Re: Problem with InstallShield (Was Re: [Bug 629] Changed - Problemwith InstallShield: ole:CoTreatAsClass(stub), ole:CoGetClassObject)

On Fri, 10 May 2002, Sean C. Farley wrote:

> On Thu, 9 May 2002 15:17, Francois Gouget wrote:
>
> > On Thu, 9 May 2002, Sean C. Farley wrote:
> > [...]
> > > > Well, how about the Wine project? Some people claim that the
> > > > development of some code has come to a halt. Why? Because TG promised
> > > > to submit that code.  So people stopped coding, waiting for that code,
> > > > which didn't come till today. TG is not releasing it for free, but
> > > > wants to trade it...
> > >
> > > This is hard to prove.  My thoughts are that people needed WINE to run
> > > business applications more than games and switched to making code for
> > > those applications.
> >
> > What makes you think that?
>
> Multiple reasons for the demand of productivity tools:
> 1) When talking with people who use Linux, they talk about Lotus or
>    Office (or equivalent productivity tools) running on Linux.  Rarely
>    do they talk about games.
> 2) Personally, if I want to run an alternative OS at work, I need Lotus
>    Notes to run on it.  Running UT does not seem to be a job
>    requirement.  :(
> 3) WINE has noticed a drop in development for game support, yet I do not
>    believe it has suffered in Office support.
> 4) Although there have been several articles on SlashDot about games,
>    many more articles are about productivity tools.

I believe you are right in that the number one thing people are missing
on Linux is Microsoft Office. And number two is represented by a large
number of other 'productivity applications'. At least that's what you
hear in the press and when you talk to non-linux users. However making
games work seemed more 'sexy' and for the longest time I had the feeling
that Office applications were ignored by the Wine community, or at
least, they did not receive the attention that I thought they deserved.

I think you are right too that the proportion of office related patches
is higher now. But I attribute it to three factors:
 * first CodeWeavers is actively working on Microsoft Office, and they
*are* releasing their changes. I think the main reason why you see so
much Office activity now.
 * now that Office works so much better, it is more rewarding to come in
and fix a bug: before nothing would work, and fixing a bug would just
get you to the next blocking bug. Now the applications are usable and
you just have to fix the one bug that really irks you.
   (btw, this is why I think Wine can really benefit from focusing on
making a few applications work well and _then_ widen the scope. But I
also realize this would mean telling people what to work on which is
impossible to do in an open-source environment)
 * I also think that there has been a significant drop in game related
activity. We still see patches to make games start and a few things like
that. But when you look at the patches in dlls/ddraw (DirectDraw +
Direct3D) you see much fewer non-transgaming contributions in 2001 than
in 2000. So there are fewer obviously game related patches too, hence
the even higher 'office' patch proportion.


Well, of course this is all quite subjective.


--
Francois Gouget         [email protected]        http://fgouget.free.fr/
                     Linux: the choice of a GNU generation