[ubuntu-art] Theme Teams. Moving Forward. Making Stuff!

[Nemes Ioan Sorin]

I personally take this Civitas Forum in a semi-serious mode.
Why ?

I put here on this community some questions - in time - and I add some 
points in discussion.

Responses, generally - just disappoint me. Where I talk about serious 
problems such a programmatic way to rethink UI elements design - giving 
some examples, other peoples respond me they don't like the color of my 
example [ where the color was not the problem on topic ] - so I see some 
discussions are done in parallel - some peoples talk about something - 
other peoples understand everything else -> so being parallels they will 
not meet in the next gazillion of years. [this is not about Ken - I 
observe Ken has a good background, knowledges and leader qualities - 
this is good ].

So regarding your question Sebastian - I am designer - I respect my job 
rules - for some applications I have to design custom graphics for form 
elements, and UI. I do Plex WT theme for XP few years ago.

I can design elements for a new Ubuntu theme. But also I see here some 
talented guys that can do the same. Not a single problem here with 
designers. But with decision power.

How I can help when I say "the things should be on this way(....), from 
Usability point of view" and other one after me will say "no, you're not 
right" ...so where my expertise can go ?. Is not important that I have 
some experience with this kind of things. Anyone will say NO and the 
problem is solved.  ...waste of time, believe-me Sebastian - until the 
decisional mechanism is solved. Right now anyone is equal to anyone.

This is the perfect terrain for the entropy rules (sad joke).

For example shadowh511 said :
 > I think of a clean, simple OS.  the color brown
 > represents cleanliness and simplicity, while blue represents sadness and
 > fear.  If we want to have people download hardy, why not give them a
 > nice theme such as union and give them the desktop cube and the wobble
 > windows and all of that eye candy

How could I can take this seriously ? Regarding colors - the problem is 
solved before we born - so when he "think", some peoples could affirm 
precisely where the problem is. Also a lack of maturity ->
"why not give them a
 > nice theme such as union and give them the desktop cube and the wobble
 > windows and all of that eye candy"

 From his point of view all problems are solved with some wobble and 
some eye candy. That's all. No problem with the enterprise user - which 
has other rituals / values - no problem that Ubuntu must penetrate 
there, eyecandy and wobble will solve all... even healthy problems maybe.

Well - this is a complex product with long term effects. But some 
peoples want just to see how their dreams come true - not important if 
this is in benefit of all (or almost all users) or not.

Also we not need a theme - there are a lot - we want to do "default 
Ubuntu theme" (with minimum 3 color variations). That's the point. Hardy 
will be LTS.
Hardy will go on enterprises and offices.
That mean thousands of peoples with vary ages.
Hardy is not just for few peoples with free time. This theme must cover 
a social demand - to be easy received by all that peoples / to be easy 
to work with / to be visually pleasant.
To be clean, useful and distinctive for Ubuntu.
This is not so easy to obtain - anyhow some proposals will not go too 
far with diagonal stripes on the scrollbar OR semitransparent buttons 
(on scrollbar on others sides) - at least corporate users will hate that 
because affect the look focus - also those stripes does not represent 
anything if favor of "clean" principle, being from start a complication.

Here must be a distinction about how we like and what is good. But this 
mean maturity and professionalism - not just "I like this - I think that 
..and so".

Professionalism mean clear states in every domain "Yes and No" not "I 
think this could be.. " or ".. Maybe...", or with states as "Me, then 
Goethe...".

So when I'll see a clean Idea in which I can believe OR when I'll see a 
structure where I can collaborate [anyhow you need to create a 
decisional structure - democracy, democracy but until when ?] - be sure 
I will participate with work and knowledge - on the mean time I am 
member of other Ubuntu teams and I have to fill daily bug reports and a 
lot of other stuff ...

I will put some considerations about the Ubuntu 8.04 default theme in a 
later (maybe tomorrow) mail. We will see after that.

Good luck - best wishes for everyone - and ..be minstrels not kings guys ;)

SorinN

Sebastian Billaudelle wrote:
>   Well said!
> 
> I think that many people don't take us (you?) seriously. The current 
> theme is years old...
> Nobody uses the default theme (except of me, I think...).
> If anybody woullead a team, I would join in. (I could do things like a 
> new GDM-theme...).
> 
> Let's fight;-)
> 
> Am Samstag, den 05.01.2008, 11:23 +0000 schrieb Who:
>>  All, 
>>
>>  On my schedule for this (potential) process, today was the day to 
>>  decide whether or not we wanted to do this. Very few people have 
>>  answered... Please answer. 
>>
>>  As it stands, with one suggested theme and no leader for it, we can't 
>>  go ahead. There is just no point. Is there any support for this idea, 
>>  or are people only here because they want to design the default theme 
>>  (serious question, not an attack! ...please answer) 
>>
>>  In summary, here is why I think it is a good idea to do this 
>>  * If you want your design to be available to Ubuntu users, this is the 
>>  only certain way to do it 
>>  * In the past, this team has had most success developing community 
>>  themes (my opinion, but see below) 
>>  * If we want to be taken more seriously as a team in the future, 
>>  getting good stuff done well without offiicial hand-holding is 
>>  important 
>>  * Developing these themes is fun, seeing people using your theme is great 
>>
>>  But if we don't get people able to run them/do design we can't go 
>>  forward. It is only sensible for me to drive a process like this  a 
>>  certain amount (i.e the leaders need to want to do it!, and do does 
>>  the team) 
>>
>>  It occurs to me that if we can't even make a complete theme of ANY 
>>  style to a good standard, we shouldn't expect to be taken seriously 
>>  when we ask to design the default theme! 
>>
>>  Happy answering, 
>>
>>  Who 
>>
>>  On Jan 3, 2008 9:59 AM, Frank Schoep <frank at ffnn.nl <mailto:frank at ffnn.nl>> wrote: 
>>  > On Jan 3, 2008, at 9:42 AM, Mikkel Kamstrup Erlandsen wrote: 
>>  > > To all the new people around here - please pay attention to Who, he 
>>  > > has been around here for a good while and knows the drill. … 
>>  > 
>>  > Absolutely – there are a few people on this list who've been around 
>>  > for quite some time. I think this list is very fortunate to still 
>>  > have experienced people like Who and Troy around, but it's also good 
>>  > to see a lot of new enthusiastic people sharing their vision. 
>>  > 
>>  > > … 
>>  > > We came close to the real deal once, was it Dapper?, where we got a 
>>  > > few community themes, bundled, but not enabled, by default. 
>>  > 
>>  > I think you are referring to Edgy, as the Theme Teams were introduced 
>>  > in that release. Eventually three themes ended up in universe, being 
>>  > Blubuntu (Who / PingunZ), Peace (Chuck Huber) and Tropic (Viper550). 
>>  > 
>>  > While varying in quality and polish, the mere fact they were included 
>>  > was a sign that independent small community groups could work towards 
>>  > their own vision *and* meet the hard deadline constraints that were 
>>  > set for them. 
>>  > 
>>  > > This happened solely because of two things: 
>>  > >  * A few people stood up and took responsibility for creating themes 
>>  > 
>>  > Indeed. There was a deadline for Theme Team applications a few weeks 
>>  > into the release cycle so that the theme leaders needed to be 
>>  > involved from the start up through a few weeks before release. For 
>>  > Edgy, four leaders stepped up with a serious proposal. 
>>  > 
>>  > During the development period, we regularly discussed progress and 
>>  > problems and where possible I tried to help out either myself or by 
>>  > getting the right people in touch with each other. 
>>  > 
>>  > >  * Daniel Holbach saved our asses with a lot of packaging work we 
>>  > > really should have done our selves 
>>  > 
>>  > Daniel has historically helped out with a lot of packaging work, 
>>  > indeed. For the Edgy Theme Teams, we made sure he only had one final 
>>  > version to package per theme with room before the deadline, so they 
>>  > wouldn't burden him much. 
>>  > 
>>  > > I think it would be very valuable to have a "History Page" on the wiki 
>>  > > outlining the success and Failures of the art team. That would 
>>  > > probably help to make it clear how we are doomed to repeat history 
>>  > > unless people step up an take responsibility. 
>>  > 
>>  > While I can't say much about Feisty, Gutsy or Hardy-in-progress, I 
>>  > could tell you about Edgy. As far as I know, Edgy was the first (and 
>>  > last?) release to actively try and use community input as a viable 
>>  > source for distribution artwork. 
>>  > 
>>  > Postmortem I did an interview with Linux.com on the Edgy cycle, and 
>>  > there's some half-decent comments from Slashdot, too: 
>>  > http://www.linux.com/feature/58477 
>>  > http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/11/14/2241255 
>>  > ('Stroep' [sic]) 
>>  > 
>>  > It seems that all the history we built on the Wiki has been shoveled 
>>  > elsewhere or been dumped in a landfill altogether, but if you can 
>>  > find it, you might be able to reconstruct a decent timeline along 
>>  > with the mailing list. 
>>  > 
>>  > It was pretty high traffic during those days (July - October 2006) 
>>  > and the ML / Wiki combination seemed to work somewhat satisfactory. 
>>  > 
>>  > All in all, Edgy was edgy to me – as you can read in the interview 
>>  > the idea was to try something new, community artwork by default, and 
>>  > since there were no trodden roads available I did my best to get and 
>>  > keep things rolling in an enjoyable fashion. 
>>  > 
>>  > I think it worked out pretty well in terms of community involvement, 
>>  > enthusiasm, commitment, process structure and raw output. Slightly 
>>  > missing was the desired art *direction* but somehow I don't think 
>>  > that problem's been resolved ever since, no flame or offense intended. 
>>  > 
>>  > If you'd ask me now, sure I'd do things different based on the Edgy 
>>  > experience and the knowledge I've accumulated since then, but I think 
>>  > the Edgy cycle already showed a lot of potential for the future 
>>  > although it never got tapped into afterwards. 
>>  > 
>>  > Tell me if I'm wearing rose-colored glasses, thanks for reading. 
>>  > 
>>  > Sincerely, 
>>  > 
>>  > Frank 
>>  > 
>>  > 
>>  > -- 
>>  > ubuntu-art mailing list 
>>  > ubuntu-art at lists.ubuntu.com <mailto:ubuntu-art at lists.ubuntu.com> 
>>  > https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-art 
>>  > 
>>