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List:       kde-promo
Subject:    Re: [kde-promo] Article about Baloo
From:       Àlex Fiestas <afiestas () kde ! org>
Date:       2014-02-19 4:16:14
Message-ID: 1701132.9r6ZvGZubQ () minibad
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On Wednesday 19 February 2014 01:04:24 Aaron J. Seigo wrote:
> 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.
Or can help us to communicate that they are the same thing bringing all the 
negative things stated on this thread many times.

> 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:
We don't need to build anything behind Baloo (or nepomuk for that matter) 
since most users should not be aware that it event exists. Bugs shall be 
reported under "Search and tagging" or something similar, and baloo will be 
kept as the library (where it makes sense to change names since we developers, 
are able to understand the difference between projects).

> "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.
Well, we can argue on the communication but the fact is that Nepomuk has been 
a problem, and the solution it would appear is remove it.

> > 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.
But that is what we have been selling for the last years.

> 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.
Terms like "end users" are confusing. The end users I have in mind won't read 
the dot. The ones that do (from my perspective) we have been feeding them 
semantic for years. We need to know dot demographics to be able to properly 
talk about this.

> > 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
Sure, so does the other thing.
> > 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). 
We have no data about this but pure subjective information, so we can't know.

> 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.

I still see no need for any dot article to be honest, and I see no reason to 
continue doing promo about Nepomuk or Baloo. Those are technical terms that 
nobody but interested parties should know. We have stated many many times that 
they "user" should not know about Nepomuk yet we keep doing promo about it.

My take on all this is adding a paragraph in the 4.13 release notes explaining 
the new goodies, how fast search is now and how awesome we are. In the 
meanwhile we can keep business as usual on planet.kde.org which is (under my 
subjective PoV) more targeted to nerds/geeks.

Cheers.


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