[Pan-users] Re: Re: Re: Re: Fit image to Window

[Duncan]

James Sumners posted <address@hidden>, excerpted
below,  on Tue, 19 Oct 2004 20:47:28 -0400:

> The LCD was quite cheap because it was a return item. The base is
> lopsided. I have to use a monitor cable cap and a 3.5" diskette to level
> it.

Sounds like something I might do. <g>  .. Or did, with the "refurbished"
22", as I mentioned.
 
> Besides, the feature requested would be a lot cheaper to implement than
> buying a couple extra monitors. If I were not swamped with class work
> and job work I would look in to contributing the feature myself. As it
> is, though, I can only mention it and hope that it happens.

Good luck..  Taken a look at when the last PAN beta was.  January.  Pretty
soon we'll have to be adding 2004 to that, as it will have been a year.
That's a long time in open source terms.  I'm /not/ finding fault with
Charles, who after all mentioned at one point he'd had the sum total of
$16 contributed to the tip-jar on the site.  He has a real life and family
to attend to and feed.  Sometimes those take precedence.  As well, I'm not
a coder (other than simply shell scripts) myself, tho I contribute where I
can, as by helping folks here when I can.

No.. Charles has contributed a lot and brought the app a long way from
where it was with the initial developer.  However, it's apparent that he
doesn't have a lot (read virtually no) time for it any more, and a new
lead developer that has the time, talent, /and/ interest, is needed. 
Unfortunately, it doesn't seem many of those with the first two tend to
use graphical news clients enough to have the required amount of the third
one, so here PAN sits, awaiting someone who can, to decide they will. 

Note that I haven't heard anything from Charles in either list in some
time, and am not trying to put words in his mouth.  I have no idea how he
feels about this.  However, something Eric Raymond said in his "The
Cathedral and the Bazaar" book (IDR if it was that essay or one of the
others, probably one of the others, such as Homesteading the Noosphere, or
the like) has stuck with me.  The last job of any open source project
lead/maintainer, he said, when his interest in and time available for the
project has waned, is to find an appropriate person to whom to pass on the
mantle.  Barring any sudden new activity with PAN, it is beginning to look
like it's time.  Having been a follower of both the devel and user lists
for two years now, however,  there's simply no one to assume that
leadership position.  I believe I have been most active on the lists, and
have the interest and could take the time, but I simply don't have the
technical know-how.  Maybe in time I will.  However, realistically, PAN
will be nothing but a historic footnote by then, if it's waiting on me. 
If someone were to take it on and want to, perhaps I could be mentored,
but that still requires someone to take it on, with or without me.

Realistically, I'm beginning to shift my hopes toward knode, in part
because the rest of my desktop, sans PAN and XMMS, is KDE.  I haven't
looked at it in ages, and back when I DID (KDE 2.2 era, IIRC, it was
behind and PAN was under active development.  However, if knode has been
under development for the year and a half PAN has been nearly stalled, it
may well have surpassed PAN by now.  Someday I'll go look and see.  If
not..  I really don't know..

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little
temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." --
Benjamin Franklin