[Qgis-user] Fwd: QGis and developpement version

[Alex Mandel]

On 03/17/2013 11:50 AM, Andre Joost wrote:
> Am 17.03.2013 18:08, schrieb Anita Graser:
>
>>
>> OSGeo4W is certainly a little more involved. On the other hand -
>> without wanting to sound arrogant - I don't think that non-tech people
>> should be using a nightly build. In my opinion, having a little more
>> difficult installer is kind of a protection mechanism.
>
> It could be helpful if the "Desktop Quick Install" includes a checkbox
> for QGIS Master, with a warning message if necessary.
>
> The annoying thing withQGIS Lisboa is that bugs like the bad shapefile
> encoding still fed up many end-users.
>
> And for the Ubuntu world, I think there should be something more
> comfortable than typing commands in a terminal window. That's simply not
> state-of-the-art in times of smartphones and tablet PCs.
>
> Greetings,
> André Joost
>
>


All, I think we can solve some of this. For Ubuntu(and similar) I 
propose, and will help write, a short script probably as a .deb that a 
user can download and double click. The script would detect 
version/variant of ubuntu and install the correct ppa/archive in 
/etc/apt/ and trigger an install.

OSGeo4w I suggest someone file a ticket and perhaps a patch to add a 
quick install for Master.

Now addressing some of the original concerns. Once a release is made 
users should never expect new features to be added. If there is ample 
developer time a bugfix release may be expected. For 2.0 it has been 
clearly stated that all dev effort is now focused on 2.0 and it would 
only be delayed if time was spent backporting fixes to a 1.8.x release. 
If extra devs join or funding is provided I'm sure that could be 
provided. This is a reality of a large project that requires complex 
compiling.

I don't see any of this being out of line with how most FOSS tools work, 
I think the biggest difference is that we actually package the dev 
version and people know about it (Most projects just tell you there is a 
repo, have fun). That creates some mis-concpetions that it's ready for 
daily use, when the real answer is maybe on a good day. The reality is 
basic to general users are not encouraged to use Master/Dev for daily 
work, and the bar for that is, if you aren't computer savy enough to 
install it you might not want to be using it. Why, well an update might 
break it, code might change inside that makes some process unrepeatable, 
it's harder to deploy across an org and all be on the same version, etc....

Yes sadly that means you have to wait for some features or find ways to 
work around some.

Thanks,
Alex