nepomuk / baloo naming implications

hi...

as the other thread is a bit spread out in terms of topoic, i thought i’d 
start afresh and try to collect the implications in one exhaustive list (it’s 
long .. sorry :/)

== This is a journey ==

This will take a long time to communicate, no matter what happens: name change 
or not. I expect 6 months of consistent messaging is a bare minimum, and it 
will likely take longer. This is not a one-time communication question, but 
something that sets the tone for a 6 month trek, and which will easily have 
implications for the next 3+ years.

== Established investment nepomuk ==

While we’ve tried to keep Nepomuk out of the default UI as much as possible, 
it still shows up in places. It is also required for troubleshooting, and as 
such exists on our support wikis. We have recognized visual identity 
components (the nepomuk logo icon) that have been more or less visible in 
Plasma for some time.

Being able to attach the “bigger, better, faster” story of Baloo to Nepomuk is 
an easier story to tell than having to explain why Baloo replaces Nepomuk. It 
also allows us to preserve the above investments already made.

== Existing “common knowledge” of what Nepomuk is ==

The core Free software user community knows what Nepomuk is and does: file 
indexing and desktop search. This is not actually accurate, but it is the 
prevailing common understanding of it since that is what people have 
experienced with it. Usage by Akonadi or Plasma Active is not well known; some 
even confuse KRunner with Nepomuk since they use KRunner to search for things 
(!)

IOW, people have a vague understanding of what Nepomuk does. If the details 
under the hood change, it really doesn’t matter. Risk of confusion because the 
implementation details change but the name stays the same, therefore, is low.

We benefit by not having to re-explain what it is Nepomuk did and Baloo does 
now. In fact, as Carl pointed out: it is really hard to introduce Baloo 
without talking about Nepomuk .. which says a lot.

== API change ==

Some have noted that there has been significant API changes. This is true .. 
except for the widgets. Keeping the name makes that part of the story easier 
to communicate, so the question is whether it is significantly easier to 
communicate an API change with a new name.

If we look at things like Perl 6, Python 3 or Qt4 (or Qt2), or frameworks like 
node.js as it evolved: API changes are part of life. Developers choose a 
framework based on what it does (”does this open zip files? ‘cause I need to 
open zip files”), maturity, commitment by the team behind it and quality. 

Given people know what Nepomuk does, keeping the name is a win there.

Maturity and commitment are implied by continuity. Changing names and saying 
“this is essentially a brand new project” doesn’t help there, even if the new 
thing is awesome. Compare the struggles of Linux middleware that has changed 
names repeatedly to something like NetworkManager which has kept its name even 
though its API keeps changing from release to release rather significantly. 
Since it’s the same name but just “keeps getting better” it avoids much of the 
controversy that other API-shifting areas of Linux middleware have endured 
(fairly or not).

The quality issue is the big remaining issue ... but not limited to API

== The Quality Hump ==

This is an issue from both the end user and developer perspective.

Nepomuk has a relatively poor reputation (fairly or not). Keeping the name 
“Nepomuk” therefore carries some of this negativity. In the “keep the name” 
situation we then have the job of making the case for why/how the current work 
has improved .. well .. anything.

If we change the name, we need to still explain why/how the current work has 
improved anything. We also need to explain why Nepomuk was entirely abandoned. 
Which also implies “why we stuck with it for so long even though it needs 
abandoning".

So changing the name doesn’t save us much work at all; it may even create 
*more* work. The current article has an entire section called "Why change 
Nepomuk?” That entire section can pretty much be scrapped if the name is kept. 
It can be recycled into a “how this new version is better” and merged with the 
content currently under “About Baloo"

== Deprecation story ==

Saying “The Nepomuk project is officially deprecated” is pretty harsh sounding. 
It leaves an immediate question: 'what to move to if I’m using Nepomuk now?’ 
On the other hand, people are quite used to old versions being deprecated 
(that’s almost axiomatic). Keeping the name makes the migration path a lot 
more obvious while sounding a lot less like we’re abandoning things and more 
like we’re evolving things.

== Migration Story ==

Keeping the name also softens the migration story. Compare:

"Nepomuk and Baloo can coexist without issues. However, it is not optimal to 
run both of them on the same system. They both would be indexing files, emails 
and other data, duplicating functions, taxing the system unnecessarily, 
populating and synchronizing their databases.”

with:

"Nepomuk 1 and 2 can coexist without issues, however it is not recommended to 
run both on the same system. Doing so would result in indexing all files, 
emails and other data twice, duplicating functions and taxing the system 
unnecessarily due to populating and synchronizing two separate databases.”

or

"KDE Applications and Platform 4.13 will not ship with Nepomuk based search 
integrated. Nepomuk will still be available for distributions to ship as a 
separate component, but it is recommended that users who depend on 
applications requiring the old version of Nepomuk to hold off upgrading to 
Platform 4.13 until these applications have been ported. Linux distributions 
will most likely take care of this, ensuring that if any component needs 
Nepomuk it will be installed and otherwise, Baloo will be providing the search 
and storage capabilities."

with

“KDE Platform 4.13 will ship with Nepomuk 2 integration only. Likewise, KDE 
Applications 4.13 has also been upgraded to use Nepomuk 2 exclusively. This 
covers the majority of Nepomuk applications most people use. However, those 
relying on applications which have not yet been ported to Nepomuk 2 are 
strongly recommended to stay with KDE Platform 4.12 until those applications 
are ported."

It sounds more like migration and upgrade than an awkward replacement.

== Research participation story ==

Up until now we’ve been able to say “Yes, we have benefited from engaging 
productively in public research projects like Nepomuk in the EU.” That has 
gotten us quite a bit of kudos over the years.

If we keep the name, we can demonstrate continuity from that investment and 
chart from KDE’s past efforts in it to where we are now. Yes, it evolved, but 
it started with that research endeavor brought into KDE. If we toss the name, 
here’s what we end up with something like this:

“We engaged in a EU research project called Nepomuk. It needed significant 
improvements to reach the level of performance we required, so eventeually we 
replaced it with something called 'Baloo' which has a higher performance file 
indexer as well as a more focused API better for what applications actually 
needed. Some of the people who worked on Nepomuk also wrote Baloo, so Nepomuk 
was a valuable part of the path to our current solution.”

That’s really, really weak for trying to present our research involvement and 
the value of tossing resources at KDE projects. If we keep the name, this same 
story becomes:

“We engaged in a EU research project called Nepomuk. Even after the research 
project ended, we continued to invest in it and evolve the framework. Today we 
have Nepomuk <N> which has a higher performance file indexer as well as a more 
focused API that is better suited to what desktop applications actually 
needed. In this manner, we took the research project and turned it into a  
production product.”

It is really hard to make that same story when the names are changing, 
particularly in front of people who hand out research grants.

== Possible post-baloo name churn == 

From the “pessimists” department: *if* Baloo were not to work out as we want 
and ends up being replaced / augmented with something else in the next years, 
we’ll have this whole name change issue all over again .. and then it would be 
3 name changes for the same thing. 

(Which reminds me of Kat and Tenor :)

This will lead to KDE looking like it can’t figure out what it is doing ... 
sort of like the Linux middleware name churn which certainly hasn’t helped 
their cause in getting people to adopt new iterations without screaming bloody 
murder (and forking in some cases)

-- 
Aaron J. Seigo

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