TDE Status Report

Hi all, After discussions with the core development team, I have realised that I owe everybody a long overdue update regarding Trinity. I apologise for the relatively long term silence on these mailing lists. Like most people, I have to work in order to keep the lights on and the servers humming, and these commitments have taken time away from TDE. In particular over the past several months I have not had any spare time to dedicate to TDE, which is why most development (other than Slavek's tireless patching) had appeared to grind to a halt. The good news is that the work which had been taking most of my time is now easing up. I am currently diving into the bugtracker and am currently focused on getting R14.0.0 stabilized and ready to ship. Thanks to several other dedicated individuals involved in the Trinity project, progress has continued while I was away. R14.0.0 is looking good overall, and the R14.0.0 road map and long term TDE road maps have been updated on the Etherpad to more accurately reflect our goals. Despite my absence I am encouraged that TDE will continue to move forward. After some discussions with the core developers of TDE, I have begun to realise that the project's top priority from now on needs to be resolving bug reports. Other work will continue, including enhancements and feature requests, but bug quashing will need to remain a top priority to ensure TDE's survival and success. Secondly, Trinity has much in common with other "secondary" desktop environments. We never will have the developer power or userbase of KDE, GNOME, or Unity, but like our cousin "secondary" desktops, TDE has a vtal role to play in the free/libre software world. We should strive for excellence within our particular software design model, and not worry so much about what the Big Three desktops are doing at any given instant. My motivation for using and developing Trinity is to create a desktop that functions the way I think it should function. How people believe a desktop should function varies widely and this is why so many exist, along with many window managers. The Trinity philosophy does not embrace certain popular elements now available in other desktops, and those elements are unlikely to ever become a part of Trinity. That kind of focus is neither "bad" nor "good." We live in a large, varied world and there is plenty of room for all of these varying opinions and designs. This is also part of the method why free/libre software will succeed in the long run: by encouraging choice and freedom of opinions. Continuing Trinity is not about "us" versus "them"; instead, we are simply exercising our freedom of choice by improving our software as we see fit. Nothing more, nothing less. Thank you so much for being patient the past several months. I know it was difficult for many of you, but rest assured that work on TDE will pick up again, especially with your continuing support! Timothy Pearson Trinity Desktop Project