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Subject: Re: Useful features

Re: Useful features

From: [IDC]Dragon <idc-dragon_at_gmx.de>
Date: Sun, 18 Apr 2004 19:17:24 +0200 (MEST)

> But, I don't understand why you try to make the jukebox speak, or play
> videos, whereas there are things more important to do. (so, it's just my
> point of view ;))

Being the author of voice UI and video, probably I should feel addressed?
Well, it's definitely your point of view what you consider important and
useful. (I fail to dig out the brilliant answer Björn recently wrote to a
similar posting, about development and schedule requests.)
Rockbox is an open source project, which has two degrees of freedom:
- You're free to download and use it (the often referred free-beer analogy)
- Anybody who feels like contributing to any end of it is free to do so (the
free-speech analogy)
There is no project master plan, no schedule, and also no limits except for
the hardware capabilities.

If you take me for a random example, I wrote the video part for the sheer
fun of it, and because it's a nice jardropper demo. Call it selfish, call it
showing off, think about it as you want. Frankly, I also don't use it
actively, however some people do. Since it's a plugin, it practically
doesn't take any resources in Rockbox itself. If you don't want it, you can
delete the file.
I wrote the voice UI because we have a number of blind users. (They probably
will write you a follow-up on what's useful). I happened to just had created
the necessary infrastructure (playing clips from memory) for the video
plugin. So I felt I would be the best candidate to help out there. Since I
increasingly want to use the box in the car, this and Talkbox was also a
feature for me.

> I've just checked the NoDo list, and I didn't saw those features that
> could
> be very useful:
> _ an option to check the size and other properties of a file or a
> directory
> _ an ID3 tag editor
> _ to move files from a directory to another one

Again, features are very subjective. I personally can't see me using any of
the above, file manipulation is way better done at a PC.

> I also saw those requests in the "requests list" and I'm surprised to see
> that those (useful) features are not in the rockbox firmware yet.

It's not there because nobody implemented them. As Björn put it, anybody
with the skills or the will to learn them is free to do so, maybe including
you.
We also have constant need for non-programming skills, like writing
documentation, doing usability and beta testing, specifying stringent UI
flows, etc.

> If you are able to make the box speak or play video, you are able to fix
> those features, aren't you ?

Nobody is good in implementing a feature for somebody else in his/her
precious free time.

> Have a nice day all :)

Yes, you too, no offence was intended in any of the above.

Jörg

-- 
NEU : GMX Internet.FreeDSL
Ab sofort DSL-Tarif ohne Grundgebühr: http://www.gmx.net/info
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Received on 2004-04-18

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