Oneiric Update

[ScottALavender at gmail.com]

This is copied from my blog to share with others:  
http://dullass.blogspot.com/2011/08/oneiric-update.html


Well, here we are, getting close to the release of Ubuntu Studio 11.10 aka  
Oneiric Ocelot and a few topics come to mind for immediate discussion.


ONEIRIC DEVELOPMENT
Sadly, development is crawling forward in between periods of stark  
inactivity. Our goal was to transition to XFCE during this development  
cycle. Unfortunately, it seemed that almost everyone of those actively  
involved were busy outside of Ubuntu Studio. Development stagnated for  
several months but I think we are building momentum again and making  
progress.

Therefore it seems that while we may make a transition, it will not be the  
thorough or complete transition for this release. It is embarrassing, but  
it is also true.

So, it would seem that two development cycle will be required to complete  
the transition to XFCE.

We are currently testing the Beta 1 image. You can help test as well  
(please do!) by going to the QA Website and choosing the appropriate  
architecture to test. And be sure to report your results!

I tested (and reported) the image last night and I will forewarn you that  
it currently is not aesthetically pleasing at this point. Our main concern  
at this point is to make sure everything works, then we can make it pretty.

Currently the current theme and settings are still the default XFCE  
settings but Cory is still working on this. So, "pretty" is still in the  
plan ;)


HELP
We still need help for almost everything. But this time I want to be  
slightly more selective in my solicitation.

We certainly need people for almost every aspect but one quality (well,  
perhaps two actually) I would like to highlight: self-reliance and  
initiative.

People who can take a general direction (ie "find out how to set the  
background for the new lightdm greeter"), find answers/solutions with  
minimal input from the team (ie go find other code that has already done  
it, ask the lightdm developer, or just play with it), and yield a results  
(ie "I figured out how and this is how you do it...") are greatly needed.  
We appreciate anyone who wants to help, but if the team spends time to walk  
someone else through it then other major changes will not occur. It's a  
paradox and it sucks but that is where are at.

I knew practically nothing about development and no one directly mentored  
me. I asked lots of questions, did a lot of research (all hail the mighty  
Google), and experimented/tested a lot. It can be done, even if you don't  
know much currently, but you need to have tenacity.

Also I want to state that internally we have shifted from using the  
term "developers" to "contributors" for the team. This may seem like  
semantics, but it is more than just that. There truly isn't that  
much "developing" going on as we don't write a lot of code within the  
team...but we do a lot of other things like creating themes, creating  
packages that adjust settings, testing, artwork, yadda, yadda, yadda.

The fear was that the term didn't accurately reflect what we did and it  
seemed to hold exclusive connotations. People shied away from help because  
they weren't "developers". But everyone (and I really, really mean that)  
can contribute :)

Probably the best way to really get into the mix is to visit us on Freenode  
IRC at #ubuntustudio-devel. Be sure to stay there for a while and don't  
leave after three minutes because no one says anything back. We are all  
busy and in different time zone so you may need to wait several hours  
before you receive a coherent reply.

Of course, IRC visits aren't absolutely required to help because there's  
always monthly QA testing and documentation that needs to be created and  
maintained.


AUDIENCE
A confluence of activities yielded an interesting result....the majority of  
the active team feels that we should define our audience as musicians who  
are new to Linux. This is still a continuing process so we might refine or  
adjust this definition.

But the general feelings was that other multimedia distributions are  
addressing other areas of the user space spectrum and Ubuntu already has a  
connotation of being accessible for users new to Linux.

Therefore, Ubuntu Studio could directly support those who are new to Linux.  
They might either have used a multimedia OS or may be transitioning from  
Windows or Mac.

Unsurprisingly, articulating an audience and a goal suddenly gave a clearly  
defined direction to the project that had been lacking and many of the  
questions we had simply had answers. Troy predicted this phenomenon to me  
over a year ago.

We would certainly appreciate any feedback on this subject.


Regards,
ScottL
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