Messages

511

Users / Re: Letter to the Community: LinuxMCE 0810 - The Cold Honest Reality

« on: July 02, 2009, 10:15:53 pm »

If someone would like to contribute, he will find a way to do so. But don't expect to get the award, before you have something done at all.

The only reward with projects such as these is the self-satisfaction of having contributed something, and the experience that one gains. Anyone who is striving for any other form of reward, whether it is money, respect from the devs and community, etc, is in it for the wrong reasons – plain and simple.

From what I've read no one here is asking for a free reward. The gist of the problem raised by other people is that the initial time investment required (lets call it the "down payment") to make meaningful contributions to this project for a newcomer is too high (compared to other projects). This, they say, is turning away people from the project who's time could otherwise be harnessed.

The devs, on the other hand, appear to disagree; they think the down payment is reasonable, and though they are stretched thin, they are prepared to continue without the help of the less skilled who are unwilling to pay the down payment.

Tim and others are suggesting that the project could be reorganized slightly to make it easier for newcomers to contribute, to decrease the down payment, and to ultimately make the devs' lives easier (wouldn’t that be a good thing, if people started coming out of the woodwork to contribute because it was so easy and fun to do so?) But Tim needs the devs to be on board with the idea for it to have any chance of succeeding at reorganizing things. It’s not that Tim doesn’t want to contribute at all; it’s that he doesn’t want to waste his time trying to do something that the devs have indicated they are opposed to.

512

Users / Re: Letter to the Community: LinuxMCE 0810 - The Cold Honest Reality

« on: July 01, 2009, 10:00:09 pm »

Please allow me to juxtapose two quotes:

IF more managemt is needed, then management people just need to start DOING it and not TALKING about it. IF financial gurus think money would help, then they need to raise that money and not just say it is needed and so on.

Before you cry, "well just do all that stuff and stop complaining", you need to know that all that stuff falls into one or both of two categories.  The first requires cooperation from the key developers (how can a graphic designer contribute to a GUI if he doesn't code, or how can a PR person describe to the press about where the project is going without a clear plan being agreed?). 

Similarly, how can a financial guru raise money for the project if there is no clear plan for him to present to potential investors? I think Tim's point is that there are roadblocks which are preventing people from DOING certain things, and there needs to be TALK about those roadblocks so that they can be identified and removed.

513

Users / Re: Letter to the Community: LinuxMCE 0810 - The Cold Honest Reality

« on: July 01, 2009, 05:50:05 pm »

And before you say any sort of retort resorting to elitism...

* Those of us doing the work, tend to respect others who also dig in and do work too.

* Those of us doing the work write the code. He who writes the code HAS THE FINAL SAY.

This is because we're down in the trenches, and we choose to give away the fruits of our work for others. There is an unwritten rule here that those who recieve should also give in kind.

So, when you sit there on top of the mount and preach that "you should do this and this and this and this..." guess what? it sounds like you're preaching from the mount.

tmoore, it is THAT reason why I am ascerbic to you. You have done absolutely nothing to gain credibility in this community. If you want your incredibly assertive statements to carry any weight, you need to change this and get down here in the dirt with us.

And the sheer fact you just back-pedaled on your last thread really did nothing to help your credibility. Just a tip.

-Thom

With all due respect Thom, I believe it is possible to do work on a project such as linuxmce without writing code or documentation (or being in the trenches as you call it). I see Tim’s writing on this forum as doing work; there is value to proposing/discussing organizational ideas even if you don’t see them as good ones. There are very good reasons why large successful projects have some people dealing with macroscopic elements and other people writing code. The “overseers” are often viewed as bureaucratic deadweight, and a lot of them are, but there are good ones with job functions that actually are important.

514

Users / Re: Letter to the Community: LinuxMCE 0810 - The Cold Honest Reality

« on: June 30, 2009, 08:48:02 pm »

This thread started as an expression of frustration due to the situation with resources. The devs seem to have indicated they are not open to a change in direction or organization. I think it must therefore be accepted that there will be no relief for the devs, since to expect a different result without a change in approach would be insane (as defined by Einstein).

With this in mind, are there examples of wildly successful open source projects that are as big as linuxmce, that rely exclusively on self-motivated developers, and that have 5 developers pulling everything together? I’m not aware of any, so please enlighten me if there are. If there are not, what makes the devs think that linuxmce will be an exception? I am assuming there is a desire to make linuxmce wildly successful.

The way I see it, the devs can continue on the current path and achieve 50 units of progress in the short term and 1,000 units of progress in the long term. Or, they can increase their documentation/training efforts in the short term (at the expense of development efforts) to achieve 5 units of progress in the short term and 10,000 units of progress in the long term.

It's an accessibility investment that is urgently needed. If the investment is made to make this project accessible to the 100s of people who have 1-10 spare hours a week,  the invested time will pay for itself over and over and over.

I urge the developers to open their minds to this.

515

Users / Re: iPhone/iPod Touch Orbiter?

« on: June 17, 2009, 09:20:00 pm »

I'd contribute $40

My iPhone 3GS 32GB is on its way 

Am I allowed to ask if development will be going ahead, and if so when it will begin? 

516

Users / Re: Can't download the Windows Orbiter installer

« on: June 11, 2009, 10:54:00 pm »

710 windows orbiter works fine for me (haven't tested all functions though).

517

Users / Re: Android Orbiter

« on: June 11, 2009, 04:14:12 pm »

My next mobile phone will be whatever linuxmce has the best support for -there's talk of developing for both android and the iphone. I'm willing to contribute $40 to one of these, but I prefer to wait to see which makes greater strides.

518

Users / Re: 710 install on M3N78-EM

« on: May 25, 2009, 10:09:35 pm »

I don't have a HDMI TV or Receiver so I have no way of testing its functionality, sorry.

519

Users / Re: 710 install on M3N78-EM

« on: May 25, 2009, 09:30:44 pm »

I ended up going with 810 since 710 was giving me piles of trouble. Aside from my Fiire remote not working and a few of my AVIs not playing, everything seems to be running smoothly.

Contrary to the wiki, I had to install restricted drivers before running the lmce install scripts.

520

Users / Re: 710 install on M3N78-EM

« on: May 21, 2009, 05:09:57 pm »

Hi,

Did you look at the Unrecognized NIC wiki?

What kind of NIC is it?

Yes, I checked it out. There's no kernel module available from what I can tell. I understand it's a Realtek 8211 chipset.

521

Users / Re: 710 install on M3N78-EM

« on: May 21, 2009, 05:07:24 pm »

If I go with option b), do I need to do the CD install?

I.e install kubuntu 0710, upgrade kernel so that I have onboard NIC and PCI NIC recognized, install linuxmce?

Or can I use the DVD install and upgrade the kernel after the whole process finishes? .

522

Users / 710 install on M3N78-EM

« on: May 21, 2009, 04:00:20 pm »

My onboard NIC is not supported under 710 without a kernel upgrade. What is the best/easiest way to install:

a) Install 2 PCI NIC, upgrade kernel, remove 1 PCI NIC
b) Install 1 PCI NIC, configure single NIC setup, upgrade kernel, switch to double NIC setup.

If a), what manual configuration is necessary following removing the PCI NIC?

I'm planning on giving 0810 a try in a few weeks but I don't have time at the moment to fiddle with an alpha release. My gf is patiently waiting for the mess of "computer guts" in the living room to get cleaned up

Thanks,

Dave

523

Users / Re: Strange diagonal distortion on divx files - not present when playing on Win MP

« on: April 30, 2009, 01:59:34 pm »

I think I'm having this issue or something similar to it. I'd call them diagonal clouds, not lines, and they look a bit like the northern lights. The divx movies play back in black and white, but the clouds have a single-colored hue that changes depending on the material.

It's fixed if I switch to xv. Problem is that the UI2-masked responsiveness is poor and movie playback is stutter-y with xv (opengl's much better), so I'm stuck switching to xv each time I want to watch certain DivX movies.

It's a fairly fresh build, you guys think a rebuild is worth it?

524

Users / Re: What softphone to use for external winxp client ?

« on: April 20, 2009, 07:20:04 pm »

Bulek,

Did you ever have any luck with this? I'm having a similar-sounding issue with registering my sip softphone from an outside pc. I've got no router between the core and my cable modem, I've disabled the firewall, set the appropriate ports to core_internal in the pluto-admin firewall settings. Asterisk CLI shows no indication that it is getting any registration requests (i've tried 'sip set debug')

I've tried SJphone and X-lite with the same results. I can ping the core from the remote pc, and 5060 is open.

I have no problem setting up softphones on the internal network.

Thanks,

Dave

525

Users / Re: automatically browse "movies" when going into videos?

« on: April 16, 2009, 05:53:24 pm »

Sorry for my ignorance, but is the implication that this is not worth the hassle? I too am facing the same issue with regards to WAF. If the video list could remember the filters which were last used that would be a big improvement.