Actually, there is supposed to be an official (Qt based) MeeGo API (not published yet), and that’s the "expected" level of app-level compatibility. Unless delayed, April will see Moblin 2.2 and the first incarnation of the Qt based netbook UX.

There was some talk about this on #meego, but without much conclusions. It is very difficult to say what will be transferable from one UX to another (especially considering DUI and friends), or, in other words, what will happen in practice to Qt’s "code less" mantra.

I was going to ask / state something similar about MeeGo not being released yet in a developer package.

Most people here should know by now it's not going to be for the faint of heart however I think a good portion of the community here at Maemo.org consider developer os's the geek version of legos at least I do. (No I am not knocking Legos, because frankly those are fun as well even when your old(er).)

I hope they don't push out the developer release to far as I have some great ideas which are rusting away in C++ at the moment. Not that C++ is bad or anything

These are wise words!

My laptop has an ATI Xpress video subsystem - ATI have decided it is legacy software and as a result the I lose the 3D-accelerated goodness from ATI's driver on later versions of Xorg. I have to rely on the open-source drivers to give me decent performance on my laptop. Great for compiz effects p*** poor for games.
Unfortunately ATI have no plans to release the full specs of my legacy device or willing to release the source code of the drivers. This situation will not change in the immediate future.
I either stay with an old distribution and keep 3D performance for games or install a current distribution and lose great 3D performance but access to the latest versions of software. I had to choose the later otion because I do not have the time to build packages for an older version of a linux distribution.

I really hope Nokia decide to support the n900 closed-source drivers in some way by:

(a) releasing the source under an open-source license.
(b) releasing linkable binary blobs
(c) officially supporting the n900 via MeeGo
(d) helping the community to write open-source versions of the drivers.

(a) or (d) would be ideal because it will allow people to experiment with custom-installs of other distributions (e.g. Install Debian and still be able to use the phone functionality)
I don't think (a) will ever happen - e.g. there are probably third party licensed software and patent issues)

But the closed-source nature of some of the n900 hardware will hold it back and it will be unlikely we'll see a fully working n900 device under MeeGo.

I hope Nokia do the right thing and remove this "restriction" in some way.

Well... You already have all required drivers and proprietary binaries on your device.
These are just not redistributable, but certainly usable.

Moebian already solved the problem of linking these binaries to custom distribution.

If this is the definition of MeeGo, there's no branding problem _at all_: Harmattan is as MeeGo as the code drop that will come today.

This is also Nokia's PoV.

I personally disagree with this PoV, but that might be because I like to tinker with internals -- I'm pretty sure this "level of compatibility" works for a majority of developers.

Not the definition of MeeGo, but MeeGo compatibility. A subtle, but very important difference.

Touché. That leaves me wondering as much as you if both UXs will be "two MeeGos" or "two compatible MeeGos".

Even if from a branding PoV they're both "MeeGo", they're not going to be binary compatible, but "MeeGo compatible".

For those of you who want to do serious MeeGo Dev work, start here:

http://wiki.meego.com/ARM

Otherwise, do not even bother trying to install this release. You have been warned.

-Thom

Unfortunately, as seen on other threads, some people have already reflashed and are now panicking with what to do next. I have modified my signature to point out to as many people as possible not to do this. Is it that surprising people ignore the warnings onscreen and just click straight through to the download prompt?

Great idea adding that guidance to your sig, but that's exactly the kind of tip that ought to be 'sticky-fied' atop the forums somehow... Mods/Reggie?