On Mon, Jul 11, 2005 at 09:06:25PM +0100, Paul Walker wrote:
> On Mon, Jul 11, 2005 at 03:40:33PM -0400, John J. Foster wrote:
>
> > leave a folder without having read all the new mail, but still be able
> > to tell if there was unread mail there. Cache an f'ing flag somewhere.
> > The only time you've gotta deal with it is when mutt is first opened.
> > Unless I'm way off base. But other clients seem to be able to handle it.
>
> If it bothers you that much, write it.
Paul, I understand your frustration... a lot of people are complaining,
and they don't seem to be offering any solutions. But your comment
really misses the mark. If we write it, who's to say one of you guys
will think it worthy of inclusion? Will you even give an opinion?
That's what started this whole thread in the first place. Some guys
wanted to fork mutt into mutt-ng. Thomas was opposed. However, users
want more features, and the current maintainers aren't making it
happen. Many would argue you're not LETTING it happen either. The
current development process is terribly stagnant, with no clear
statement about what features the maintainers are interested in
adding, and often not a lot of communication from you guys about
proposed feature ideas or patches that people code up.
For many of us, it isn't worth writing without some kind of commitment
from the commiters that it will be committed. Maintaining patches
sucks. But you guys aren't keeping the users satisfied... No one
says you have to, either. But if you're not willing to, you ought to
give up the code to someone who will.
NNTP support is a great example (and one I happen not to care one iota
about). Lots of people think netnews should remain separate from
their e-mail client. Fine. But lots of people want the NNTP support
in their e-mail client... If it gets added, those who don't want it
don't have to use it. If it doesn't get added, those who do want it
are SOL, unless they feel like hacking up patches, and maintaining
them, and toting them along with them each time they upgrade to a new
version. This is not a sustainable development model! Ask yourself
the question, which choice best serves the users?
Lots of OSS projects start out as one or two guys scratching an
itch... But Mutt is no longer playing ball in that ballpark. It's
used by thousands of users worldwide, and those users want their
e-mail needs met. The current development model isn't getting that
done.
--
Derek D. Martin http://www.pizzashack.org/ GPG Key ID: 0xDFBEAD02
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