pauljohn32 | # 11 | 2007-12-30, 20:00 | Report

Other guy says "Well, you usually get what you pay for. Ranting about poor descriptions of free software seems just a tad juvenile to me, but maybe that's just me."

I have to disagree with the your point that the poor descriptions are inherent in either free software or in Linux. I've been a Linux user for more than a decade and I've never seen program descriptions in the RedHat/Fedora community that are as bad as the descriptions for the Maemo/N800 tablet packages. Go read http://www.freshmeat.net and you very rarely see a description of the form "flite is a hacked-up version of flite" or such. Compare that with the description you see on the Fedora 8 Linux version of flite. Here's output from "rpm -qi flite"

Name : flite Relocations: (not relocatable)
Version : 1.3 Vendor: Fedora Project
Release : 8.fc7 Build Date: Tue 14 Nov 2006 11:57:48 AM CST
Install Date: Sat 15 Dec 2007 04:41:35 PM CST Build Host: hammer2.fedora.redhat.com
Group : Applications/Multimedia Source RPM: flite-1.3-8.fc7.src.rpm
Size : 10483102 License: BSD-style
Signature : DSA/SHA1, Fri 18 May 2007 01:22:00 PM CDT, Key ID b44269d04f2a6fd2
Packager : Fedora Project <http://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla>
URL : http://fife.speech.cs.cmu.edu/flite/
Summary : Small, fast speech synthesis engine (text-to-speech)
Description :
Flite (festival-lite) is a small, fast run-time speech synthesis engine
developed at CMU and primarily designed for small embedded machines and/or large servers. Flite is designed as an alternative synthesis engine to Festival for voices built using the FestVox suite of voice building tools.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

I find myself wondering why the flite debian package for Maemo does not have a similarly rich description.

Are the online descriptions in the Maemo repositories taken from the build script files (in RPM systems, these are called "spec" files, I don't know what Debian calls them) with which the deb packages are built? Or are they just "off the top of my head" lines that package owners type in when they register projects?

PJ

dblank | # 12 | 2007-12-30, 22:44 | Report

Probably because the person who compiled flite for maemo didn't care to add a rich description.

I've spent hours and hours compiling tons of software for the tablets, by the time I have them running on my N800, I don't generally care to add a description. Of course the people who grab my packages know darn well what it is they're downloading, since I usually post them in response to a thread here in the forums

Descriptions are typically "off the top of my head", but sometimes the author will include a debian/control file which has a proper description, so no extra copy/paste/description writing is necessary.

TA-t3 | # 13 | 2007-12-31, 14:31 | Report

FWIW, here's the description from the desktop Debian flite package:
I don't know what others do, but when I port packages I include the original description as much as possible (I start out with the original debian package after all, with the original control file where this Description resides). I may change where necessary (e.g. not pointing to packages not available for the N800) and shorten it a bit, because the application manager will only show a limited number of lines.

What people put in the descriptions on the sites where packages resides I'm not sure. Possibly just some single line description, not in any way extracted from the package description itself.

nilchak | # 14 | 2007-12-31, 15:30 | Report

I agree with you - so why dont YOU also shut your damn big 'free stuffing' mouth and do a search ? This is free stuff, and it doesnt come with a how-to, so take it and like it. Don't ask others if there is an update - just go search like anyone else.

Learn to live by your own rules first before spewing meaningless venom and equally meaningless geeky attitude. It doesn't help anyone, least of all Linux and the free stuff.

Users have every right to ask for features, free or not - and the poster did ask very nicely. To get that age old - 'its free stuff' rant is now passe. Try a new line please.

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Last edited by nilchak; 2007-12-31 at 15:32.

jdr93 | # 15 | 2007-12-31, 21:26 | Report

perhaps the reason so few people take the classes on sarcasm is because they're free and the class descriptions are so short. you basically have to use a dictionary to figure out what the classes cover.

by the way, hildergranommgeltigat.deb.so and libneedlenardlenoo.so.0 are still in beta, but the source codes are being distributed to those who attend the advanced sarcasm class.

barry99705 | # 16 | 2007-12-31, 22:00 | Report

Advanced sarcasm isn't available until you finish sense of humor 204.

sgosnell | # 17 | 2007-12-31, 23:11 | Report

So does that mean the sense-of-humor-impaired can never get sarcasm? Seems like discrimination to me. Any lawyers around?

barry99705 | # 18 | 2007-12-31, 23:17 | Report

Hey, if you don't want to take the class, don't go trying to pull the discrimination card! Though you could try to clep out of the class. Or maybe talk to the instructor, maybe he'll wave the requirement.

jdr93 | # 19 | 2008-01-01, 05:44 | Report

in my day 'sents of humour' required an over-night spirtual desert excursion, with the further requirement that all acolites had to roll naked through the cactus. advanced sarcasm was indeed an easy class after that.

barry99705 | # 20 | 2008-01-01, 07:27 | Report

Man that sounds like trying to copulate with a porcupine! If you can do that without severely injuring your self, you can do anything!