Hello guys,
I'm packaging Gnac, it's my first package and I have the following doubt:
Gnac is an audio converter, it can convert a lot of audio files and some of these types aren't directly supported by Fedora. On the .desktop file, it register some of these non supported types.
Michael Schwendt (he did the package review), find better if an application didn't register for MIME types it doesn't support, but some other applications like audio players does that.
What I should to do in this case? The bugzilla link is:
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=555018
Blog - http://www.focolive.org
Taylon Silmer wrote:
Hello guys,
I'm packaging Gnac, it's my first package and I have the following doubt:
Gnac is an audio converter, it can convert a lot of audio files and some of these types aren't directly supported by Fedora. On the .desktop file, it register some of these non supported types.
Michael Schwendt (he did the package review), find better if an application didn't register for MIME types it doesn't support, but some other applications like audio players does that.
What I should to do in this case?
I'd be quite upset if I would have a file of an unsupported type and when double clicking I would see an application which instead of playing the file would cry "unsupported file" (or any similar message) So I would say that Michael is right, unsupported types should not be registered. And after all, what would be the usefulness of lying to the users ?
Manuel
Hello guys, < So I would say that Michael is right, unsupported types should not be < registered. < And after all, what would be the usefulness of lying to the users ?
I beg you pardon, but I tend to disagree.
From user perspective I would be more than happy to see that I have got
the right application to handle given format already. Only thing I am missing is the right codec.
Gnac is using gstreamer that means that support for some other type of media could be probably added just by installing plugins to gstreamer. The fact that it is not supported out of the pure Fedora repository doesn't mean that the support cannot be added by the user by installing the right plugin (for example from the rpmfusion repository).
That is probably the reason why other media players do register for all possible media types even without the right codecs present already in the system.
Best regards Michal Ambroz
On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 19:43:02 +0100 (CET), Michal wrote:
Hello guys, < So I would say that Michael is right, unsupported types should not be < registered. < And after all, what would be the usefulness of lying to the users ?
I beg you pardon, but I tend to disagree.
From user perspective I would be more than happy to see that I have got
the right application to handle given format already. Only thing I am missing is the right codec.
1.) See http://bugzilla.redhat.com/555018#c4 - the app prints a very ambiguous error message only.
2.) Fedora does not supply "the right codec". The app would still advertise MP3 support, for example, even on installations where no 3rd party repository is enabled.
On 01/18/2010 08:43 PM, Michal Ambroz wrote:
Hello guys, < So I would say that Michael is right, unsupported types should not be < registered. < And after all, what would be the usefulness of lying to the users ?
I beg you pardon, but I tend to disagree.
From user perspective I would be more than happy to see that I have got
the right application to handle given format already. Only thing I am missing is the right codec.
Actually as an ordinary user you would see an application that claims to support a file type, but it does not. Most users have no idea what a plugin is. And they do not care. They just want the application to simply work (trust me on this one, I am doing user support since '87 and I've had my share of WTFs). I might be persuaded to accept an error message saying "It seems you want to play a file of type XYZ but unfortunately you miss some bits. For a full blown experience, please visit http://<useful hint goes here> install the support for XYZ and retry". But I would remove without hesitation an application which pops in just to say "Hey, Johny! Remember what you have just tried ? Guess what ! It does not work ! (No, Johny, I will not tell you why, go figure that yourself.)".
Gnac is using gstreamer that means that support for some other type of media could be probably added just by installing plugins to gstreamer. The fact that it is not supported out of the pure Fedora repository doesn't mean that the support cannot be added by the user by installing the right plugin (for example from the rpmfusion repository).
In which case the app should register those media types in the moment when the right plugins are installed
That is probably the reason why other media players do register for all possible media types even without the right codecs present already in the system.
Or maybe they are all wrong. The most frequent reason I uninstall an application is when trying to use it and notice that it does not perform the tasks that it claims it. (Second reason is when the application keeps crashing or misbehaving )
On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 23:27:12 +0200, Manuel wrote:
Actually as an ordinary user you would see an application that claims to support a file type, but it does not. Most users have no idea what a plugin is. And they do not care. They just want the application to simply work (trust me on this one, I am doing user support since '87 and I've had my share of WTFs).
Though, for those who do research about 3rd party add-on packages, installing additional GStreamer plugin packages will make this particular app work. Plus, the app's default .desktop file will not need a modification. That's the only benefit. The users will not need to install a gnac-freeworld packages to extend the application. Nobody will need to create and maintain that extra package.
However, in the same way the 3rd party add-on packages provide additional codecs to GStreamer, they may also
- supply support for even further file types _not_ covered by the .desktop file, - remove support for file types regardless of what the .desktop file says.
It boils down to deciding how Fedora would like it to be handled in general. There are no guidelines about that yet. Fedora _without_ added 3rd party repositories does not provide MP3 support. Do we want software to advertise MP3 support nevertheless? If so, what conditions must be met? Clear error messages about failures to handle files, even if "secret"/undocumented 3rd party codecs pkgs are missing? How much weight do we give 3rd party add-on repositories in Fedora's packages even if we cannot create RPM dependencies for any add-ons?
In another review, an audio utility examines files with "sox". Fedora's "sox" does not handle .mp3, .mpc, .wma and many other file formats either. It cannot easily be extended. One way to extend it is to _replace_ it with an ugly shell-wrapper-script that handles some file types with external tools, albeit in a very basic way only. Such a replacement packages is not available yet, afaik. So, if the app pretended that it would handle MP3, it would be wrong and also confusing. On the contrary, if it only advertised support for the file types that Fedora's software collection can handle, I would find that okay.
I might be persuaded to accept an error message saying "It seems you want to play a file of type XYZ but unfortunately you miss some bits. For a full blown experience, please visit http://<useful hint goes here> install the support for XYZ and retry". But I would remove without hesitation an application which pops in just to say "Hey, Johny! Remember what you have just tried ? Guess what ! It does not work ! (No, Johny, I will not tell you why, go figure that yourself.)".
That's close to what Gnac does currently, unfortunately. It doesn't complain at all about adding a file it doesn't understand. Later, upon starting the conversion, it only says
Conversion complete with errors
in its status bar. Which isn't true. Actually the conversion had failed entirely. On the console it's not much more specific:
Gnac failed to convert file file:///home/qa/Desktop/audio/test/1.wma Error message: An error occured during conversion
Once the audio player already does that, we shouldn't to continue registering these mimetypes until exist some guideline?
Blog - http://www.focolive.org
Someone has some other opinion?
I'm a new packager and in this case I don't know what I should to do.
packaging@lists.fedoraproject.org
-
Manuel Wolfshant -
Michael Schwendt -
Michal Ambroz -
Rex Dieter -
Taylon