11 Apr
2008
11 Apr
'08
7:46 p.m.
On Tue, Apr 8, 2008 at 9:25 AM, Ivica Ico Bukvic <ico(a)vt.edu> wrote:
I think this is also the greatest ailment of the Linux
audio community.
Perhaps it stems from the fact that everyone is excited about the 2%
inspiration new project offers but is taken aback when the first 2%
finally
disappear and one is left with 98% perspiration. Such projects never go
past
the 0.3 version and eventually join the endless ranks of "potentially
really
cool but totally buggy and unfinished" software tools.
This is why I've been lobbying hard to get all the online resources into
one
place. That's why we have apps.linuxaudio.org docs.linuxaudio.org
lists.linuxaudio.org etc. (yes some of these are placeholders waiting for
users to contribute). We need more perspiration than inspiration at this
point as that will be the only thing that will bring us closer to some of
the noble goals mentioned here.
ico
The following are rough musings on my part on ways to improve linuxaudio.org,
they have most likely not been well thought through;)
I certainly agree some consolidation could be a good thing. What I am
wondering about though, is the possibility of truly using the
linuxaudio.orgas a portal. In order to do this I think several things
would be needed
from my standpoint....
1. A centralized basic information about all applications (wiki already in
existance, good start)
2. A centralized repository of general linux audio information(ie What is
realtime, why/when should you use it, FAQs etc.)
3. A centralized place to go for announcements from all projects at once...
- This would likely entail using a RSS feeds for all members of the
linuxaudio consortium, and subscribing to those feeds to be displayed on the
news page. I am sure there is a better way, but this is what sticks out to
me at the moment, filtering of the announcements might be necessary. I
suppose another option would be to utilize the linux-audio-announce mailing
list instead so as to have a natural filter preventing things like general
informational posts.
4. I am not against a centralized forum either, however I think app specific
forums and websites are still a good thing, which leads to the next point
couple of points...
5. Tight integration between all of the above. On the wiki we have links to
the forums for those peices of software, or from the FAQ/Info sections links
to the forums, or from the Forums to the wikis, with the news announcements
a link to the wiki for the software the announcement is about, etc.
6. A single login for linuxaudio... And I don't just mean linuxaudio.org,
but all member projects if possible. This is the one most difficult to
implement, and probably most contreversial, but would allay some of the
problems that Dave and others have, which is having to sign up for hundreds
of forums with logins to remember etc. Having one place to go for that
would be great. This could tie into the centralized forums, by having
direct links to each of the projects individual forums, if applicable, and
auto-login. OpenID is making good strides in this area, but as I mentioned
I do expect this to be the most contreversial of my suggestions I suppose,
along with still being the most difficult to implement.
But the goal with these would be to provide a single portal, from which you
can get all levels of help by utilizing all the availiable resources out
there.
Seablade