Re: Why Unanimous Consent Doesn't Work (Was: Re: why do we need change?)

[Richard Frith-Macdonald]

On 2005-10-26 08:49:52 +0100 Dennis Leeuw <address@hidden> wrote:

> I think it is a clear goal. Something we can all agree on, I don't think 
> there isn't anybody who doesn't want GNUstep to become 1.0. We just need a 
> list of things to be done and a timeframe.

Personally I see three, largely independent targets that I think, we should 
be aiming for ...

Target one:
As already identified, gui/back  reliability/polish/10.0-release ... 
proibably the most important target ...

The two gui/back issues that really annoy me are ...

1. window manager interaction ... I want clicking on windows to work 
*reliably*, so that when I click on any GNUstep window
a. The application activates (shows its menu and panels, and raises the 
window clicked on).
b. The clicked winbdow starts accepting keyboard input
c. any other GNUstep application deactivates (hides its menu and panels)

2. popup/pulldown menu operation ... sometimes (often) popup menus seem to 
fail to track the mouse, so you can't select their buttons.

And the one new development I'd really like to see is ...

Camaelon integration into the gui.  I have no particular need for it myself, 
but it's a good selling point and it's needed for my third main target.



Target two:
I'd like to see progress on providing a suite of applications.  Someone 
recently complained about the lack of a central repository for object 
libraries, but I think the same issue applies (only more so) to 
applications.
Can we think of some way to provide a suite of applications that people can 
download in one go from the main GNUstep site.
GNUMail, GWorkspace, Terminal, Preferences, TextEdit, Gorm, ProjectCenter, 
and a few others.
Perhaps the individual authors could contribute them as subprojects in some 
way, to widen out access to them for people making bugfixes and allow the 
community to support them when their main authors are on holiday or 
overworked elsewhere.
Even if we can't manage that, I think we should at least mirror these 
applications to the main GNUstep site and make it very easy for people to 
download them when they download the core libraries.  We should also try to 
maximise their interoperability using common data formats for DnD and the 
services system as much as possible.



Target three:
ms-windows support ... we've made a lot of progress on this, but we *should* 
be taking it a lot further.  Personally I want to run GNUstep on windows 
(when I have to use windows) and have it look/feel like GNUstep/NeXTstep.  
However, a lot of people want it to look/feel like windows, so we need to 
have a windows theme (and Camaeleon built into the gui as I mentioned 
above).  We need windows backend/gui development work, and we need to be 
able to support both windows and OpenStep style inter-application 
communications (cut/paste, DnD, services, notifications, workspace/session 
management etc), though this isn't going to happen quickly and must be 
viewed as a long term goal.


Of course, there are many other things we want to do, but even concentrating 
on three main targets is a LOT of work, and I don't think having more than 
three formal goals is a good idea.