[maemo-developers] Assuring quality in extras (was Re: Beware)

[From: Quim Gil]

The discussion about the potentially buggy extras package is a good
starting point to a discussion about how quality should be addressed in
Fremantle extras.

We have started this discussion many times but never got to conclusions.

The fact is that the good work done by the community working on the
extras content and infrastructure is convincing Maemo SW that the extras
repository should be activated by default, being part of the offering
Maemo 5 users will have since day 1.

All this should result in much bigger number of downloads and real users
enjoying those apps. But if then something goes wrong e.g. an applet
draining a battery... The negative effect is also more visible in basd
press, calls to Nokia Care, units returned and etc, since all what most
users see is "my Nokia Something worked before but now it doesn't".

The extras process introduced in Diablo has been useful improving the
quality assurance but 'packages that build' is not enough. What else
could be done?

There are some vague ideas listed at
https://wiki.maemo.org/Extras_repository_process_definition#Quality_Assurance

-- 
Quim Gil
marketing manager, open source
Maemo Software @ Nokia