I’m not worrying much about different frameworks. After all they are based on QT, so you can just compile DirectUI and run it on Symbian device
I’m sure community will make Symbian theme. It’s easy and fun.

I guess that people are mostly worried about if they want to port their plain Qt application to Maemo 6 or to Symbian DirectUI they need to create two different UIs. But personally I was surprised that Nokia will introduce two Qt based UI frameworks that are not compatible at the same time. Unless I have understood something wrong? For me this just sounds waste of resources and money.

I can understand why there are DuiWidget based widgets in Maemo 6. If you want to create “cool” Maemo 6 applications you should build (at least) your application UI based on Dui widgets. If you’re using Maemo 6 widgets in your application then you will gain all the benefits that application framework can provide your app. Apple does the same thing in their application framework in order to “force” applications to have the same and a consistent look and feel all over the platform. Personally I think this approach ok from the perspectives of OVI Store, marketing and the future Maemo releases. Unless Nokia decides to introduce a new incompatible UI framework for Maemo 7:)

But as I stated in this blog article, I believe there is nothing that prevents you to use plain Qt and run that application on Maemo 6.

Thanks for your comment. If you want, you can also raise these Maemo 5 problems here or give me a pointer to a specific discussion thread in maemo.org. I can add a link to this article also if you want. It seems that some of the Nokia people are actually reading this blog, but also creating a new topic to the Maemo TALK forum and make it active is a good way to get some publicity for the problems.

The reason why I have started to think of Maemo 6 is that there seems to be problems also. If it is possible to raise these issues in early phase (but I think we are already late) maybe Nokia could change something before the final release.

I think you’re right that things must work for Maemo 5 and make people to want to do development on top of that. If Nokia doesn’t get it work properly, it’s definetly not a good base for Maemo 6, but I’m also worried that the difference between Maemo 5 and Maemo 6 might be quite huge. Will the work on Maemo 5 has an effect to Maemo 6?

@reader: It really might be that Nokia strategy is the “survival of the fittest” as you stated, but when I’m thinking of all the money and resources that are spent for that, is that really a wise strategy? I don’t know…

@timsamoff: You have many good points there. Thank you.

I understand that Nokia is doing business with Maemo and the community is important, but the it is not a priority #1. I guess the priority #1 is to create a mobile device for masses, sell millions of it, and only after that comes the community. The community is important because it will produce the most of the applications available for Maemo 6.

I’m NOT saying that Nokia is treating community bad, actually I think they are doing it pretty WELL – Maemo Summits, maemo.org, pre-released devices for community members, etc. I assume, the community would be more than happy if they could be part of the Maemo development even more earlier. Community has also provided valuable information about how it feels about the things that Nokia is doing. This has probably had an effect at least at some level inside the Nokia, or if it hasn’t, then I’m disappointed. Of course you can’t please everyone, that’s a fact.

I believe that the previous versions of Maemo (including Maemo 5) have been sort of “training lessons” for creating a linux based Maemo device and the real target is the Maemo 6. This could be one of the reasons for incompatibility between Maemo versions. I also believe that after Maemo 6, we are not going to see such a huge differences between Maemo versions, especially when it comes to the application development. It’s not a wise thing to change API too often if they want to beat other commercial app stores and keep applications available even for a new devices.

Still I’m interesting to see how Maemo 6 and Symbian orbit/DirectUI will fit together.

Yet, all this is just a speculation ;P

But, the downfall of being community members and not company employees (as always) is that we cannot see the heirarchical roadmap of what Nokia is planning… What we have been promised is an easier, more streamlined approach for development under Maemo 6. What we know is that Maemo is the current “flagship” operating system at Nokia. Therefore, it can probably be presumed that methods are being created to allow developers to code once for every (mobile/Maemo/Symbian) platform.

Of course, as stated, this is just a presumtion. I wish I knew.

Still, the issue that’s always existed within Maemo — and, to some extent, every major open source project — is that there are a bunch of very smart people who think they know what’s best (for their own ends, of course). The fly in the oinment concerning Maemo is that it exists (and survives) because of corporate sponsorship. And, unfortunately, the corporate sponsor has the bigger vote in what’s “best.” We, as a community, are fortunate enough that the corporate sponsor allows us to voice opinions in the first place. But, more importantly, we are extremely lucky that they really are thiking about the best way to allow the community to develop software for their platform(s). And, let us not forget, that Maemo Devices is made up of a number of Linux developers — many who lived and developed in the open source world before going to Nokia. This may not be as “poorly planned” as everyone thinks.

Then again… It might be. :p