KDE's Aaron Seigo Bashes Ubuntu Phone 92
sfcrazy writes "KDE's Plasma Active team leader Aaron Seigo has raised some concerns around Ubuntu Phone. He says 'We can start with the obvious clue: Unity currently does not use QML at all; Ubuntu Phone is pure QML. So, no, it is not the same code, it is not the sort of seamless cross-device technology bridge that they are purporting.' He then concludes, 'If you're a Free software developer, user and/or supporter and buying into these claims, I don't know how else to put it other than this: you're being duped. Consider what supporting those who employ such tactics means for Free software.'"
Hrm (Score:1)
Re:Hrm (Score:5, Informative)
No, it's just Michael over at moronix who needs more clicks, so he misrepresents what someone says to get them. Slashdot gets on the bus for the same purpose. News at 11.
Mod Parent Up! (Score:5, Informative)
There is almost no correlation between this story headline and the actual content Aaron wrote. Among other things Aaron wrote:
Re:Mod Parent Up! (Score:5, Interesting)
The question is, if all of you can see how obvious it is that the editors here are misleading people to sell a few ad clicks, why are you still visiting the site? I had considered making an account to post this but to be honest I'd really rather not bother. I'd rather not help the editors make a buck off another pointless flame-war that THEY FUCKING STARTED!
I'm not saying that any other site is any better, but Slashdot used to be one of my favorites. I think I'm now getting a glimpse of exactly what made Malda retire from his post. The flame-war monster that he created has spun out of even his control so he got out while the getting was good. With any luck this place will go the way of digg.
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> The question is, if all of you can see how obvious it is that the editors here are misleading people to sell a few ad clicks, why are you still visiting the site?
The same reason I sometimes read the mail in my spam folder. Because it's amusing.
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I am not sure they did it entirely intentional. The story was just so flamy-delicious looking they forgot to check it was actually true.
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It's a sad thing to see, really. Slashdot was the machine through which many of us saw all the awesomeness of the early years of the "world wide web" and when we cut our teeth on technology - I'd say 1997 through 2003, roughly. So it's sad to see stuff like this, particularly when we remember how it used to be, and how there really isn't much left on the Internet that's similar to "how it used to be" to such a large degree as even slashdot.
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For one thing, it helps to know what kind of falsehoods the proletariat are buying into, and the actual truth, so that I know enough to counter it when I hear it.
Pot and kettle (Score:5, Insightful)
There is almost no correlation between this story headline and the actual content Aaron wrote. Among other things Aaron wrote:
So then the question becomes "Why is this false story being posted on slashdot?" Is it that the OP wants to slander KDE or Ubuntu or maybe slashdot itself? We all regularly complain about mainstream media and yellow journalism, so how come slashdot isn't doing something about this story?
Re:Pot and kettle (Score:5, Interesting)
And if Slashdot (and DICE) won't do something about this story, why aren't its readers doing the open source thing and "forking" Slashdot to something better. Make a new website, just like Slashdot, except with responsible editors (or any editors, for that matter).
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So then the question becomes "Why is this false story being posted on slashdot?"
Well, if you took the trouble to do such an unorthodox thing as reading the article, you might find out. Try it, it's only a few paragraphs.
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So then the question becomes "Why is this false story being posted on slashdot?"
Well, if you took the trouble to do such an unorthodox thing as reading the article, you might find out. Try it, it's only a few paragraphs.
I did read it and that is why it begs the question. What is slashdot's motiviation in promoting this particular controversy?
Re:Mod Parent Up! (Score:5, Insightful)
It's the kind of thing that doesn't make me interested in any form of desktop or GUI open source development and hasn't for years. It's the same old bullshit. Pardon my French but Ubuntu either needs to either produce something worthwhile and useful that will move open source desktop and GUI usage forwards dramatically or they need to run out of Shuttleworth's cash and fuck off.
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"Pardon my French but Ubuntu either needs to either produce something worthwhile and useful that will move open source desktop and GUI usage forwards dramatically or they need to run out of Shuttleworth's cash and fuck off."
But traditionally, GUI is really not a "part" of Linux at all. It is an add-on. Thus X, and Gnome, and KDE. I don't mention Unity because I don't think it's worth mentioning... I view it as a niche attempt to corner the Linux interface market, which is likely doomed to fail.
I have been using Kubuntu -- the semi-official KDE Ubuntu -- for years. I like it, it's stable, and the interface with least surprise. It does what I want, when I want, and it doesn't try to "integrate" things that do not need to be,
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Nevertheless, Aaron is pretty critical of Ubuntu Phone, and frankly, he has a point.
So he does. It doesn't necessarily mean Ubuntu Phone is a total crock of shit, it's just that it's not really the platform they imply it is. (Now what would be really cool would be a Slackware phone...)
What struck me, however, on following the link at the bottom of the article pointing to release of the phone product on 21st Feb, the first thing I saw was that YouTube clip of Stallman talking about Ubuntu and spyware.
Re:Mod Parent Up! (Score:4, Funny)
Nevertheless, Aaron is pretty critical of Ubuntu Phone, and frankly, he has a point.
So he does. It doesn't necessarily mean Ubuntu Phone is a total crock of shit, it's just that it's not really the platform they imply it is. (Now what would be really cool would be a Slackware phone...)
Gentoo phone. That you compile ON the phone.
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Openmoko.. http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Main_Page [openmoko.org]
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More like akin to bolting a jackbooted Stasi thug directly onto your face.
Re:Mod Parent Up! (Score:4, Informative)
> It's the kind of thing that doesn't make me interested in any form of desktop or GUI open source development and hasn't for years. It's the same old bullshit
Wish I had mod points today I'd mod this right up ! +10 insightful.
The latest Gnome/Unity fiascos has put me completely off desktop Linux. There are so many areas of Linux that are in desperate need of improvement (pro audio apps, pro image manipulation apps, pro video apps) - not to mention all the usability bugs that never get fixed.
But what do the developers do ? Continually fuck around with the desktop metaphor, keep breaking things, continually "reinvent the wheel" (extremely badly), or needlessly trying to push new paradigms down our throats. "Hey we haven't rewritten subsystem X this week so let's throw out what we've got (thereby conveniently ignoring all the bugs) and let's write something entirely new (with all nwe bugs that will never be fixed) instead".
It's a huge, huge waste of time.
Not to mention the fact I'd got quite a number of people in my locaility to start using Ubuntu. When they pulled that Unity shit every single one of them was on my case complaining how the latest updates had broken their computer and "how can we get rid of this rubbish ?"
Desktop linux is a waste of time. Excellent server. Complete waste of time as a desktop. Constantly moving operational metaphors, not enough pro quality apps and no desire to fix bugs (let's make new buggy, shitty "shiny" instead)
There I've said it.
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The latest Gnome/Unity fiascos has put me completely off desktop Linux.
Quite the opposite here.
Indeed at first it did shake my confidence but it also made me look at the DE alternatives, which turn out to be many. There are even forks of Gnome 2, possible only because of open source. That flexibility has given me greater confidence.
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I feel sorry for the sales guys who have to convince people to buy computers with Windows 8.
It almost makes me want to give a hand to Reactos to try to make a open source Windows clone.
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Nevertheless, Aaron is pretty critical of Ubuntu Phone, and frankly, he has a point. Ubuntu is not using the common codebase they try and claim
Maybe I've looked at the wrong websites but I have yet to see a claim that both desktop Unity and phone Unity are written using the same codebase. I just saw the claim that one application's Qt codebase can be used on both systems and that's completely true. Canonical wrote various bits and pieces even quite some time ago to make sure that Qt applications utilize indicators, global menus, etc.
Canonical also rewrote at least their UbuntuOne desktop client in Qt a while ago. Canonical also forked MeeGo's Qt-b
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It's the kind of thing that doesn't make me interested in any form of desktop or GUI open source development and hasn't for years.
Obviously wrong because if you weren't interested, you'd not even read such stories, let alone comment on them.
Something must be said... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:well it worked for google (Score:5, Insightful)
The GPL doesn't ensure that you can "actually contribute to or even see developmental android code" and Google not offering that doesn't mean that their products are a "proprietary exploitation". The problem here is a nerd's sense of entitlement.
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The GPL doesn't ensure that you can "actually contribute to or even see developmental android code" and Google not offering that doesn't mean that their products are a "proprietary exploitation". The problem here is a nerd's sense of entitlement.
The problem is that Google sets expectations when they describe something as "open" [android.com] (as if that meant anything by itself, but still) and then breaks them when they do not utilize an open development process.
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Re:well it worked for google (Score:5, Insightful)
Read Cathedral vs Bazaar to understand just what exactly open means.
Uh, no. Not only have I read it, but he didn't invent the term open, nor for that matter open source. Nor did anyone else who claims to have done so, oddly enough.
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Still, the "cathedral" model was used by GNU back in the day, and you'd probably be nuts not consider Emacs open.
You will never ever catch me saying that GNU's Not Open. That's not how it expands anyway.
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Then we can't blame Google for not being open - after all, they are doing the same thing GNU did, using the Cathedral model of development.
Google is Open Source. That's a fact. But Google uses a closed development model. I don't blame Google for not being open, I blame Google for claiming to be more open than they are. If they call Android "Open Source" I cheer. If they call Android "Open" then I scowl, that doesn't mean anything.
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If they call Android "Open Source" I cheer.
Well that seems dubious, you can't really call 'Android' open source, only specific versions. I suppose you could say Android is open source based on the released versions - well assuming Android was open source until 3.0, then was not open source for a while, then became open source again - but i think it's best to do it version-specific since when a new version is announced it isn't open sourced until the first devices are shipping to protect OHA member exclusivity. I don't think there's anything wrong wi
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If they call Android "Open Source" I cheer.
Well that seems dubious, you can't really call 'Android' open source, only specific versions.
OK, all versions but 3. And all three customers are really bent about it. Your point is taken, and I was a bit miffed about it at the time, but 4 really did come out shortly thereafter and the lack of Android 3 code really didn't impact much. Still, yes, your qualifier is valid.
Language of choice (Score:3, Insightful)
Man, if only there was a way to take code written for one display device and. what's a good word, "compile" it into a program that uses a different display device.
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Or a shim to get from one API set to another API set.
Pretty heavy handed (Score:5, Insightful)
He has a point (actually two: the phone isn't using the same API, and Canonical marketers implied that it was) but he seems to think that that is disqualifying for users of free software. I don't think it is.
Point it out, but just add "KDE's approach is quite different. Here's what we're doing instead..." instead of talking about ethics and such.
Re:Pretty heavy handed (Score:5, Insightful)
He said that the ethical implications of the deceit might be "disqualifying for users of free software", not the technical details themselves. Talking about "ethics and such" is certainly relevant in that context especially in a community that thinks it's so ethically-minded.
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Re:Pretty heavy handed (Score:4, Interesting)
Something I've never quite understood from the "free/libre/open" software culture is the self-contradictory sentiment of, "you're not doing it our way, therefore you are wrong!" Isn't choice and variety and each person being able to take something and mold it to their wishes one of, if not the, primary points?
I wonder if decoupling morality from software the way it's so commonly tied together in the FSF/OSS movements would help? I don't mean entirely, just not that everything is a moral imperative. That's clearly not in the cards for the FSF any time soon, but ostensibly, that's one of the reasons the Open Source movement was started.
Personally, I find Ubuntu on phones to have great possibilities, and though it has a long way to go to prove itself as qualified and viable, I could see it surpassing Android in appeal to me. That it's a more honest offering of "Linux on your phone" than Android is. I haven't had a chance to flash it onto one of my Nexuses yet, but am looking forward to doing so sometime soon.
Honestly, seeing nerds rage against something on meta-reason grounds is often the first sign that it's going to be good!
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"You can do whatever you want. No, not that." is a contradiction.
FS/OSS advocates pay lip service to choice, but far too many of them have large sets of choices which they tell others are wrong.
Fixed (Score:1)
KDE's Aaron Seigo Bashes Ubuntu Marketers.
Fixed that for you.
FUD (Score:1, Informative)
Unity's 2D version is QML and is not the standard there up til very 'recently'; and has been used for the phone version.
Why making /. headline before even the people could check the phone version out.
Androidist's FUD ?
Re:FUD (Score:5, Informative)
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Ubuntu Phone is based on Qt5 and QML2. The deprecated Unity2D is based on Qt4 and QML1. Granted, the effort to port from QML1 to QML2 is minimal (which is why KDE Plasma components are first being rewritten in QML1 to prepare for the port to QML2) but they are not the same.
poppycock (Score:5, Informative)
Not, he's not bashing Ubuntu phone, mostly because such a thing does not exist - yet. He is criticizing Canonical's less than sincere approach to the rest of the world. That's all.
Re:poppycock (Score:4, Interesting)
But the Ubuntu press release explicitly says that the code will be shared when the project "is completed", which it is obviously not. And getting upset about a marketing video seems like a waste of time. It's not new that a marketing video may not present the actual current development status, but the one that you want to sell down the road.
Not a problem with Ubuntu Phone (Score:5, Informative)
I doubt Aaron has many complaints with the technology used in Ubuntu Phone, because that's Qt Quick using QML, the same is used in Plasma. The thing is, Plasma was conceived as a very flexible way to create the primary user interface (that is, the visible thing that is not the applications). At that time, that was the "desktop shell" (Plasma Desktop), and nowadays is also a touch-device user interface and others (Plasma Active, Plasma Media Center, etc.).
The vision the KDE guys had was right, and with few resources have created a great framework. Instead, Canonical had to write Unity several times. The "normal" Unity I don't even remember in what's written (GTK+, Clutter, Nux... can't follow it), but I remember that there is the Qt-based Unity-2D (dead, AFAIK) and the new Ubuntu Phone version, which uses Qt again.
They could have saved tons of resources by choosing the technology and sticking a bit to it, helping to develop it. And now they claim they provide a seamless user experience across devices. Well, that could be true, but not using the same technologies, so the user experience is not going to be consistent with different bugs, different features, because the code bases are totally different.
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Why do developers seem to pick technologies based on that they ARE NOT what the other guy uses, rather than what benefits they provide? This seems to be the hallmark of the GTK-ish community.
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But QML _is_ what the other guy is using. It is not, however, what Canonical is already using, which was Aaron's entire point. In this case, Canonical is definitely moving in the right direction. Now, if
- Canonical starts using QML with the same components (same API) it for Unity apps
- Ubuntu Phone and Plasma use the same QML components
free software on mobiles should have a bright future. Even as a third option, like on desktops, it should be great.
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Why do developers seem to pick technologies based on that they ARE NOT what the other guy uses, rather than what benefits they provide? This seems to be the hallmark of the GTK-ish community.
The GTK community was created around that very notion. KDE pre-dated GTK, but used the Qt framework which at the time was published under the controversial QPL [snopes.com] (it wasn't until 2000 that Qt was published under the GPL). GTK arose partly as a response to this, and since KDE used C++, using C mitigated the risk of the two projects competing for developers.
The more two competing open source projects use the same technologies, the less distinct their identities. Whether this is a good thing or not depends on ho
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Gnome used C because there was and is a large group of people who hate C++ and think C a superior language to develop in. It wasn't anything to do with avoiding competition for developers.
I never said that they made the decision for that reason; simply that that was the reason it happened. If KDE had used C, it's likely that many of the people drawn to Gnome during its formation would have been those who preferred C++.
Pearls from the post (Score:5, Insightful)
Some pearls from the original conversation [google.com]. Alan Pope:
Daniel Stone on wether Ubuntu Phone uses Wayland or not:
And the best one, the only thing that Mark Shuttleworth had to say:
I wish success to Ubuntu Phone, really, but it hurts me a little bit that it receives the same or more attention from the community than Plasma Active, when the later delivered the same or more (specially if you value open governance and source code from day 1), with way less resources.
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We're agile enough that we can migrate our desktop to QML if that's the decision that gets made. Unity has existed on four toolkits already, what's a fifth between friends ;)
I can't really make up my mind if this says the most about OSS or being "agile", but I think a facepalm is in order...
His actual post (Score:5, Informative)
on Google+: https://plus.google.com/u/0/107555540696571114069/posts/HSL2C21DJt7 [google.com]
Thanks (Score:1)
"We can start with the obvious clue: Unity currently does not use QML at all; Ubuntu Phone is pure QML. So, no, it is not the same code, it is not the sort of seamless cross-device technology bridge that they are purporting."
I hear what he's saying, but Ubuntu cross-platform seamless operation isn't really about what's going on underneath. Canonical know full well that we're entering into an age of dumbed-down users. It's not about smartphones, it's about dumbed down computers/PC's. One flavor of Linux had
apt-get (Score:5, Insightful)
Too slow anyway (Score:2)
We can start with the obvious clue: Unity currently does not use QML at all; Ubuntu Phone is pure QML.
I knew they wouldn't put Unity in the phone. It's just too slow. Even on the PC it takes almost a second to open the Dash or Alt-Tab between applications.