Extras enabled out-of-the-box on MeeGo-Harmattan device?

[Jaffa]

After a long time, Nokia enabled Extras for out-of-the-box on Maemo 5, meaning that users would see a large range of software when going to Application Manager.

I think this has been crucial to the success of the N900 - certainly, if I get a device and go to its "get more software" app/page and see only a few apps, I think the ecosystem is dead.

The community put in place a QA system to ensure quality; I think this has also worked (relatively) well to prevent major obvious breakages getting through.

So, the question is, should Nokia keep Extras enabled out-of-the-box on the MeeGo-Harmattan device later this year?

[Lullen]

I think they should, just to show they appriciate the community

[Crashdamage]

Yes, absolutely! If it's not enabled someone responsible at Nokia should be fired!

[qgil]

Thank you for starting this discussion. It is a good time to have this discussion.

Jaffa, you have pointed out the positive aspects, but let me remind you about other indirect consequences that brought some extra hassle:

- Having Extras enabled out of the box has put more pressure in the community QA process, that several times has been criticized as too heavy.

- Having Extras enabled out of the box has put more pressure in cases like emulators, FM Radio, Chromium...

I'm not saying this is good or bad, and I'm not even saying that these problems wouldn't exist if Extras wouldn't be not enabled by default. But there is indeed a link.

An option would be not to offer Extras enables out of the box but keep promoting great Extras apps in the official Nokia channels, like it has been the case in Maemo 5 with http://maemo.nokia.com/maemo-select/ and others.

[slender]

Hmm.
Now when extras is enabled out of box in N900 it means that QA should interest Nokia also. End users do not understand where programs come. They only see that device is from Nokia and programs come also from Nokia. And if quality is not perfect then they blame Nokia.

So I´m not sure if Nokia should enable it by default. Maybe disable and give user option to enable it with warning and when installing stuff then also warning that Nokia doesn´t give any support or promises that programs work.

Currently for example widgets/im protocols and programs that install daemon to background seem to be high risk programs that should undergo much much stricter QA than single app or theme.*

*One way to decrease incompatibility of new fw and apps in extras is to release devel fw. And this seems to be case with Meego?

.edit
gqil's idea about promoting good apps to official Nokia channels sounds good to me.

[Jaffa]

- Having Extras enabled out of the box has put more pressure in the community QA process, that several times has been criticized as too heavy.

Well, now that we've seen the Ovi QA process, it's perhaps time to loosen up the maemo.org one ;-)

- Having Extras enabled out of the box has put more pressure in cases like emulators, FM Radio, Chromium...

I'm truly interested if there's a way we can find out whether having Extras enabled out-of-the-box had any bearing on the emulation and Chromium issue. The latter, I'm almost certainly, was found through some kind of regular Googling (or, given the suit, Binging) for "chromium download". That'd've led to maemo.org and a C&D.

The former (emulators) was perhaps something to do with the visibility of a *.nokia.com domain showing off a video of them.

All software has bugs, the FM Radio case didn't cause any longterm damage (wasn't it fixed with a reboot?). Would an Ovi Store developer trying to do something similar either a) have had the issue picked up during Ovi QA or b) had more access to Nokia engineers when designing the software? There were some Nokians helping yerga during the development on maemo-*, but it seemed a little ad hoc.

An interesting idea would be to look at the two classes of problems found there (major loss of functionality side-effect and C&D letters) are find other ways of mitigating them, rather than just turning Extras off. Perhaps:


Any application which integrates with hardware (microphone, FM radio, Bluetooth, GPS) goes through a more rigourous process; perhaps including some official Nokia input? (Or they go into a different repo?)
The maemo.org legal situation is, as you know, being discussed.


Are there other classes of problem which need to be looked at?

An option would be not to offer Extras enables out of the box but keep promoting great Extras apps in the official Nokia channels, like it has been the case in Maemo 5 with http://maemo.nokia.com/maemo-select/ and others.

I'll do a survey of the two less-deeply-involved-in-the-community people who have N900s to see if they've even heard of Maemo Select; or even maemo.org/downloads/ - or whether they've just used the "Ovi Store" link and the Application Manager.

I really don't expect people in a more mainstream device to go Googling to find where to get extra software from, and - TBH - I think placing the bets that Ovi for MeeGo(ish) platforms will be a roaring success is, perhaps, a little optimistic. People are used to integrated experiences now, having Extras enabled out-of-the-box goes a long way towards that.

[Jaffa]

So I´m not sure if Nokia should enable it by default. Maybe disable and give user option to enable it with warning and when installing stuff then also warning that Nokia doesn´t give any support or promises that programs work.

Shipped but disabled? If so, can we only have one single enormous warning rather than obtrusive messages on each install. Annoyingly, the code to do that was even available for the Diablo HAM (cos qwerty12 and I submitted the patch); but it's harder to do with the current UI.

[qwerty12]

Not enabling Extras OOTB in MeeGo/Harmattan/whatever it's called is, plainly, an insult towards the community.

The QA process that maemo.org has now was put in place to prove to Nokia that enabling Extras OOTB would be safe, that only tested software would make it through.

IMO, it's succeeded: The Testing Squad are good at finding issues re. optification etc. and Venomrush was quick to post about sio2interactive's gaming of the system.

Contrast this to the Ovi store, enabled by default, run by Nokia, where non-optified apps have gotten through a few times.

[fatalsaint]

I am in favor of keeping Extras enabled. But I still retain that we need to perfect our processes for extras... especially including a way to remove apps that become broken after-the-fact by the maintainer, as well as a better testing system (or at least, some way for people to vote on testing directly from the device easily).

[timoph]

I'd like to see extras at least offered as an optional source for software if not enabled by default. I really don't want to see all the community effort hidden from the users. that said it should be discussed what can be offered to the users. personally I find it a bit weird that all the users are offered custom kernels, etc from extras. I think that kind of packages belong in devel.

about the community QA. I think the problem is not the weight of extras QA but the lack of community QA testers. time to live for packages in testing would be useful IMO. if package is not promoted within a month remove it from testing.

[johnel]

When I got my n900 I played with it for a little while. One of my first thoughts was "Cool! What other stuff can I play with?"

Went to the App Manager to see what was out there and then started downloading stuff.

Users take it for granted that other apps are available and expect to "play with stuff".

The last thing you need is to expect users to enable or configure something - reasonable defaults are expected.

I think Nokia are determined to lose the "premium" Smartphone market and seem to think making money from down-loadable software is a bad idea!

Nokia's misunderstanding of the smartphone market is becoming rather funny.

[slender]

Not enabling Extras OOTB in MeeGo/Harmattan/whatever it's called is, plainly, an insult towards the community.
Why?

The QA process that maemo.org has now was put in place to prove to Nokia that enabling Extras OOTB would be safe, that only tested software would make it through.We have just touched iceberg here. After meego devices start going mainstream at full speed I´m a bit afraid that it´s going to be total clusterfck here in testing. You can easily take advantage of it and widgets seem to be one problem.

IMO, it's succeeded: The Testing Squad are good at finding issues re. optification etc. and Venomrush was quick to post about sio2interactive's gaming of the system.Optification is one of the minor issue here. I´m talking about memory issues that can be noticed after days of usage. Those issues could hit devices performance slowly. First you do not even notice that device start to slow down until eventually you end up rebooting it. Moreover most important issue to spot on this device is problems that releate to powe issues like cpu state wakes etc.

Yes it has worked but do we have enough know-how to spot all the memory or cpu wake up problems when meego hits the shelves and programs start to come in hundreds?

Contrast this to the Ovi store, enabled by default, run by Nokia, where non-optified apps have gotten through a few times.It has been pretty horrible experience and i think that Nokia should first really see how bad quality of apps hits their image. They have all the resources and capability to handle QA (oh dear that twitter widget and optification problems...). BUT you probably understand that if (and they have) nokia enables extras by default it means that QA is also Nokia´s problem and then they should have permission to remove anything they want immediately from repositories. Right now I think that people take bit too loosely how quality of apps affect to the image of Nokia and Maemo.

[qgil]

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying we should do A or B. I'm just helping drawing the picture, like Jaffa and others are doing. And a little background: I have invested as much as time as anybody else to have Extras enabled by default in Maemo 5.

Short answer to Jaffa: no matter how you put it and how it goes with Ovi, the fact is that having an official Nokia image released with a community repository supported by default and not controlled directly by Nokia puts more pressure on Nokia and the community.

Ovi publishers agree to certain terms, including the possibility of getting their app removed if Nokia decides so. In the case of Extras everything is based on good faith, from the developers, the maemo.org admins, the council... Until now such good faith has existed and the cases brought in the Maemo 5 context have been handled very well. But nobody knows what will be the context of MeeGo-Harmattan, the community developers, the council members, the maemo.org admins (well, the latter is more predictable). :) I'm just saying that the relationship is quite unique and delicate, as opposed to the known model of Ovi Store clearly controlled by Nokia with agreed written terms and conditions.

[attila77]

- Having Extras enabled out of the box has put more pressure in the community QA process, that several times has been criticized as too heavy.

- Having Extras enabled out of the box has put more pressure in cases like emulators, FM Radio, Chromium...

I'm not saying this is good or bad, and I'm not even saying that these problems wouldn't exist if Extras wouldn't be not enabled by default. But there is indeed a link.


Can you elaborate on the link, especially the latter ? It sounds like ’security through obscurity at best’, especially considering how the emulator story got into the limelight. Plus, nothing prevents Nokia from participating in the community repository processes, on a a) policy level, b) expressing concerns about particular packages/thumbing packages down.

As for the QA process being hindered by it, that’s IMO almost ridiculous. All the ’fuss’ about heavy QA was exactly because Extras was interesting to developers as the repository that is available to the broad public by default. Had it not been enabled and been established as a solid source of software, nobody would care and would stick with extras-devel or 3rd party repositories, rendering Extras pretty much pointless, or at best on the level it is on Diablo.


An option would be not to offer Extras enables out of the box but keep promoting great Extras apps in the official Nokia channels, like it has been the case in Maemo 5 with http://maemo.nokia.com/maemo-select/ and others.

This is worse than ghettoisation, it is essentially the death sentence to Extras, as that officially means ’Extras is the home to apps that are so crappy we don’t want them in Nokia channels’ and is on the border of sounding like ’all we want from the OSS dev community is good apps to boost our own channels’, which is really really bad from an OSS perspective. Maemo Select is dead/pointless. Ovi made absolutely no publicly visible progress in accomodating community applications, to the level that we have received ZERO feedback from them. A strong, healthy, independent Extras IS the only viable channel for community apps at the moment. If that is not seen as potential and something to cherish, but just a nuisance and liability, I’m slightly worried about the future of the platform as a bona fide member of the Open Source platform family.

[Jaffa]

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying we should do A or B. I'm just helping drawing the picture, like Jaffa and others are doing. And a little background: I have invested as much as time as anybody else to have Extras enabled by default in Maemo 5.

Indeed, thanks for your original efforts and discussing it now. However, I do echo Attila's concerns to an extent - that it's not been seen as a commercial benefit to Nokia and "just" a headache is worrying. We are probably putting words in your mouth there, though.

Ovi publishers agree to certain terms, including the possibility of getting their app removed if Nokia decides so. In the case of Extras everything is based on good faith, from the developers, the maemo.org admins, the council...

OK, an obvious answer is "Nokia can remove any app if they say so". Assuming we want to find a ground somewhere other than that extreme (although AFAIK, every time Nokia has requested a package to be pulled, it has) are there any things which you think the community do which would make Nokia happier; and ensure that Extras continued to be enabled as the best place to get a broad range of engaging, quality software?

Explicit terms which developers sign up to would be something you've mentioned; if a developer clicking "I accept" on uploading a package and/or signing up reduces Nokia's legal (rather than brand) concerns, I don't see that as too onerous.

However, I'm just saying that the relationship is quite unique and delicate, as opposed to the known model of Ovi Store clearly controlled by Nokia with agreed written terms and conditions.

BTW, has the Twitter applet been pulled from Ovi? That's the most obvious example of a broken and extremely, and immediately, damaging to the end-user experience in Ovi. What about the unoptified packages which can damage the brand in terms of SSUs?

If these packages had made it through Extras QA (and large unoptified packages almost certainly wouldn't; the speed with which the Twitter applet flaws were noticed suggest it wouldn't either), I think the Council would have made the decision to pull them from the repo.

[qgil]

Indeed, thanks for your original efforts and discussing it now. However, I do echo Attila's concerns to an extent - that it's not been seen as a commercial benefit to Nokia and "just" a headache is worrying. We are probably putting words in your mouth there, though.

Well, yes you are. :)

I'm playing evil's advocate in this Sunday night (in fact Monday here now) as a community member reminding the extra hassle this Extras-enabled-by-default has caused to the community in the form of extra pressure from Nokia. If the posts here reflect the sentiment of the community then this is useful information.

Nokia sees Extras as a benefit more than a worry. This is why it's enabled by default in Maemo 5 (it wasn't before), this is why the MeeGo-Harmattan application manager and security framework know about its existence and this is why we have been pushing the Extras concept (community QA included) to the MeeGo project.

The "just a headache" goes more for the community than for Nokia. I haven't heard anybody at Nokia questioning the current setup, and I will ask about feelings and current situation for MeeGo-Harmattan.

If you think the collateral headaches of being enabled by default are worth considering the benefits then, as said, this is useful information.

[Jaffa]

[Words in mouth] Well, yes you are. :)

Sorry :-)

If you think the collateral headaches of being enabled by default are worth considering the benefits then, as said, this is useful information.

I very strongly believe the benefits outweigh the disadvantages. But then I've not received a C&D letter yet :-/

[ZogG]

i think even if there would be no more extras, it wouldn't be a problem to make our own repo for them.

[qgil]

http://wiki.maemo.org/Extras is already the community's "own repo for them", no need to think on a new one.

[evad]

I am probably looking at this from a bystander perspective, but what I see here is that Maemo is clearly transforming from cool and hack'ish mobile distro into more established and "serious" MeeGo OS, that is keen to attract the masses, hence "hack'ish" label isn't very welcome. This is why we get this discussion here: unofficial community powered extras vs. official Nokia's Ovi.

Personally, I wouldn't mind to see Ovi Store as a main source of 3rd party apps, but the trouble in my eyes is that... it hasn't got them. Apps, I mean. In fact, I hate HAM for its slowness, but this is the only way to get something fresh. If I could see extras-approved (aka maemo-select approved) apps straight in Ovi Store, I'd be more than happy to use it more often. But it simply doesn't happen. I'm not the one who answers "why?" question on that, as I'm writing this from bystander pov.

One more thought on QA side of extras. Although I've signed up for testing squad, I admit I didn't put much effort into this. Main reason is that I have my work and personal life aside of Maemo, which clearly isn't helping to get involved more. However I think this is important point - community don't get paid for their involvment, it's their free time when they get into it, hence we can't always expert QA will be as quick and good as we wanted it to be, and facing potential explosion of new apps once MeeGo devices start hitting public, community-powered QA might simply be not enough.

I don't think there's golden solution to this situation, but what I'd definitely would like to see is another step of "promotion" of extras apps to Ovi Store. So the process might look like: devel -> testing -> extras -> ovi, with more paid and dedicated QA testers (probably directly from Ovi) involved in the process. They could hand-pick apps from testing repo and help promote/demote in order to get ball rolling much quicker.

Don't know how T& of Ovi fit in such approach but anyway I see that as an option to consider by both sides.

[dneary]

Now when extras is enabled out of box in N900 it means that QA should interest Nokia also. End users do not understand where programs come. They only see that device is from Nokia and programs come also from Nokia. And if quality is not perfect then they blame Nokia.

I disagree with this. What does Google do? What does Apple do? They enable distribution of applications through a market, and there is a clear expectation of all involved that nothing offensive or malicious will get through, but no expectation *at all* that all the apps come from Google or Apple. The value of a mobile platform these days is related to what apps are available for it, and how many. Disabling a distribution channel seems to me like seppuku to me.

If Nokia is feeling a QA burden, then they should relieve that by realising that device users do not have an expectation of Nokia in the community channel or market. There is no need to impose a QA burden on the community either - the good, useful reliable apps will rise to the top if you get your search & ratings interfaces right.

Cheers,
Dave.

[juise-]

So the process might look like: devel -> testing -> extras -> ovi, with more paid and dedicated QA testers (probably directly from Ovi) involved in the process. They could hand-pick apps from testing repo and help promote/demote in order to get ball rolling much quicker.

My thoughts exactly. Nokia now has a problem with both amount and quality of content in Ovi. So why would they not just start picking apps from extras, doing their own QA, heck, even contribute back to original projects? Maybe work with the community developers, or offer bounties for fixing issues, in order to get more Ovi-qualified apps.

Even if such a level of interacting with the community is beyond practical, they could just take and fork some projects. I guess most apps in extras are licensed in a way which allows that.


On completely different subject that is mentioned above, the ability for widgets to anonymously cause breakage:
I think this issue should be solved architecturally, by making each of these widgets run in their own process, so they could be blamed for their resource usage without bringing out serious debugging tools. The current model where blame goes to the stock system software helps neither Nokia nor the widget developer to find and fix actual problems.

[Helmuth]

- Having Extras enabled out of the box has put more pressure in the community QA process, that several times has been criticized as too heavy.

The big benefit at the community Extras are the QA process. And I can install the applications directly on the device. No need to visit a mostly not working website.

I can't see anything like the Extras QT process at the official and Nokia own ovi store. They are not only selling expensive and not supported MMS messages to the N900 users (at a time nobody has ever seen a announcement of fMMS), they have not optified, not well tested applications in the store and the support does not work.

At example Cube Touch (http://store.ovi.com/content/21559) from Offscreen. Aviable since last year with a Bug in the application that it makes impossible to resolve this puzzle. And additionally the Application crashes very often.
Many times reported, per Mail, here at talk and in the comments at the store... but it is not fixed, no official statement, no update and the application is still in the store. Nobody has considered to remove it I guess.

The complete QA prozess is hidden or simply not existing. At maemo Extras we have a working QA process, I can search for problems in the past, who has voted for the package. Who is the programmer, what dependencies are there. Are there still not fixed reports at the Bug Tracker.

I don't have this at OVI. And there are many reasons in the past to don't trust applications from ovi!

[!!Nokia N900!!]

absolutely with u.

[slender]

dneary,
You probably realize that Apples walled garden and Androids environment for apps has one big advantage. It´s stability. And IMO it actually could be the most important thing of all. To have sandbox where you can run apps and main OS keeps on going even thought apps brake is quite big thing when we are talking about end user experience. One broken app might affect the whole quality of all apps and main platform.

And about expectations. I think that it´s quite hard to say how people see responsibility when installing apps. I can only speak about some conversations in TMO where some users that have installed stuff from extras and end up with sluggish performance and blaim Nokia for bad OS. Not app developers just Nokia. For some people it even might be hard to even notice that slowness/buginess of main OS etc. is related to app what they installed one week ago.

Maemo and meego give developers full access to almost anything on your device. User has full responsibility of their handheld device. So how could you teach users that they are responsible for all action what they do? Not application store owner or devices manufacturer. Remember that we are not talking about computers here. Comparing to other handheld devices only. So actually we should have much much stricter and throughout QA than android or apple because on this platform apps have pretty much open playground.

You are right about that if search & ratings interfaces are good and they could actually IMO seen as outmost ring in whole QA process. I really hope that Nokia and also maemo.org's community are able to establish system to end users that is easy to use and effective. In this context all that matters is how many taps :) . Also feedback from bugs straight from apps and user approved anonymous statistics are important building blocks of good QA for apps and system. Still I feel bit uneasy about this when I think that you and I and probably most of TMO users represent power users who deep down really understand quite much about computers and have probably friends who are technologically literated. I´m just trying to put myself in pants of my friends who have trouble even installing autorun windows games but still use quite a much money on phones/smartphones/mobile internet devices and represent IMO the main market of upcoming devices.

[YoDude]

Well, yes you are. :)

I'm playing evil's advocate in this Sunday night (in fact Monday here now) as a community member reminding the extra hassle this Extras-enabled-by-default has caused to the community in the form of extra pressure from Nokia. If the posts here reflect the sentiment of the community then this is useful information.

Nokia sees Extras as a benefit more than a worry. This is why it's enabled by default in Maemo 5 (it wasn't before), this is why the MeeGo-Harmattan application manager and security framework know about its existence and this is why we have been pushing the Extras concept (community QA included) to the MeeGo project.

The "just a headache" goes more for the community than for Nokia. I haven't heard anybody at Nokia questioning the current setup, and I will ask about feelings and current situation for MeeGo-Harmattan.

If you think the collateral headaches of being enabled by default are worth considering the benefits then, as said, this is useful information.

We should also be careful for what we wish for...

I fear the pressure on this community to provide what is essentially Nokia's burden in customer support if community "Extras" are enabled by default.

The question here after the N900's release has been:

"Why do the passengers on the bus of complaints all seemed to disembark in our small town instead of continuing on to Espoo?"

http://img.mtv3.fi/mn_kuvat/mtv3/urheilu/jaakiekko/2009/763323.jpg

"Extras", and more specifically the communication tools this community provides via this forum may be the reason.

I think that before answering this question, the question back to Nokia should be:

"Does Nokia intend to provide at least the same level of support for "OVI" apps as this community provides for its "Extras" repository?"

If the answer from Nokia is to provide the same level of support for "OVI" apps as it currently provides, then that would be the "insult" to this community. :)

[NvyUs]

what people are forgetting is Ovi store is already a success if you minus the Maemo version, they get over a 1.5 million downloads a day.
I'm pretty sure Nokia will put in a massive amount of money and other resource's for MeeGo version of the store now the MeeGo platform will target a much different and bigger user base.
I'd be happy with a bookmark to Extra's Download Page on MeeGo devices, then if people see something they like they will click download link and Repo will be configured and added automatically with no hassle.

[thp]

As an application developer making heavy use of Extras, I really hope that Extras will be enabled on the devices by default. Several really usable applications are available from Extras. If quality is a problem, we can always modify the "rules" of the Extras QA process (more than 10 votes, stricter rules, etc..).

As already pointed out several times in this thread, right now the Extras QA process seems to yield better and more stable apps than what comes out from the Ovi QA process at the moment. The process is also more transparent and easy to grasp for developers. Shortcomings of the process can be fixed by modifying the "rules" - we can't really do much about the shortcomings of Ovi until Nokia decides they want to change something (and we don't really want to wait until that happens?).

If you are not going to enable Extras by default, please make sure that Ovi Store is on par with Extras feature-wise. This means support for Python applications (PySide, PyGame, ...), SDL games (+OpenGL ES 1.1 games that don't make use of Qt) and everything else that's not built with The One True Toolkit in The One True Language using only The One True API (AFAIK Ovi only supports Qt apps written in C++, and no other APIs than Qt Mobility + whatever "stock" Qt offers).

Isn't the community-driven Extras repository something that positively distinguishes the Maemo platform from the rest? If so, why *wouldn't* you want to enable it out of the box?

[lemmyslender]

If MeeGo-Harmattan is really expected to be mainstream (not just another beta step), then Nokia should be asking themselves about the benefit of Extras being enabled.

I suspect the most immediate benefit is having a large amount of apps available very quickly after launch. I also suspect that community resources may be quickly overwhelmed by testing requirements. Particularly in the case of few devices being available for testing prior to launch, or a slow to start developer program.

So, I would suggest that it would be in Nokias best interest to have a couple (or more) paid tester positions prior to launch and for sometime afterward to help the community test and promote quality apps quickly.

If that isn't economically feasible (beneficial), perhaps Nokia could implement a programmers discount system. Reduced cost / streamlined access to a "free" section in the Ovi store for programmers that have shown to be contributing to the community. Make it easy for these folks to get stuff submitted to the Ovi store. Ovi QA would be in place, and Nokia would benefit from having the apps in its store.

I think in the case of a mainstream device, the majority of apps should come from a "sponsored store", not a community supported repo. This would significantly reduce stress on the community. I think most mainstream users would blame Nokia for problems perhaps related to mis-behaving apps anyway, so Nokia should have some control over them.

Extras should contain stuff that Nokia couldn't/shoudn't support in their store (enhanced kernels, emulators, Chromium, etc). In this case, Extras should not be enabled by default, and only enabled with whatever warnings are warranted.

Just my thoughts.

[YoDude]

As an application developer making heavy use of Extras, I really hope that Extras will be enabled on the devices by default. Several really usable applications are available from Extras. If quality is a problem, we can always modify the "rules" of the Extras QA process (more than 10 votes, stricter rules, etc..).

As already pointed out several times in this thread, right now the Extras QA process seems to yield better and more stable apps than what comes out from the Ovi QA process at the moment. The process is also more transparent and easy to grasp for developers. Shortcomings of the process can be fixed by modifying the "rules" - we can't really do much about the shortcomings of Ovi until Nokia decides they want to change something (and we don't really want to wait until that happens?).

If you are not going to enable Extras by default, please make sure that Ovi Store is on par with Extras feature-wise. This means support for Python applications (PySide, PyGame, ...), SDL games (+OpenGL ES 1.1 games that don't make use of Qt) and everything else that's not built with The One True Toolkit in The One True Language using only The One True API (AFAIK Ovi only supports Qt apps written in C++, and no other APIs than Qt Mobility + whatever "stock" Qt offers).

Isn't the community-driven Extras repository something that positively distinguishes the Maemo platform from the rest? If so, why *wouldn't* you want to enable it out of the box?

And the only thing I would change is...

...If you are going to enable Extras by default, please make sure that Ovi Store is on par with Extras feature-wise. This means support for Python applications (PySide, PyGame, ...), SDL games (+OpenGL ES 1.1 games that don't make use of Qt) and everything else that's not built with The One True Toolkit in The One True Language using only The One True API (AFAIK Ovi only supports Qt apps written in C++, and no other APIs than Qt Mobility + whatever "stock" Qt offers).

Isn't the community-driven Extras repository something that positively distinguishes the Maemo platform from the rest? If so, why *wouldn't* you want to enable it out of the box?

:)

[slender]

I´m sorry I would not bee too optimistic about this :| Don't you see any problems with extras enabled out of box on device that is quite a far away from n900 the "developers" device. It was marketed only in couple of countries and lately we have seen that it should not have been marketed as it was :|

@thp your first sentence IMO differers you probably quite far away from upcoming meego devices main market where they harvest money so think about that when trying to see whole picture.

I also think that extras is positive thing and it really distinguishes maemo platform from rest, but still Nokia has to think about end user experience and "what if..." and worst case scenario and minimize the risk.

This is quite multilateral thing and should be approached on many angles and think all the positive and negative sides of them.

[fatalsaint]

I don't see the issue really. As has been stated; there is no testing or devel at all for the Android Marketplace. A developer simply uploads an app to the market, people download it, and leave feedback.

Google has virtually no input or care for what quality of apps go into their marketplace.

When I look at even the Ovi Store I don't immediately think "This app sucks, whats wrong with Nokia?!" ... Um.. no. The developers made the apps; not Nokia. The people supporting the apps are not Nokia, they are the developers. You leave feedback for the app, not for Nokia. It's entirely up to the developers whether to fix them or not.

The one thing I see is that a truly malicious app can be removed if necessary by either Google or Nokia for their respective official channels. But considering chromium was just removed upon being asked I don't see a problem there either. Worst case is allowing Nokia to remove apps if necesary. But this is a very extreme measure; the only app I ever heard of Google actually removing was the tether app, and that was only because T-Mobile was the only carrier of their phones at the time and they complained. I believe they are back now (tethering apps) because Google doesn't have to bend to the whims of a single carriers ToS anymore.

I look at Nokia, and I see a far more stringent control on getting apps into the market on both the Extras/Community side, and on the Ovi Store - than either Google or Apple for their apps. Now, Apple makes you pay, and they take a cut, so they're kinda out there in left field. But the Android Market, AFAIK, is a simple sign up for a dev account, and start uploading. The Android market operates much like our Extras-Devel does.. no need for votes of any kind to get it anywhere.

So this whole argument about QA or control over apps from Nokia makes no sense to me... they are the only company (if they are) that cares about such a thing regarding their app store.

Guess that's not entirely true, Apple will remove an app if it doesn't (or does) fit a certain category: Such as Jailbreaking, or Porn. But as far as the actual quality of the app, they don't care as long as they get their cut of the profits. Look at all the fart apps out there.. ridiculous.

And google... well... like I said: I'm unaware of google getting involved with apps at all in the Marketplace except for that one. Which leads me to believe it has to be really bad before Google gets involved.

So.. I guess it really comes down to: Does Nokia want to be another Apple; or Google? Personally, I prefer the manage style of the latter to the former.

[thp]

@thp your first sentence IMO differers you probably quite far away from upcoming meego devices main market where they harvest money so think about that when trying to see whole picture.

That was my opinion as a developer. In times where "app count" is important for a mobile platform to take off, these platforms are also marketed to developers (in addition to the "main market"), because those are the ones who create the apps. I've seen Maemo as a platform where developers are given the choice to use the best tool they can find to solve a problem, and I hope they will continue to provide that choice. It's a pleasure to write apps for Maemo 5 and see non-geek users obtain and use them from Extras.

The Extras repository is important for bringing these applications to the end user. And the apps I *write* are totally targeted at the "main market" you are speaking of (even though I may or may not be part of that market *myself* - that doesn't matter in this case).

[slender]

So.. I guess it really comes down to: Does Nokia want to be another Apple; or Google? Personally, I prefer the manage style of the latter to the former.
oh dear. I was trying to say that maemo as platform differs quite much from android and iOS because it´s open. I have understood that even in android apps are run in sanboxed environment. This means that that they can control leaks and malicious behaviour on some extent as in maemo you can do pretty much anything and single widget or odd behaving daemon can take system down slowly.

Please someone correct me if i have understood something completely wrong.

[attila77]

It is true that there is no sandboxing in the sense of Android or iOS, however sandboxing does NOT give you any implicit leak of performance guarantees, unless we’re talking about complete virtualization (and we aren’t if we’re talking about Android and iOS). There is no way for the OS to tell whether CPU/memory usage is a leak or rightful use, regardless if you’re inside a sandbox or not. It *can* be easier to manage, but sandboxing is NOT a performance oriented measure, especially as most sandboxing methods incur a certain level of overhead. Security is of course a different story.

[fatalsaint]

oh dear. I was trying to say that maemo as platform differs quite much from android and iOS because it´s open. I have understood that even in android apps are run in sanboxed environment. This means that that they can control leaks and malicious behaviour on some extent as in maemo you can do pretty much anything and single widget or odd behaving daemon can take system down slowly.

Please someone correct me if i have understood something completely wrong.

I am talking from a managerial point of view. From an OS point of view, Android and iOS are more controlled on their apps, sure - but that isn't to say malicious apps still can't be developed for them and distributed.

I am not arguing our OS is or isn't more open than the competition, but from a company perspective on QA and management I don't think there should be much of a difference.

[qole]

i think even if there would be no more extras, it wouldn't be a problem to make our own repo for them.

http://wiki.maemo.org/Extras is already the community's "own repo for them", no need to think on a new one.

If there is no Extras enabled by default, then I don't think Extras will have any more authority than other repos as "the community's own repo". It is the implicit approval of Nokia that is granted by enabling Extras that gives it all of its authority.

I guarantee that if Extras is not enabled by default, the third party repositories will again spring up like weeds. I think there will be lots of third-party repos simply because the platform will be so huge and mainstream, but without a default-enabled Extras, there will be more weeds than grass in the Harmattan lawn.

EDIT: You think we've got QA problems now? If you don't enable Extras, it will be a nightmare out there.

[qgil]

If MeeGo-Harmattan is really expected to be mainstream (not just another beta step), then Nokia should be asking themselves about the benefit of Extras being enabled.

Think also that if MeeGo-Harmattan really goes mainstream is probably because operators bring it to the masses. Nokia will produce a vanilla version of the OS, but operators will have a decision about the repositories enabled or installable in the devices they sell to their customers.

About proliferation of repositories, the Security Framework is a guardian that didn't exist before. Installing a non-recognized repositories will be possible only in the open device mode. As said, Extras is *the* recognized community repo according to the current plans.

[wmarone]

About proliferation of repositories, the Security Framework is a guardian that didn't exist before. Installing a non-recognized repositories will be possible only in the open device mode. As said, Extras is *the* recognized community repo according to the current plans.

So any application that makes it into Extras will have to respect DRM? I suspect that will constrain the number of truly interesting programs that are allowed in... perhaps I should request an "open" category (similar to "free non-free".)

[fatalsaint]

So any application that makes it into Extras will have to respect DRM? I suspect that will constrain the number of truly interesting programs that are allowed in... perhaps I should request an "open" category (similar to "free non-free".)

I don't think that's what he meant.. or at least hope not.

I would image he simply means we cannot add third party repositories ourselves in the "closed" mode operation of the device. Where someone said above that people will make their own repositories instead of using extras if it's not the official repo.

So, essentially if Extras is enabled by default then users will be able to use it in closed mode (regardless of DRM, I would hope...) .. whereas if it is not - then users would be unable to add it.

[YoDude]

I don't think that's what he meant.. or at least hope not.

I would image he simply means we cannot add third party repositories ourselves in the "closed" mode operation of the device. Where someone said above that people will make their own repositories instead of using extras if it's not the official repo.

So, essentially if Extras is enabled by default then users will be able to use it in closed mode (regardless of DRM, I would hope...) .. whereas if it is not - then users would be unable to add it.

Reading a tad more into it. "Extras" by default would not require a Mobile Operator to make a decision to include it on their distributed devices. They would have to make a conscience effort to exclude it.
If these devices are provided by the Mobile Operators in the "closed" mode then a customer might have to go through the additional cumbersome, and possibly shady steps of "unlocking" the device before they would have access to community developed applications.

What little I once knew about such things was before Apple changed the nature of relationships between Mobile Operators and Manufactures. All of this is supposition on my part. Depending on Nokia's agreements with them, Mobile Operators may even be compelled to provide all Nokia Default applications and repositories.

If these suppositions are correct then that would be a horse of a different color. With "Extras" enabled by default, community developed applications would have a pipeline to all users and the answer to the question now becomes a "no brainer".

My apologies to the developers and others who saw this earlier.

[qgil]

This is unrelated to DRM. The Security Framework also observes the location of repositories. It is possible to configure it to forbid the installation of unknown repos.

For what is worth MeeGo, that also has this Security Framework, will have Extras (or whatever is the name for the meego.com community repo) enabled by default. MeeGo vendors will still be free to override this default with their own settings.

[Helmuth]

What about the QA prozesses at the Ovi store?

Will the meego part get a more open and transparent system?