July 10, 2008
13:56
First off was LinkedIn, I hardly use it to be honest I know I probably should do more; then there is Last.fm something I sort of use, I say sort of because I'm in the lap of the gods when it comes to plugins that register (or not) my listening habits; then Facebook, something I very rarely use now as it just seems really immature to me; then there is Twitter, I use this a fair amount although that may change; why would it change? Because of identi.ca that's why.
Twitter has a fairly good ecosystem around it allowing developers access to its APIs etc, which means loads of additional apps etc. Poor identi.ca has a very small eco-system at the minute but that is only because it is very new, and I'm sure that will change. What am I saying it already is! Ryan Paul has made one of the first big steps, he has created Gwibber. So what's so good about it then? well for starters it's one of the first if not THE first identi.ca desktop clients, secondly it allows you to use all of the following Social/Web2.0 sites in addition to identi.ca - Twitter, Jaiku, Facebook, and Digg. It's great fro cross posting on services - write once and post to Twitter, identi.ca and Jaiku at the same time.
So for all you Geeko lovers I present
There are packages for openSUSE 10.3, 11.0 and Factory (11.1). Please try it out and let me know of any issues, or
better yet file them here. Enjoy and remember it's good to be social, but even better to be a sociable
geeko 
July 19, 2008
11:50
July 20, 2008
18:23
July 21, 2008
11:23
Original photo by Roger Whittaker
Hopefully I haven't offended anyone by the religious connotations, if I have then I'm sorry but from this side of the fence it's fairly amusing
19:33
July 23, 2008
13:09
As anyone that has filed a bug with openSUSE/Novell knows, it is done in Bugzilla. The problem is it is a web only interface with no easy way of dealing with bugs apart from through a web browser. This is not a failing of the software as it was designed this way to ensure global reach, if you have a browser (not many desktops don't, and even mobile devices have them) you can file a bug. Almost all bugtracking services are web only, for that exact reason - Launchpad, Mantis, Trac, JIRA etc. Bugzilla is by far the most common, as not only do openSUSE/Novell use it but so do RedHat, Mozilla (funny that), the upstream Kernel, GNOME, KDE, Apache, Eclipse, OpenOffice.org and many others.
My itch is for a desktop client to Bugzilla and the other bugtrackers. Ideally the other bug trackers could be enabled/disabled via a plugin system. If you think about it the Bugbot in IRC can interface with all of these so why can’t we from one app? I first started thinking about it when Lamby created his Debian BTS applet. I spoke to him again about this and my itch at LRL on Saturday. By the way, shame on you Ubuntu for taking his applet modifying it and not feeding back the changes! This provides some of the function I would like to see, as in the main app would minimise to the tray and only show the applet. From this you could access a subset of functions and also get notifications. On the topic of notifications, one item I would like to see this client – which I’ll call bugthra (a play on Godzilla’s foe Mothra) but not set in stone – deal with is not having to have your inbox battered with bug notification e-mails, yes I know I can set up filters but that’s not the point! Instead you get a notification bubble notifying you and possibly also some form of icon change.
So what features would I like to see? In no specific order my thoughts are the following:
• Search - I think this is kind of crucial. It’s always good practise to search for similar bugs before filing a new one
Being able to save searches etc would be
handy.• Modifiable views – I’m kind of thinking along the lines of being able to have a window/tab for “Bugs I’ve filed” and any other custom view a user wishes, removing selected fields from view etc.
• Creating/Modifying/Following bugs – Duh, one of the main reasons for the app. Hopefully an intuitive interface to facilitate simple filing/modifying of bugs. Following bugs is also pretty key, as there are times when a specific bug perks one’s interest and curiosity. Also you may experience the issue but have no further info to provide.
• Offline facility – not sure how feasible this would be, but certainly falls into the “would be nice” category. Having something similar to a DVCS would be handy and enable bug work whilst offline. User connects to the bugzilla server, and on initial connection does a sort of check out of bugs that the user already is dealing with and stores it locally (SQLite/embedded MySQL/etc). Any additional changes are stored locally and checked back in periodically (connection permitting).
• Ideally cross platform – Again not vital, but to enable maximum uptake being desktop agnostic would be ideal. If I had to choose one, I would possibly say Gtk because I spend most of my time in a GNOME desktop. I will admit I have limited knowledge as to how a Qt works on GNOME and other desktops.
I have no real knowledge about the APIs available, but I believe they’re all there waiting to be used. There is currently a proprietry application called Deskzilla that does do a fair amount of what I’m talking about which Open Source project contributors can obtain a free license providing they meet specific requirements. I would like to see a FOSS competitor, which can beat it
So please
chip in a scratch this itch if you can, would be great if it could be taken up as part of the next HackWeek. As a reward
I will donate some of my acquired openSUSE goodies, either a geeko or usb stick, to the first two major contributions. I am also willing to create an official project with associated bits and
bobs if people think it plausible. Either leave a comment, mail me or catch me on IRC (I normally go by the nick of
FunkyPenguin)July 29, 2008
22:59
Why? Well it's Free and Open, that includes the source
and it is under some serious development of which you are more than welcome to join in. Gwibber is now on IRC - #gwibber on irc.arstechnica.com. I have packaged it for a while, but had some weird issues with webkit/glade/cairo, but that is all in the past! Get Gwibber for
openSUSE now, I have fixed the 1click so that it doesn't re-install python (well I think I have). If you do hit any issues remember to file a bug.Obligatory Screenshot showing tweets/dents/jaiks, guess which is which:
