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List:       kde-promo
Subject:    Re: [kde-promo] Article about Baloo
From:       "Aaron J. Seigo" <aseigo () kde ! org>
Date:       2014-02-19 0:04:24
Message-ID: 2094733.4er49HvPvj () freedom
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On Tuesday, February 18, 2014 22:59:57 Àlex Fiestas wrote:
> On Tuesday 18 February 2014 21:09:21 Jos Poortvliet wrote:
> > To me, it sounds like a 'have your cake and eat it too' solution. I always
> > like those. The article already mentions that the API's and widgets are
> > simply taken from Nepomuk. For application developers and many users they
> > are the FACE of Nepomuk. So, we kept Nepomuk. The backend is changed -
> > from
> > Virtuoso to an abstraction layer called Baloo.
> > 
> > Sounds like good spin if you ask me ;-)
> 
> Technically this is a lie, their api has been changed 100% (not a single
> line compatible), virtuoso and Baloo are nothing alike. 

Yes, the API has changed. This happens sometimes in projects.

If Baloo is meant to displace Nepomuk (it is) then it is not simply another 
product but a successor .. and keeping naming and some level of visual design 
continuity (e.g. not changing the icon / logo people have come to recognize) 
can help us communicate that.

The widget and their API has remained the same, and the user-facing 
functionality is essentially unchanged. The underlying storage/retrieval API 
has changed, however; this is, as the article already notes, to address the 
desire for a more streamlined API in that area. (Nepomuk was indeed very 
complex for querying, e.g.).

So the question is how to best communicate that set of improvements, which may 
not be "change the name" since all the work is still ahead of us from that 
point. The idea that changing the name will communicate "stuff that needed to 
be changed has changed in a positive manner" is not true; it requires putting 
effort into stuffing meaning into that new name with months (or, more 
realistically, years) of communication effort. Without a name change, we still 
have work ahead of us, but the communication path can be a lot easier:

"This is the replacement for the old Nepomuk. It fills the same needs Nepomuk 
has been servicing. The widgets and their API have been retained. The 
underlying store/retrieve API has changed, however, and for the better .. 
here's how: <...>"

With just a couple sentences, we are able to skip the entire "what is baloo?" 
thing and get right into the heart of things. It also allows KDE to save some 
face; Phoronix was not entirely wrong in criticizing KDE for tossing out a 
major public R&D investment.

> Baloo is not even semantic in the way Nepomuk is.

This is relevant to nobody that uses it. If Nepomuk's particular semantic 
features had caught on wildly and there were tons of applications using them 
deeply, this would be a valid concern. That didn't happen, however. 

For end users, most of them see "Nepomuk" and think "desktop search" or "file 
indexing". ~nobody knows that we use(d) Nepomuk in Plasma's Activities, for 
instance.

> Besides you will be able to have both, nepomuk and baloo running (for
> compatibility reasons).

"you will be able to have both Nepomuk 1 and Nepomuk 2 running, for 
compatibility reasons" <-- it works just as well

> Also, take into account that Phoronix (that might or might not have more
> media outreach than the dot) has already published a link to an email where
> we explain the facts, creating now a "good promo article" in the dot might
> be too little too late.

Phoronix is not *that* influential (thankfully). A Dot article would be a good 
start in addressing issues, but it would also need several follow ups over the 
course of the year in the form of widely spread blog entries, articles from 
others in the press, etc. Muktware has already stepped up in this area. 
Getting a message across takes repetition and time (in addition to a good 
message); and unless Phoronix decides to re-publish that article every week 
we've got the upper hand there.

-- 
Aaron J. Seigo

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