sad but true ... or not ?
i have been actively contributing to Hydrogen for over 2 years now and i have spend quite a bit of time trying to get more people involved (the drumkit contest was the most recent attempt that had some visibility, but there have been other attempts)
my conclusion is that it _is_ possible to attract new people, but you have to invest a LOT of time into it. A general 'we are looking for people to help out' broadcast is ok for a start, but once/if you get a reaction you need to make sure that you email this person directly, keep in touch and keep motivating him/her _constantly_
After all you are relying on someones goodwill so you need to keep them happy. (this might sound weird or plain wrong, but that's the reality)
Lucky for me i'm no good at coding anyway, so i'm not wasting time (that i could use to write code) talking to people
On the other hand i know that there are a lot of people out there that want to help, but automatically think that we only need people that write code.
Not true of course !
IMHO keeping the manual/site/forum clean and up to date is JUST AS IMPORTANT as delivering good apps
Sadly it sometimes happens that we simply scare off these people due to too much tech talk, or because of the need to 'stay in charge of our beloved project'
Also this is perfectly understandable, but i feel that any project would benefit from having 1 ore more non-technical people that 'interface' between the user and the developer
Hydrogen was the audio app that triggered my interest in linux and linux audio (now over 7 years ago) but sadly i had to stop working on the project recently due to a lac of time and a change in priorities.
However, i hope i can find some spare time in the near future and jump back on board ;-) there is always work to be done !
after writing this i am still left with 1 final question :
It is good that we can have this kind of discussion, and i think we all see and knowledge that there are several challenges, but ...
will we find a way to come together and make this work ... ?
Linux audio rocks !
Grtz
Thijs