Directx9

[brettholcomb at charter.net]

As a user watching this thread here's my comments - Mike is correct.  I understand Wine is not to 1.0 yet (close at .9 <G>) but we need something that is stable and that we can run while development is done in the unstable branch.  To be honest, Wine isn't going to be very useful and adopted until there is something that a user can install and know that if I have to update to a current verson and I pick the stable version that my apps that are running will continue to run.  At one time Wine was like this but in the last year it's gotten so that things that work don't anymore.  I have submitted bugs and done some regression testing but let's be honest - most don't have the skills, time or desire to do that but they want to move apps to Linux.  If anyone wants to use Wine for serious work to run apps they need then they won't use Wine.  Some may go to Crossover, others will just drop it and either go Windows for those systems or forget about Wine or it's derivatives.

As a user comments about letting things break and that users just have to put up with ituntil they are eventually fixed scare me!

Many projects have stable source that is intended for users and those who want to actually do something useful with the application and then they also have CVS which is for those who want to try out the latest, help fix bugs, etc.

> 
> From: Mike Hearn <m.hearn at signal.QinetiQ.com>
> Date: 2004/09/14 Tue PM 12:59:45 GMT
> I don't think it's about features. It's more about buggyness, and having 
> popular apps work. Having a stabilisation period where only regression 
> fixes are allowed on a particular branch could help with that.
> 
> > After all I don't think our Wine CVS is THAT broken/problematic (the
> > test suite should help here, too! Why not improve that one for a change?),
> > and if people want that extra bit of stability, then they're very
> > well-advised to go with CXO (or do you want to deprive CodeWeavers
> > of their well-earned money? ;-)).
> 
> Hehe, of course not :) I'm not volunteering to do any of this, at least 
> not right now! If Jeremy wanted to push Wine 0.9/1.0 forward then yes 
> I'd be happy to work on it but right now I don't have the time, and what 
> time I do have all goes on bugfixes and stabilisation for CrossOver.
> 
> Anyway. The fact that CrossOver is a successful product perhaps says 
> something about the value of stable releases.
> 
> > Even just thinking of the extra 700MB compiled code on my HDD resulting from
> > two branches worries me a bit. ;-)
> 
> Nobody is saying you have to use it, I'm sure most kernel developers 
> don't have both 2.4 and 2.6 installed at once.
> 
> > Not to mention that I believe that the kernel and KDE projects have a
> > drastically larger developer audience than Wine, so they can easily afford
> > having some people do the branch maintenance.
> 
> No, it's just a matter of willpower. Even small projects can do 
> stable/unstable releases. Indeed, KDE basically is just a collection of 
> smaller projects.
> 
> > So at this point in time I still think that doing stable/unstable branching
> > would be the entirely wrong thing to do.
> 
> What point in time would it be the right thing to do?
> 
> For me, the right time is "whenever Jeremy says it is" :) But, with my 
> community hat on, it's something that should be addressed at some point.