[Server-devel] XSCE Update day 2

[David Farning]

We are in the early afternoon of day two here in Gimli. We are still
in a camper trailer with limited 3G access. George is suggesting that
we turn of the power and try to survive on the trailer's 12 volt
battery power....

The big new is that Aneesh Dogra will be picking up Pathagar (
http://www.olpcsf.org/node/126 ) and beating it into shape. Pathage is
a simple book server.... which is a critical piece of the puzzle.

The book server presents a four way question of which came first the
chicken or the egg :(

1. Well curated book collections.  Unless librarians and teacher know
that real live students will be benefiting from their work, it is hard
to engage them in curating digital libraries.

2. Working book collection software. Unless hackers know that real
live students will be benefiting from their work, it is hard to engage
them in writing the software.

3. Publishers support. Unless publishers know that real live students
will be benefiting from their catalog, it is hard to engage them in
sharing their catalog.

4. Impact on students. Without book collections, book server software,
and publisher support, it is hard to have a significant impact.

This presents an implement challenge. We can't just say, "Step one
done, let's move on to step two."  Instead, we iterate back and forth.
Adding one brick at a time to build up the four walls.

The other technical advance is Jerry's progress on the off line
installer. As we saw with David Leeming. Installing MUST just work. If
someone wants to try XSCE and the install fails, it is going to be
very hard to convince them to try again. Please see the Purchase
Funnel at ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purchase_funnel )

Finally, on the community side. We have 10+1 people from around the
globe participating in the sprint to make this project a success. A
couple of hours ago, during our daily call I thought I was going to
lose my mind:) Each sprint the number of people and number of moving
parts increases. It can be stressful to trust the culture that we have
worked hard to nurture... rather than micromanage and piss everyone
off:(

--
David Farning
Activity Central: http://www.activitycentral.com