KDE representation

Hi!

Today I subscribed to three of the LSB mailing lists as one of probably two 
people representing KDE in the LSB.

My name is Olaf Schmidt. I am a member of  KDE e.V., co-maintainer of the KDE 
Accessibility Project and founder of the freedesktop.org accessibility 
initiative. I participate in the FSG accessibility working group, working 
closely together with the Gnome Accessibility Projects to define common 
standards for accessibility.

I live in Europe, so it will be difficult for me to attend meetings and phone 
conferences, but I hope that I can contribute via email.

When will the desktop topics be discussed at the LSB Plenary Meeting tomorrow? 
The problem is that the meeting will be from midnight to 4am (German time). 
If the desktop is discussed at the beginning of the meeting, then I will call 
in. Otherwise I hope my email comments are of help to you.

I am especially interested in giving feedback to the plan to include a single 
toolkit in the next version of the standard. The reaction to this has been 
very negative in the KDE community.

I am aware of the libQt FAQ. I understand that the reasons not to include Qt 
are political objections the copyleft idea and not opposition to KDE for its 
own good. My impression is, however, that the LSB is not fully aware of the 
results that the political decision to standardise only a single toolkit 
would have.

By including a single toolkit in the next version of the standard, the LSB 
would make itself a very strong force in the KDE/Gnome debate. It would 
alienate itself from large parts of the Linux desktop commmunity, and turn 
itself into a powerful weapon of toolkit zealots. It would destroy much of 
its credibility.

My suggestion is to include no toolkit in the next version of the LSB 
standard. Instead we should only standardise libraries and protocols that are 
used for interoperability between the desktops. This would give us time to 
work out a better solution and prevent danger to the LSB's credibility.

Cooperation between the KDE and Gnome projects vastly improved in recent 
years. My impression is that the toolkit wars are over, and that both KDE and 
Gnome will play important roles in the Linux desktop of the future. I don't 
want this spirit of good cooperation to be poisened, as would happen 
if the LSB restarts the desktop wars by siding with one of the two popular 
Linux toolkits.


Olaf Schmidt