend to
> use graphical news clients enough to have the required amount of the third
> one, so here PAN sits, awaiting someone who can, to decide they will. 

I would say that Pan is, in part, a victim of it's own success. I've
used it in more or less it's current form for quote a while now, and it
does pretty much everything I need it to. That being the case, there's
no particularly pressing itch to scratch. Now I could easily come up
with a list of features I'd like to see added (better scoring, binary
posting, filtering on currently unsupported headers), but there's
nothing that's really critical there.

> leadership position.  I believe I have been most active on the lists, and
> have the interest and could take the time, but I simply don't have the
> technical know-how.  Maybe in time I will.  However, realistically, PAN
> will be nothing but a historic footnote by then, if it's waiting on me. 

For what it's worth, I believe time and interest are more important than
technical skills, which can be acquired faster than you'd think. Pan has
pretty readable code, and makes heavy use of Glib and GTK. If you
genuinely have time to put in, I'd suggest buying a copy of the GNOME 2
book (http://www.nostarch.com/frameset.php?startat=gnome), and just
jumping in. If you're willing to put the time in, I thing you'd be
surprised what you could achieve. I frequently thing about contributing
to things, and lack of time is what prevents me more than enything else.

> If someone were to take it on and want to, perhaps I could be mentored,
> but that still requires someone to take it on, with or without me.
> 
> Realistically, I'm beginning to shift my hopes toward knode, in part
> because the rest of my desktop, sans PAN and XMMS, is KDE.  I haven't
> looked at it in ages, and back when I DID (KDE 2.2 era, IIRC, it was
> behind and PAN was under active development.

Knode is still seriously lacking in some areas compared to Pan. It can't
be used as an offline reader at all, so there's a large user community
right there for whom it's useless.

> However, if knode has been
> under development for the year and a half PAN has been nearly stalled, it
> may well have surpassed PAN by now.

It's had two releases in 2004. It's may be more active than Pan, but it
doesn't seem to be that much more.

Here's hoping you feel like trying to take Pan forward :-). I'm sure
there are lots of us who'd cheer from the sidelines...

Mike.