went from the frying pan into the fire quite disheartening news regarding the development of Nepomuk, the semantic engine from the KDE desktop and its main developer . Surely many of you may know what I mean, is that the response has been quite strong by the community. I actually did not want to give it wings, something I regret now, so I come to offer an amendment, but I still see many things clear.

The story itself can be found on the blog of Sebastian Trug, a leading developer of Nepomuk , and no one better to explain it, but I present a translation published in Blue Leaf Linux, one of Spanish blogs in the first echo:

After all those posts semantic “Exposing more Nepomuk development to the community” I have to admit having a motive beyond.

recent months I have had no salary. Has been and still is, an uncertain situation with an uncertain future in which still had the hope that Mandriva will recover from its financial problems. But slowly the hopes and savings are dwindling.

I see a bright future for the semantic desktop Nepomuk in general and in particular prefer to continue working on this instead of choosing some other unrelated work. Nepomuk progress was made during the past months, the community grows and the system design is nearly mature . Essentially, my party would stop the development project and still am the only person working full time in Nepomuk and has a deep knowledge of every part of the system.

Therefore, if you think that the semantic desktop is worth the effort if you’re interested in features like semantic desktop search, exchanges between related persons, projects, events, files, emails, and if you want the stored semantic is possible, if you want Plasma Active differ from the rest by its powerful tools shown in Contour , if you want to browse the folders independent files physical, if you want to save snippets of web pages, pdfs, images and other, aim at them and label them, if you want the system to adapt to contextual changes and previous patterns of use, if you want to organize your work in the way it does your mind then please support my work in Nepomuk.

I am now in a position where you need to ask your help to get out of this drought. Until you find a way to support my work in Mandriva Nepomuk with or without have to rely on your donations.

Two days after the previous message, Sebastian Trug updated his blog with a new entry appreciating the response of the community and providing information on how you will communicate the fruits of their labor to those who are making money. Currently have won more than 2,300 of the 4,500 euros that seems to require the developer.

interested in donating money to Sebastian Trug can continue with their work can do it from the links on the blog linked, via PayPal.

So far the news. From here, opinion.

What’s wrong with that request financial aid? Nothing. If you want to donate some money, if not, then no. It’s as simple as that. But the future lies ahead for a project that has to remain so, more be a key part of the experience of an entire desk while a technology unfinished and quite unknown to most users of that desktop, has several factors to keep in mind that does not have to do with each other and summarized in bread today, hunger tomorrow.

The first factor in what to look out for is that there’s no drama human . A Sebastian Trug probably will not cost much effort to find work, but he wants to continue working on Nepomuk for the reasons explained above.

second direct consequence of the former, is stupidity displayed by the managers of Mandriva , the first discarding Trug, after launching a new version of its system that seeks to build on from the very pitcher Nepomuk applications. What the hell does that mean? It is clear that the company has struggled lately cheap, but I play one arm, that, while not firing the bosses have dropped a dollar or salary, as is the norm in these days of crisis.

third leads to the development model which is based on free software , and there are several. At this point I would like to express a little article on the subject which I think is the talking software utopia-get: an example called Linux Mint . If you pass from time to time by the blog of this distribution, each month publishes a kind of extract donations from developers and users that either have to do. Some donate 1 euro, hundreds, each month the project is bagged an average of 2000-4000 dollars, which are used to pay for infrastructure, and the salary of the project leader, Clement Lefebvre, and occasionally one of the leading developers.

business model of Linux Mint is excellent, although only one person can live from it (if they’re lucky, a more can do so). The problem is that it can not be extrapolated to the case at hand. How long can expect to live on donations Sebastian Trug, considering what it means to users today Nepomuk, a development that has spent years without getting anywhere in particular? And let no one misunderstand me, Nepomuk is great, just never just be ready . But again, how Trug with 4,500 expected to hold euros? Two months? ‘Three

The situation, as I said at the beginning of the article is quite disheartening, because it makes clear that without a firm which employs them, this effervescence of donations days are numbered . At this time I think of Nokia, which has quite a few KDE developers hired prominent … how long? We do not know. I also remember what happened to Pinta recently. Surely the developer would have continued with the project of making a living from it, although not the same case (now shown that a troll MuyLinux haunt clamoring for the benefits of proprietary software, but it does not matter).

So how is everything? That donations are more than well accepted, necessary , not only for the case at hand, but in general, but make only a little help, a small patch that improve the situation, least until a large majority of users will really raise awareness. Nothing more, nothing less.

if you expect some light to give final consideration to the matter, sorry, I have none. Maybe I just dream that will not be met, such that the government is spending millions of euros on duty free developments in supporting deserving, instead of continuing contracts that enslave embarrassing to Microsoft and Co. (I do not I am an anti-Windows, but in public institutions is even immoral to continue in this way in times of crisis, and continues without shame), or that, increasingly, small and medium businesses that are close to GNU / Linux Open Source solutions and not only do not drop a euro cent, to be seen as a future investment that, yes indeed going to bring enough savings, but you have to contribute.

But none of that will happen, so my apologies for the billet (this time does not criticize anything, but I complain).