DeRose: Designing pro creative apps (Part 1-3)

> So a person cannot take the name "Ubuntu" without writing 10 lines about it's udnerpinnings and ideology and the various components it is made up of.

You are absolutely missing my point. I don't mean that at all.

This isn't about underpinnings. It's about the Unix wars all over again. It's a great companion piece to today's article where Google says "Android is the Linux desktop dream come true".

In short, no it is not. Rather than having a whole ecosystem with many different parts filling different niches but in general part of the same thing, we have segmentation and fragmentation. That's not good.

Just FYI -- Android is just Linux, not GNU/Linux, because the only GNU component Android uses is GCC.

It's going to be pretty damn exhausting when you accidentally plug in the wrong thing and it starts importing 8gb of stuff you don't want.

There's a difference between streamlining and forcing.

it sounds like this application needs and 'import all from directory' (with a clickable option, possibly on by default that imports from subdirectories as well)

Okay, but is the import a modal popup, in which case its interfering and annoying? Or is it a background task I'm not aware of in which case I end up with data corruption on insert/remove? Or is it a thing that has an unobtrusive progress meter that I forget about most of the time with the same result?

I'm just not convinced that "do stuff without asking the user" generally works, because the user is not mentally engaged, and errors result.

I'm very much invested in "make it as simple as possible for the user to do what they want." For example, inserting cards could present window-corner icons, and clicking on them could trigger import, with another action (rightlick menu?) offering status and cancel, or similar.

Please do not put words in my mouth I never said. I said that the idea of novacut was quite revolutionary. I also said that no code for novacut has been written. Where is novacut? I know that you've written dmedia, but didn't say you hadn't written any code for it. I never once called you an idiot OR an alcoholic.

I said that the idea of giving some random guy who says he has ruined his personal finances working fulltime on an open source app is a very bad idea. Clearly that shows a lack of responsibiliy yet very strong convictions on your own part. How do I know you won't use those $$$ to go pay down your own debt and then disappear? I don't and by nature, I'm sceptical of people who say they will do things without accountability. Open source / Free software people are often very big proponents of transparency. I find it almost repulsive that you're going about it asking for donations this way. It sounds an awful lot like pan handling. Now if you were to say setup a novacut non-profit (difficult) or something through the Software in the Public Interest (free for you to do) to solicit donations that could be:
- Tracked
- Accounted for
- Claimed on tax forms as donations to a non-profit

I might actually even give you money. No seriously, my main beef is with the way you've went about things and the ridiculous claims (you already are better than final cut) to get media juice. It sounds like a snake oil salesman. If that was all incorrect and I am an a$$ (very likely), I apologize, however I still stand by everything previously said. You are going about asking for handouts the completely wrong way.

When I said you have 0 lines of code, it was referring to novacut, which still seems to be a theoretical piece of software. Sorry if this upset you.

Please read my response to jderose. Novacut has 0 lines of released code and he is doing things like soliciting donations of $5000 for a BBQ where you have to pay for your own flight. I'm sorry, but as a long time open source user and small time contributor, this doesn't sit right. dmedia is good stuff, but novacut still has 0 lines of released code until he proves me wrong.

Um, yes, it *does* actually work like that in the real world. My example was my own personal experience with Macromedia Director. Proprietary companies like Adobe are real pains about coming up with their own asset formats that aren't open (e.g. INDD, AI, etc. etc.). You work with the free tool, it'll use an open format, so at least when you're a college senior trying to put together a portfolio of work you slaved over during your freshman and sophmore years, prospective employers will actually be able to open and view your work! (Yes, Director.)

The skillset loss is a huge, huge, huge hit as well. And yes, this also happens in the real world. I know an artist who still uses Macromedia Freehand, because it's what they're most efficient with, but they're going through awful pains to continue using it as you might imagine!

The $$ issue isn't a key issue for professionals as the two above, no. The ongoing upgrade fees are just the cherry on top of the 'haha, sucker!' ice cream sundae for them. You need a tool to get your job done, yeah of course. It makes you 20% more efficient and costs $1K, sure that's worth it. $1k every year or two? Maybe. Until the product is inevitably dropped or screwed up in such a way you've got little option but to have to relearn something else and involuntarily have to completely overhaul your workflow in the middle of a key project? Yeah, not so much.

The initial cost and ongoing fees is absolutely a key issue for educational institutions... we had *two* labs on campus that had Photoshop, and of course it was the lab you could never get access to because the hours were bad and when it was open it was overcrowded. Forget about giving pre-college students legal access to Adobe tools via a school system! Even today many primary and secondary schools are lucky to even have one computer lab for their students.