Hi, > Let me start with some good things. I thought Fedora was in > desperately bad shape in the FC3/FC4 period, FC3 wasn't *that* bad IMHO. FC4 was a bit on the disappointing side. > First, a relatively minor issue that is nevertheless quite annoying. > It's the Fedora distribution art This, and fonts, are the two areas where just about every Linux distro falls behind Mac and Windows boxes as both companies invested a massive amount to get professional font and graphics people to generate the graphics for them and unfortunately, it seems eye candy is everything. > I know at least one fairly influential kernel developer who threw out > Red Hat/Fedora in disgust over this. When he asked me straight up how > I could defend what he bluntly called 'corporate cowardice', I didn't > feel like I had a good answer. And I still don't. In return for all > the free development work they get, it does seem to me that it's part > of Red Hat's job to shoulder risks like these -- and that Red Hat > hasn't held up its end. > > AVI. Quicktime. ASF. MPEG. DVD playback. Flash. Java. These are > *not optional* in 2006, any more than the ability to read Microsoft > Word files in a word processor is optional; if we try to treat them > that way, consumers will blow Linux off. Eric, I couldn't agree with you more. While I can accept the DVD playback argument over CSS, I can't over the others especially as there is a GNU Flash package in development, libQuicktime has been around for yonks and from what I can see from the licence, there shouldn't be a problem shipping a Java plugin with FC. There is even a "clean" mp3 module out there. I enjoy Linux as I don't have to play "hunt the driver" as I do when installing a Windows box (which I have to do as part of my job), however, it's a pain in the backside having to go to freshrpms or livna to grab Xine/mplayer/xmms-mp3 or having to mess around to get the Java plugin to work. > 1. We can end-run the patent restrictions on the technology (say, > by developing outside the U.S. and distributing through overseas sites > that are wink-wink-nudge-nudge unconnected with Fedora/Red hat). I think that's been suggested, I'm almost certain it was on the test list (or on here) to have Mono included > 3. We can buy the rights to the technologies we want as a straight > commercial transaction from the patent-holder. It looks like this is what happened (more or less) with Mono. > If solving the multimedia problem takes having Red Hat sell a > plugins-and-drivers disk for each spin of FC, full of proprietary crap > that it negotiated rights for, that sucks -- but better that than > never getting any traction on the desktop because we got too caught up > in our own idealism to meet actual consumer needs. It would be very much the same way as Linspire works. TTFN Paul (who had the pleasure of sitting to a meal with Eric at the 2004 ACCU conference with Jutta, Niko, Allan and someone else who's name escapes me for the moment) -- "Logic, my dear Zoe, is merely the ability to be wrong with authority" - Dr Who -- fedora-devel-list mailing list fedora-devel-list@xxxxxxxxxx https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-devel-list
