[Lazarus] Release 1.0, part 2

Helmut Hartl helmut.hartl at firmos.at
Wed Dec 2 13:27:21 CET 2009


At the current state this discussion mixes orthogonal things into
one dimension.
A thing a programmer never should do ... :-)

The following may sound funny, so at least you have something to laugh ....

My still limited mind sees at least the following dimensions:

A) Delphi vs Lazarus Competition
B) Developer concerns about stability and stable interfaces (Bug Fixing
/ Reintroducing / Breaking Features)
C) Users wanting a fancy "Release Tag"
D) Hope of getting more Users / Contributers / Developers
E) Discussing version numbering schemes
F) Companies/Users dreaming of stable, out of the box usable software,
fullfilling their needs.

The points are only loosely related and can't be mapped to a one dimensional
version number/release discussion.

No ones expectations, hopes and wishes can be fullfilled with a version
number.

Give it up. :-) We will never get there -> http://www.ntg.nl/maps/05/34.pdf

Lazarus will never be stable for all widgestsets on all os's, as the are
not stable by themselves.

I am a "company" user developing software since 20 years.
(But thinking about a second start as a gardener)

Here my viewpoint/experience:

I am using FreeBSD for network appliance (e.g. some sort of firmware)
programming.
I am perfectly happy using a patched svn fpc  (using FreeBSD 8.0) 
somewere near the fpc fixes 2.4 branch
I am perfectly happy using tagged svn Lazarus "releases" - There IS no
release for "my" OS ...
I had problems with Lazarus, and mattias fixed it for (small)
bounty/donations directly and ultrafast (<24h)
(I got f*cked by MS and Delphi and other companies at support questions
for years, and counting ... -> 24h - lol, next release lololol ... )
I do make money using lazarus and fpc and I am happy with it.

"A wise man should see a diamond gem if it lies before him on the
ground - At least he can decide if he wants to use funny arranged 
carbon atoms - or not. 
The dumb one does have at least the possibility
if you (developers) want it and you put a giant red wrap around it
("Lazarus 2009/Q3/Christmas Edition")

*) OSS Developers will not and should not be forced to anything.
(because they are idealists) -> A), B), E)
*) "Dumb" users will need C) and of 100 blind users maybe you get 5 good
ones and 1 idealist contributing -> D)
*) To make a point at A) you need a "killer application" (VLC, Lazarus
itself,  uTorrent, Skype ...) and state that its made with Lazarus/FPC
and a target audience
*) Thinking about B) -> MS broke the socket, the TAPI and the QoS API 
between every Release of 2000, XP, and Vista, forcing us to rerelease 
our "Delphi made"  VoIP Softphones at every new OS release .... 
(Reality is here)
I think they have one or to more developers then the Lazteam ?
(We have a deployed userbase of > 30.000 mixed over these OS's)
*) Even companies have the possibillity to contribute, if contribution
is welcome, and a company can see the gem ...

If you want to satisfy all needs you would need to compromise on some
things. (Which should be easy, as no one gives guarantees for anything)

If my litte daughter wants a new blue lolly in favour of the red one
- I usually give it to her if no one gets hurt. :-)

Who gets hurt at doing what ? Maybe you get new (core) developers 
with a fancy brand at a little chance (better than nothing ?)

But what does the fancy Delphi User say ? (Future Forecast)
"Lazarus 1.0 is 2009 releases behind Delphi 2010 and they have just
released the 3rd HOTFIX !!)

I have all Delphi releases from 5 to 2009 bought ...
(I does not give me a warm feeling in my stomach ...)

For me I want to switch my firm completely from Delphi to FPC:
Which is hard because our GUI Clients uses many Components which needs
to be ported ...
So we tried to "book" Mattias for a week crash/internal course
workshop in Jan.2010 - He agreed.
That will help us evaluate possibilities and make progress ...

Maybe the "5000 year old principle" of giving something to get something
is still applyable ?

greets
 Helmut



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