J5’s Blog

Havoc,

I totally agree that embeddable languages is the way to go.  I’ve been using JavaScript heavily lately, along with the excellent Firebug for debugging (decent debuggers are something some very big languages are missing btw).  The biggest issue I have with JavaScript  is it’s lack of structure and horrendous scoping rules (this certainly doesn’t mean you are calling the containing object, especially when running a “method” from a callback).

What would really make JavaScript even more useful is the proposal for JavaScript 2. Unfortunately that presentation was made in 2006 but some, if not all of those features are part of the ECMA Script 4 proposal.  They even have a reference implementation up which is under a liberal license (I haven’t looked into it much but it links to a GPLv3 library).  As anything in committee, it is slow moving.  Hopefully we will see a finished spec sometime soon but I couldn’t find a timeline.

In the meantime there is an ECMAScript 4.0 to JavaScript converter call Mascara.  Unfortunately it is under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 license which means the code can not be distributed on many distributions because of the Noncommercial clause.  It isn’t always clear what constitutes commercial and most distributions I know of want to allow the possibility of for pay distribution or use in a commercial product by 3rd parties.  It also isn’t clear if that license extends to the generated code.  Does anyone want to write a GPL version?

Truthfully, I have a dirty little secret - I like JavaScript with all of its warts and hackish workarounds.  I like it because I know non-programmers who can grok JavaScript but can’t wrap their heads around Python or C.  I attribute that more to the environment than the language itself because it allows for the instant gratification of hitting the reload button and seeing something happen.  But what I like even more is the idea of embeddable languages bringing that sort of development process to GNOME.  There are a few apps that already do this and though it isn’t as easy as it is with the web whenever I have jumped into one of those apps, such as experimenting with writing a quick Vi mode for gEdit, it is amazingly simple.

What would keep me working in those environments would be an embeddable debugger, object viewer and UI/extension point tree.  Whoever writes those components and makes it simple to add scripting to any GObject app will be a hero in the community.  Anyone willing to sign up?

For my Fedora friends who don’t read Planet GNOME (you should):

• Federico’s screencast of rpm2git tool - we should be using this or something similar

This really gives a kick in the pants to those who take short cuts and lose sight of software freedom.  Kudos to Mozilla who actually has the critical mass to effect real change by endorsing Vorbis and Theora on all of their OS platforms.  Soon it will be up to the content producers to make open formats ubiquitous.  Having a delivery channel which people use on a regular basis means we can finally work from start to finish without touching a closed format if we so choose.  That to me is freedom - not forcing everyone to encode in open codecs, but to allow for those who prefer open formats the ability to deliver their content without any barriers between them and their end users. There are those who don’t want to see this happen but I have to believe that momentum is starting to swing our way.

Last week I talked about Ogg and stirred up a bit of controversy when I suggested we take Linux.com to task for not providing open formats. While it was very effective in getting people to write in showing their displeasure with propriatary formats, it almost failed at achieving the goal of getting them to switch. The problem with language is it can be very imprecise, especially in written form where tone is often hard to assess. While there is a time and a place for strong words we must understand that words can hurt and push people into a defensive stance where even the most innocuous of statements are misconstrued.

The correct words I should have used with Linux.com was that we should engage them. Simply telling them that they had to switch to Ogg was putting them in a defensive stance because of various factors. From what I had found out, this was a small team of hard working individuals with families, a love for reporting and not enough time or resources to do everything they would like to do. What I needed to do was find an way over the wall so we could figure out a way forward. That way was through politeness and an offer to help.

I had e-mailed Robin “Roblimo” Miller, a senior editor at Linux.com, with my offer to help and he suggested I call him so we could speak as two humans. I spent an hour on Friday talking and more importantly listening to Robin, realizing that this was a man who was willing to help push forward the use as open formats where practical. He had talked to Monty during an interview for a piece on video formats and hashed out the quality issues to his satisfaction. But, he has also talked about the need for delivery systems which would make Ogg as ubiquitous as Flash video and make using Ogg as his primary format and easy choice as it would be able to reach the the wider audience which keeps his site going.

What I picked up out of the conversation that was important to me was that Linux.com was moving forward and had a keen interest in supporting open media. I didn’t expect things to happen overnight, I just wanted to know that they were happening. I was pleased to see their last weekly wire go out with a link to the Ogg Theora download which I promptly watched.

But now it is our turn to be “taken to task”. We need to help out by making it more economical for sites to post open media. To do this we need to help improve the quality of Theora and help complete Dirac. We must also help out writing easy to use software to edit video. Two promising contenders in this area is Kino and Pitivi with Kino being much further along though I personally like Pitivi’s interface better. Delivery systems as I have said are also important, whether it be working on Firefox’s video tag support, various plugin systems, video blogging software or simply setting up a “Got Ogg?” campaign to distribute plugins, content and advice on using open formats.

The ball is in our court and we need to keep running with it. If you really care about open media then find a way you can help out. Happy holidays everyone.

It seems Apple is not the entity fighting for a DRM-less world we thought they were and Nokia isn’t such a great patron for open source software either. For those who haven’t heard the news, lobbying by both companies have caused the W3C to strike a provision in a HTML5 draft which would make OGG Vorbis and Theora a standard media format on the web. What baffles me about this is having Vorbis and Theora media formats does not stop Apple or Nokia from distributing content using whatever proprietary format they wish. This just hobbles the web which had exploded thanks to open standards, open formats and open source. In recent years though the web has become more and more proprietary. Allowing companies to remove open formats from an open standard without nominating another equally open format to take its place allows special interests to control the development of the web. This effectively locks out a large portion of the small independent content providers from distributing next generation content such as video while moving us toward a world where a few entities control the distribution of all content.

There is a light at the end of the tunnel though. It is time for us to make the OGG family of codecs ubiquitous with or without the mandate of a standard. A large step in that direction is Firefox developing native OGG support. Easily installed IE plugins would go a long way also. It is also up to the community to post their content in an open format. The next time linux.com post a link to mp3 content that they produced and not have a Vorbis link associated with it I hope people take them to task. The same goes for people posting content on the various planets. Open formats are essential to a free and open web.