Alexandro Colorado wrote:
On Sat, 29 Apr 2006 15:26:42 -0400, Cor Nouws <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Alexandro Colorado wrote:
Except when they do the 'inform' every other hour. And any answer
that you give them is not good enough. Then it becomes a liability.
I suspect they ask their family and friends to post the same request
frequently ;-)
Cor
We need a public announcement. something like,
www,whywewontdevelopoutlook.com :D
--Alexandro Colorado
CoLeader of OpenOffice.org ES
http://es.openoffice.org
Here's what I don't understand...
I was poking around on the project pages at openoffice.org and I took a
look at the project management project (http://oopm.openoffice.org/).
Now, if anything, project management seems even more peripheral to the
mission of OOo than a PIM project. I don't understand how that is
accepted as an incubator while a PIM is roundly shouted down as a Really
Stupid Idea(tm).
Even worse, if you take a look at the Wishlist
(http://oopm.openoffice.org/initial_analyze/wishes.html) for the
project, it quickly becomes apparent that it has a whole more in common
with PIM software than the existing suite. In fact, there is a
discussion on the project pages for Lightning toward the end of
extending the task list/to-do component into a full-fledged project
management tool.
I detect four distinct threads in the argument against an OO PIM. The
first is a philosophical argument that attempts to draw a line between
document creation and communication technologies. The second claims that
open-source software is all about single-purpose tools that do one thing
really well vs all-in-one Swiss army knife software. The third claims
that the "open-source" way of doing things is to use and contribute to
existing software rather than start another project. Finally, the fourth
makes no particular value judgment for or against an OO PIM but simply
states that the project currently has higher priorities and limited
resources.
Argument #1 is entirely specious for several reasons. Impress is
entirely about communicating ideas. On the other hand, Calc is primarily
about data analysis and Base is about the storage, organization, and
retrieval of data. Finally, *any* document is ultimately a communication
tool. Even a reminder note to yourself is a communication from your
present self to your future self.
The second argument is directly refuted by the existence of
OpenOffice.org itself. Alternative/competitive open source projects
exist for all the components of OOo: AbiWord, Gnumeric, Rekall, etc. If
you don't like all-in-one software, why support OOo at all? On the other
end of this are projects like KOffice and Emacs (it can do email).
The third argument is based on a wholly faulty premise. As of today,
Sourceforge.net proudly claims 118,615 registered projects. The Yet
Another syndrome is legendary; Yet Another Text Editor, Yet Another
Browser, etc. Some of this can be ascribed to the hubris of believing
yourself capable of creating the definitive example of some type of app.
But some of it is legitimately aimed at satisfying a niche in the
software ecology. An OO PIM would fall into the same category as KMail
whose real reason for being is to fit into the KOffice/KDE paradigm.
The fourth argument is the only one that carries a lot of weight IMO.
Given limited resources it probably is better /at this time/ to
concentrate on improving the existing components of OOo, particularly
Impress and Base, pushing projects that are more central to the mission
of OOo like the Biblio project and SVG, and generally dealing with bugs,
optimizations, and code cleanup.
Having said that, though, I disagree with the characterization that this
would be creating this whole thing from scratch. One of the beauties of
OOo is the code reuse, and a whole lot of the pieces to a PIM already
exist in the form of useful APIs, particularly if the thing is built
around HSQLDB.
So I'm not jumping up and down screaming that we have to have it and we
have to have it now. I just disagree with a lot of the objections that
are raised against the idea. And I really don't understand the people
that seem to get so /angry/ when the subject is brought up.
--
Rod
---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
