Re: Cocoa/Windows parallel dvlpmt

[Philippe C.D. Robert]

Hi,

Philip Mötteli wrote:
> Am 04.02.2004 um 11:34 schrieb Florent Pillet: 
> > I'd go farther than that.
>
> Could you please repeat that and send a copy to P. C. D. Robert? I can't 
> remember all the names, that already publically said, that they are 
> interested in a Windows port of GS. But it needs to be more evolved. 
> P.C.D. Robert seems to constantly censore such statements. Perhaps we 
> have to make a mail bomb that it gets into his mail box?

I am not sure why you show such a hostile attitude, if you have a 
problem with me then discuss that with me, but *privately*!

Anyway, if you read my posting, I was not talking about GNUstep on 
Windows, but about porting Mac OS X apps to GNUstep....

> I don't think, this is vey difficult. The problem of GS is manpower. In 
> order to get that manpower, GS has to be usefull for them. 
> Unfortunately, the only use of GS most of the developer see, is as a 
> porting means. But at the moment they still think that it takes too much 
> effort (costs too much) to port with GNUstep to Windows. So GS don't 
> gets those developers and P.C.D. Robert is frustrated about the progress 
> of GS.

I am not frustrated about the progress of GNUstep, I wouldn't allow 
myself to be frustrated as I do currently not contribute to the GNUstep 
project. I hope this will change again anytime soon.

Anyway, I do think that in order to overcome the manpower "problem" it 
would help to position GNUstep differently - you would call it change of 
marketing plan I guess... Alexander's proposal is IMHO very promising in 
this respect!

> > OTOH, if Apple would somehow revive the Yellow box I'd be happy too. 
> > I'd even be happy to pay for it, as long as it allows me to seamlessly 
> > port my apps...
>
> I do agree again. But lets say it in the words of P.C.D. Robert: "...it 
> would probably be a wasted effort. Unfortunately - for most Mac OS X 
> developers - there is no or at least it seems that there is no such user 
> base". He surely knows better than you.

Do not rip sentences out of context, if you want fairness then be fair 
yourself! What I said was:

"...there must be some potential user base on the "other platform" in 
order to justify a porting effort. Otherwise it just does not make sense 
to port, it would probably be a wasted effort."

And I said this, because I think that it is not sufficient that GNUstep 
ports are just possible (technically they are already), GNUstep also 
needs to provide some "integration factor" into the native environment, 
be it X11 or Windows, otherwise *users* will not be interested in using 
such apps, and as a consequence there won't be a potential user base for 
such ports.

-Phil
--
Philippe C.D. Robert
http://www.nice.ch/~phip/