Abiword problem in 4.2

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trio
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#31 Post by trio »

More like only misunderstanding with "how to convey a message" to me....please, like whodo said, be nice in this forum, even when you're angry, after all, we're all doing voulenteer's work here. All Free..

Aaah, we've been here before eh whodo? (just like 4.2 RC's threads) :lol: and yes, FIN STOP PERIOD ETC

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#32 Post by tronkel »

Dear Cindy, you wrote:
His prime concern is helping us ordinary people
I for one do not disagree with this. GNU/Linux was specifically conceived to help "ordinary people" with whatever computing tasks they need to do - and at no cost to boot. Let's be in no doubt - this is a good thing.

But consider this:

In order to achieve this goal, basic Puppy Linux versions need to be built so that they can be used as bases for community editions plus any other required variants.

What WhoDo and Ttuuxxx have made here is not a Community Edition but a Base Edition. WhoDo and Ttuuxxx are VERY good at what they do and should be left alone to get on with it without criticism.

I do understand though that you might have confused Base Editions with Community Editions. This is an easy mistake to make.

Best regards

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#33 Post by ecomoney »

You are right Trio, angry posts, belittling peoples (free) contributions and casting accusations are no way of advancing what is a very worthy and important project for many, free or not. Ive apologised to those who have I have unintentially offended (whodo) who are generally not guilty of the same. No one should be "beyond criticism", me included.

Im want to re-iterate again that my "not nearly good enough" comment was made - from the point of view of the people "linux newbs" that this distro is aimed at - soley at Ttuxxxs first suggested workaround for the Abiword bug, not for his final fix for the problem, or the 4.2 release, or Puppy Linux as a whole.

I am wanting to turn this around to be something positive too. Whodo Im sure in the future - should my comments have not put you off managing another release - you will take the steps needed to ensure a bug of this magnitude (to end users) will not creep in again.
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#34 Post by dawnsboy »

I have worked with Abiword since the 1.x series on various platforms (Slackware, Fedora, Debian based, Windows 98 through Vista, Vector Linux, Puppy Linux, etc). This word processor has matured nicely over the years making it a very useful application. My sister uses a version in Win 98SE on her aging laptop. She creates term papers, etc in Abiword and saves them as Word documents on a disk so that she can open and edit or print them from MS Word on another computer as needed. I have been able to create fairly complex documents in Abiword and have successfully exported them to Word format. I have been far less successful with importing documents created in MS Word.

Generally letters, term papers and similar documents with and without images import fairly well (some are flawlessly rendered). Complex documents created in MS Word in my experience tend not to render particularly well in Abiword. I have a resume that was created using a MS Word resume template (2 column table) that can easily and accurately be imported into Open Office. This document can be imported into Abiword but there are issues. While the table structure is intact Abiword has difficulty placing headings in their proper positions. It tends to word wrap headings and sub-headings that fit easily on one line in MS Word or Open Office. It also adds rows to the table and breaks across pages in odd places. In my experience this is typical of Abiword which has always been a fast, lightweight word processor that does meet the criteria for the Puppy Linux mission statement (especially for documents created in Abiword and sent to printer or exported as Word Documents). However it has always been necessary for me to import more complex documents in Open Office when available to me; if not then Google Docs or Zoho Office (zoho.com).

The abilities, features, benefits, limitations or bugs present in Abiword are generally the responsibility of the developers at Abisource. In regard to garbled fonts I wish to point out that I installed a package called fonts.pet that I found here on the forum. This changed how fonts are rendered globally on my system. I did not attempt to use Abiword 2.66 until the font package had been installed. This is something I have done with other Puppy 4.x setups.

Having said that I have had no problem whatever with Abiword 2.66 as used otherwise out of the box. I have been able to download Word documents and render them in Abiword with the anticipated results.

It has been my experience when identifying a problem that a search for a solution most often yields quick results. Sharing the problem and the solution (when possible) or asking for help within the community will alert developers to the problem and it will be addressed. I have never worked with a distro of any kind that did not have post release issues that required additional work of some kind on the part of the developers. It is a part of life. Development of an operating system is a complex, often tedious task.

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Abiword problem in 4.2

#35 Post by cindy »

Thanks for your reply, not certain what to make of it ???

As I said I have broad shoulders.

I was not just sticking up for a friend. I was saying what I thought after reading your remarks. As to looking a gift horse in the mouth, I think that is an insulting thing to say. Anyway I will not bore you with anything else as I have more pleasant things to do. :D

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#36 Post by tronkel »

Ecomoney wrote:
from the point of view of the people "linux newbs" that this distro is aimed at
The "Linux Newbs" user category is by no means the only group of users that Puppy Linux is aimed at. (I'm talking about the base versions here). Puppy's raison d'etre is not solely because of newbie-friendliness (albeit that that is one of its many positive aspects). If that was indeed the case, Puppy's currently high position (no 2 in Distrowatch recently) would drop like a stone.

User categories range from "Total Newb" to "Advanced Developer" and everything else in between.

Hence the reason that base versions (current one is Puppy 4.2 Deep Thought) with their size constraints cannot be the exclusive domain of one particular user group.

Puplets are Puppy's solution for user groups who have specific requirements. That can mean anything of course - users who have special requirements that relate to say, visual impairment, or maybe to users who have an interest e.g. in ham radio or some other hobbyist area, to take one of many possible examples.

Puppy is and IMHO should always remain neutral in regard to its target user base. Without this philosophy of neutrality, the spur to innovative development could get impaired - and that would be a very bad thing.
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#37 Post by ecomoney »

Tronkel, I dont get your reasoning, heres the mission statement again.
* Booting from CD, Puppy will load totally into RAM so that the CD drive is then free for other purposes.
* Booting from CD, Puppy can save everything back to the CD, no need for a hard drive.
* Booting from USB, Puppy will greatly minimise writes, to extend the life of Flash devices indefinitely.
* Puppy will be extremely friendly for Linux newbies.
* Puppy will boot up and run extraordinarily fast.
* Puppy will have all the applications needed for daily use.
* Puppy will just work, no hassles.
* Puppy will breathe new life into old PCs
I cant see anything about it being a developer-centric distro here, it only mentions one group of people
* Puppy will be extremely friendly for Linux newbies.
It obvious that Puppys recent success with 4.2 is because it is more directly aimed at entry level Linux users with its extra usability features. Ubuntu's success is because it is "Linux for human beings", from what Ive seen of some extreme hardcore programmers...this is a very similar mission ;-)

Extra usability, if properly thought out, doesnt require huge megabytes. Usability is down to design, not construction, and has huge payoffs in terms of promoting open source (i.e. freedom).

As for the argument that puplets are the way of getting useability into puppy linux, I think you will find its the other way round.

Quote: "An interview with BarryK, creator of puppy linux" from DesktopLinux
What are your plans for the future of Puppy Linux, both near term and long term?

Puppy has a "mission statement," which you can see on the main Puppy Linux page. Apart from that, it's open. We discuss things on the forum, some guys try stuff on their own custom versions of Puppy. I pick up what looks good for the official version.
Puppies popularity lies in the fact it is aimed at helping the majority of people out there, and from what Ive seen 4.2's popularity is due to the fact that it does the same thing...more. I only hope that some of the new packages which have gone out broken do not put people off trying future versions of puppy. I hear there are major useability problems with Ttuxxxs new CUPS system too. We perhaps should have stuck with what "just works".

Of course, puppy linux needs good developers. They are the oxygen that allows it to live. What makes a good developer? Developers make programs...What is a program?


A program is simply a tool to do a real-world job. How "good" that program/tool is depends on how easy it makes that job to do, how needed that job is, and how well it does that job.


I speak from experience here, as I was a professional programmer for some very significant projects back in my windoze days. This explains my opinion of the work of a particular programmer that brought AbiWord and CUPS to 4.2 :x

Puppy not only needs developers, but they must be the right kind of developers. They need to have not only a high level of technical skill to fit in with puppies limited hardware constraints, but also a genuine desire to create something that fits in with puppies goals...this is what makes it successful, useful and "good".

If your a good developer and want a real challenge....your in the right place. If your a real challenging developer, your not.
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#38 Post by ttuuxxx »

deleted
Last edited by ttuuxxx on Sun 05 Apr 2009, 22:52, edited 1 time in total.
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#39 Post by tronkel »

Ecomoney wrote:
I cant see anything about it being a developer-centric distro here
(as extract from Barry's summary).

Nowhere in my posting did I state that Puppy is, or should be, developer-centric.

In fact, I went out of my way to make clear the fact that I thought exactly the opposite. What I said was, that for the base versions of Puppy, its ethos should reflect the distro characteristics as being user-group neutral i.e. - emphasis towards any specific user group should not be a part of the base schema. There is no room in the ISO for any other approach to be feasible. This is what makes Puppy Puppy.

Agreed though, that the core applications e.g. Abiword should work.
In the real OS world though, this is not always the case for various reasons.

Look at Ubuntu for example - 7.04 Feisty I think it was.

It had a real show stopper where even the mouse was frozen after boot-up.

This is from a commercial distro whose infrastructure for life-cycle development is out of Puppy's league. So I think one can make big allowances in this respect for Puppy.
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#40 Post by ttuuxxx »

deleted
Last edited by ttuuxxx on Sun 05 Apr 2009, 22:52, edited 1 time in total.
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#41 Post by ecomoney »

@ Ttuxxx, it shouldnt have been Slackware reporting the bug it should have been Puppy Linux...guess it proves we were "slacker" than they are?

But it wasnt, and that caused what will be to most end users a massive annoyance an inconvenience, and undoubtedly a drop in confidence about puppy linux's quality, and our ability to create a solid linux distribution without the aid and experience of BarryK. This is real shame, because, despite your best efforts to derail them, puppy 4.2's new appearance and usability features set it light years ahead of previous Puppies in terms of its accessibility and attractiveness to new linux users. I am very grateful this long overdue change has happened, and to the people that made this happen.

Ok, instead of just simply just patting each other on the back for bringing 4.2 into existence for free, and blaming other people for this bug, and calling each other names, why not inject a little professionalism into this situation and look at what went wrong? -and what we can do to make sure something like this doesnt happen again

Ttuxxx, you say it shouldnt/isnt be your responsibility to test your packaging. This is a new one because every other developer I have ever known a least does a rudimentary test of its basic functionality, but your saying you dont have the "precious time" to do this? You say thats my responsibility now? Ok fine....

Next time, you develop a package for mainstream puppy linux, make it your responsibility to SEND IT TO ME. If your not willing to take responsibility for Puppy Linux's quality, I AM.

I will personally test the hell out of it. Not only will I test it myself, I have access to a lot of people that use puppy linux for general computing (not as a hobby) in their homes and in their businesses. A great many are very enthusiastic about the opportunity to give something back, but they dont have the technical skills. this makes them ideal "test pilots". Hopefully also (if I have the time to prepare the demo tonight) I will have access to two huge cybercafes. The staff there have told me they are more than willing to act as a testbed to help puppies worthy worldwide aims.

You have yourself an unshakable partner now Ttuxxx Be careful what you wish for :wink:

Obviously Puppy needs also needs some kind of more formal testing strategy too. Thats another discussion which I will go start.

@ Tronkel

Ubuntu has a lot more code...therefore a lot more bugs. Ive used it for some time myself and on other peoples P.C.'s, but Ecomoney Systems dropped support for it recently because it is simply just too unreliable....along with the ubuntu specialist who used to work with me. Im sure the reasons for that show stopper in 7.10 were far more complex than the reasons for the broken word processor in Puppy 4.2.

From what Ive seen, puppy makes an exelent starter distro. When its users have gained confidence in linux, many of them go over to other distros. Personally think this is a real strength, considering how many people still use Windoze.

You make a good point that if Puppy becomes too user-focused developers will lose interest in it, and not use it themselves. Perhaps puppy then needs a "newbie mode"? This wouldnt necessarily need much disk space, and give both sets of people what they want. Would be far more useful than a personal Wiki IMHO.
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#42 Post by WhoDo »

ecomoney wrote:@ Ttuxxx, it shouldnt have been Slackware reporting the bug it should have been Puppy Linux...guess it proves we were "slacker" than they are?
Nope. It means they included it first, had it longer, found it first and reported it first. We don't normally go looking for application bug reports from other distros either. I think ttuuxxx went looking for that one to answer your initial criticism.
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#43 Post by ecomoney »

We don't normally go looking for application bug reports from other distros.
Another good suggestion with the benefit of hindsight.

Is this really the same bug? Several (most) of the fonts didnt work in our abiword. The bug report is scarce to say the least. I documented our origional one previously.

Whodo, while your on any idea when this bug will be fixed in the main download of the puppylinux.org page? I believe I MAY be able to get a review in Linux Format (I know a guy who knows a guy), and Ive also discovered a few other cunning methods of advertising it to windows users too.

Im reluctant to actually do this until the main download is fixed however, because it detracts from the other seriously good things about 4.2 :)
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#44 Post by ttuuxxx »

WhoDo wrote:
ecomoney wrote:@ Ttuxxx, it shouldnt have been Slackware reporting the bug it should have been Puppy Linux...guess it proves we were "slacker" than they are?
Nope. It means they included it first, had it longer, found it first and reported it first. We don't normally go looking for application bug reports from other distros either. I think ttuuxxx went looking for that one to answer your initial criticism.
Your pretty much right on that one, I knew it was a front issue as soon as the bug was found, But I couldn't understand why, since we never had that issue before, and I compiled abiword in the past without any of those issue, Plus none were reported during the compile itself, it just didn't make sense. Then the initial blame me for everything started, I knew it wasn't my fault and like i said we were in a move forward state of production, I sure as heck didn't have time to test everything, Some developers have time to test packages but everyone seen how much I was putting out, asking me to test all thats is just nuts, If it was one thing like Icewm sure I could, thats even the funny part you can't test everything like icewm, my pc's are to fast for icewm bugs like blinky leaving the taskbars, they never do, but you try it on a older pc and it happens.
We just need more dedicated testers who test beta's / alphas, I also think its a bit much for ecomoney to think he could test that much stuff, look at woof, it downloads over 600 different packages to make 1 OS for puppy, how the heck could he test 600+ packages for errors, impossible, T2 had issues with glib, gtk in 4 series that wasn't found out even until after 4.0 was released, nobody test all those packages either.
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#45 Post by ecomoney »

Your right Ttuxx, I wouldnt be able to find all the bugs...its not possible to have no bugs at all...even with open source, but what I suggest would find the important show-stoppers like this one.

I do appreciate you were under a lot of stress during the 4.2 development process that was obvious. There were a LOT of package updates included, and with every update theres a risk of bugs creeping in.

Maybe you should in future take on less yourself, take things a little slower, have more breaks and perhaps even the occasional day off? :wink:

Im glad your choosing to be more reflective. :)
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#46 Post by rcrsn51 »

Perhaps we can draw some conclusions from all of this:

1. Using a full release of Puppy as a test bed for individual pieces of software is a mistake.

2. Each package should be thoroughly tested using some systematic procedure before it ever gets near the overall build.

3. Introducing a new package or attempting to upgrade a package in the middle of the development process is asking for trouble.

4. Third-party criticism is an important part of the process.

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#47 Post by ttuuxxx »

lets just say I was nice enough to remove my post, then I read my emails and found a PM from ecomoney-Rob, and from what he said, he's lucky I removed my post, If I would of read that PM first I wouldn't never removed my responses.
ttuuxxx

Ps now i don't feel so Bad, Thanks Rob :), But i bet you do :wink:
Your lucky Rob, I had a screenshot of the PM I was going to post here, I actually did for about 2 seconds then removed it.
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#48 Post by ecomoney »

Yes, like I say I am sorry I lost my cool too, Theres no need to feel bad about past mistakes as long as theyre fixed and taken as learning experiences for the future. Im glad your feeling better.

Ttuxxx, you didnt have to remove your entire posts, just some of the "colourful" language that you used wasnt appropriate for a non-age restricted public forum. I personally dont mind it even if it is directed at me (I live and work amongst it all the time - its the common tongue around here), but others may.

Just to clarify to others, I did send a private PM asking Ttuxxx to moderate his words (in the type of language that is used around here) but none of that language was directed personally AT him, and it wasnt abusive to him in any way.

Photocopies by available request with proof of age. :roll:

@rcrsn51 Totally agree.....conclusions drawn
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#49 Post by WhoDo »

rcrsn51 wrote:Perhaps we can draw some conclusions from all of this:

1. Using a full release of Puppy as a test bed for individual pieces of software is a mistake.

2. Each package should be thoroughly tested using some systematic procedure before it ever gets near the overall build.

3. Introducing a new package or attempting to upgrade a package in the middle of the development process is asking for trouble.

4. Third-party criticism is an important part of the process.
I'm not sure I'd agree with the conclusions, but the sentiment is valid:

1. Until now we have been "beggars" rather than "choosers". I haven't seen such enthusiasm for testing since the 2.15CE development, and yet we still didn't find the font bug in imported Word documents before the release. We are a small distro with limited resources.

2. That is what Git will provide for us, I hope.

3. I don't know when or how else you CAN introduce a new package or upgrade, especially in a distro this size. From the very first Alpha it is accepted that the updated or new packages included are potentially unstable. They should be stabilised before Beta, in the normal run of things, but we don't have a full blooded test regime with hundreds of people testing and trying to break things. We certainly aren't Microsoft yet they still manage to release buggy software.

I deliberately resorted to pushing out "Release Candidates" that were clearly of early Beta quality in order to broaden the pool of testers. Heck, Barry has even released a Final because he simply couldn't get testers, and knowing full well that he'd have to follow it with a point1 bug fix release. That's the world we live in as a small distro. Hopefully the many new Puppy users this version has attracted will enlarge the testing pool considerably.

4. Constructive criticism is always welcome. It just gets a bit annoying if the critics involved haven't participated in testing and have waited until AFTER the release to make their criticisms known, especially if they've employed an accusatory tone in their criticism. It's way too late to fix by then. The horse is long gone, so shutting the stable door is irrelevant. Calling the horse a bad name won't get him back in the stable!

@ecomoney - I just wish you'd stop calling the Abiword 2.6.6 font problem a "showstopper". That's just alarmist and inaccurate. To put the bug in perspective, IF you open Word documents created elsewhere than in Abiword and IF those documents used Times New Roman font, then Abiword would garble the fonts UNTIL you highlighted the text and changed it to a supported font. No loss of data, No failure to import. No insurmountable problem. Hence, no "showstopper" bug.

I appreciate how important the issue is to you and your clients. I am not attempting to minimise that importance, but the reality is that bugs are classified according to their impact and the impact of this one is very minor indeed. A "showstopper" would be if the application crashed the first time you entered any text, or failed to save or print despite other applications doing so quite well, or even failed to save or import to or from a supported format. None of those are true in this case. It was a bad font substitution issue, nothing more.

ttuuxxx has provided a workable solution. Problem solved, for now. Please let's all get off the misery-go-round and let this very ordinary thread die a very ordinary but hopefully swift death! :roll:
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#50 Post by cindy »

I would like to say thank you to all the people that work so hard to enable me to use Linux.

Cindy

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