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Google and KDE
by T. J. Brumfield on Tuesday 19/Feb/2008, @19:24
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I was thinking long and hard today along similar lines. KDE should form a strategic partnership with Google in much the same way Mozilla did.
As far as the API goes, you only get so many uses for your API key, so KDE couldn't just take the API and use it without paying for it, or striking a deal. They'd go over API usage with all the people who use KDE.
However, imagine Google contributing code to NEPOMUK and improving Strigi.
Imagine fully integrating Google services like GCalendar, GTalk and Gmail into your desktop.
Imagine easily integrating Google Docs to share documents.
Imagine being able to search an index with your account, and have it know that what you're looking for is on another computer you've used recently.
KDE 4 is now cross-platform. With plasmoids, open APIs, and the beginning of the Semantic Desktop, you could fully integrate your desktop experience with an online community, and simultaneously integrate online services into your desktop.
The partnership would profit both parties, and the end users would get much better features.
You could take it even further. It could create in-roads for KDE usage in the Enterprise environment through the strength of the Google brand. I can tell you first hand that integrating Sharepoint is very costly. Imagine an OSS alternative that allows the entire enterprise to communicate via email, calendar, IM, share documents, collaborate, search, etc. intuitively, and directly through your desktop apps.
We need to brainstorm this, and someone needs to approach Google about this. |
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Re: Google and KDE
by Kevin Kofler on Tuesday 19/Feb/2008, @22:35
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Please, no!
Please don't let them corrupt our Free Software by integrating their proprietary web applications, or even their proprietary desktop software (Google Desktop Search, Google Earth, Google Sky, ...) we already have viable Free alternatives (Strigi, Marble, KStars, ...) for in KDE!
(I'm saying "our" rather than "your" because I happen to be a KDE developer (I'm the one to thank if you ever use Kompare in KDE 4, I got it from non-building to shippable in KDE 4.0.0).)
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Re: Google and KDE
by jos poortvliet on Wednesday 20/Feb/2008, @00:01
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you got a point, but so does he. Working with Google has advantages and disadvantages - we can use money, resources and goodwill, but we don't want to be tied into them, offer google as only option. Luckily, it doesn't have to be that way - see the Magnatune integration in Amarok - it's now pluginbased - in part thanks to Magnatune contributions! Some companies really *get* FOSS, are genuine and willing to properly contribute to and work with us. Google has been doing well, so I think we could/should work a bit more - but not commit to ONLY google.
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Re: Google and KDE
by Kevin Kofler on Wednesday 20/Feb/2008, @00:44
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Indeed, Magnatune paying an Amarok developer and even letting him implement support for competing music stores is very nice of them. Cooperations like this (with no lock-in involved) are beneficial to KDE.
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Re: Google and KDE - Proprietary Taint
by T. J. Brumfield on Wednesday 20/Feb/2008, @05:33
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Google partners with Mozilla, offers money and code. They don't taint Mozilla with anything proprietary. They offer code and money to MySQL. They don't taint MySQL with anything proprietary.
I suggested integrating open API's and such into the desktop. I suggested having Google aid Strigi and Nepomuk.
Where exactly did I suggest we remove open code with proprietary code? And when did the GPL suddenly allow such a thing?
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Re: Kompare
by Erik on Friday 22/Feb/2008, @15:47
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> I'm the one to thank if you ever use Kompare in KDE 4, I got it from non-building to shippable in KDE 4.0.0
Thank you for giving Kompare some attention. It semmd to be abandoned for so long! Like I was the only person left using it. And I use it a lot, mostly to review my own changes before committing to SVN (svn diff|kompare -&) and of course configuration file changes on Gentoo (set pager="kompare -" in /etc/etc-update.conf). Did you just port it or did you also fix some of the old bugs? 2 of the most annoying are that it does not understand directory structures (output of "diff -r", see [http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=139233]) and that pressing "Next file" jumps to a random file, not the next in the file list.
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Re: Kompare
by Kevin Kofler on Sunday 02/Mar/2008, @17:13
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I fixed some bugs (e.g. the character set issues), but I haven't looked at those yet.
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Re: Google and KDE
by Ian Monroe on Wednesday 20/Feb/2008, @00:18
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Our technology by and large directly competes with Google. Trolltech/Nokia compete with the GPhone, KOffice is a competing Office suite, Strigi does the same thing as Google Desktop etc.
Google does help us out (KDE 4 release event, tons of students for Google Summer of Code) I think mostly because creating a non-Microsoft software ecosystem is ultimately in their interest. And because we're cool. :)
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Re: Google and KDE
by T. J. Brumfield on Wednesday 20/Feb/2008, @06:22
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Trolltech/Nokia does offering a competing product against Android, but that doesn't mean that Google would never partner with KDE. Google doesn't offer an offline Office suite, so there is zero competition there. Google does support ODF, just like KOffice, and Google would suddenly provide a means to easily share your documents online, and to allow collaboration. And I didn't think Google offered Desktop Search on Linux or Mac.
Who knows? With a partnership, Strigi could effectively become the new Google Desktop search, except it would be FOSS, and it would strengthen the KDE brand.
I don't know about the rest of the world, but in corporate America, FOSS is a dirty word, where as Google is highly respected. Such partnerships would increase visibility not only to individual desktop users, but also to enterprise environments.
If Google had something against Strigi, KDE, KOffice, etc. would they spend money out of pocket sponsoring Summer of Code projects for them?
As you already stated, they like to promote a non-Microsoft software environment, and they seem to respect KDE. In much the same way they assist MySQL and Mozilla, I think Google could help KDE.
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