Re: [Opensync-devel] Fwd: Google plugin for opensync

[Quentin D. <que...@gm...>]

Hi Chris,

thank you very much for your long response and the clearing up of the
situation. I am happy to know that there is still a motivated and very
active developer in the opensync team. I think it is high time to finally
release a stable 0.40 version, including up-to-date plugins (the engine
without plugins makes the project useless). I have recently been in contact
with former opensync contributors or potential contributors, there all told
me that they stopped working on opensync because of its constant API changes
and lack of progress and stability.

I my opinion, it is urgent to bring opensync back on track. Many users and
developers are disappointed of the stalled progress and moved towards other
solutions. Some innovative projects will some make opensync a dead and
outdated application, two projects in particular are about to bring the
ultimate solution for KDE users:
- http://saidinesh5.wordpress.com/
<http://saidinesh5.wordpress.com/>- https://akunambol.forge.funambol.org/
So, my recommendation is to concentrate all the efforts on a new stable
release with all plugins working before these two projects dethrone you. The
next urgent thing would be then to create an Akonadi plugin [1] and the
opensync suite is back on the desktop!
Try to create a buzz around the new and finally stable release. Publish beta
versions and release candidates. Announce news on the website; show that you
are still actively developing it. ... And I will update the wiki, I promise!

Concerning the google plugin, Adenilson told me about the current features
of libgcal:

"Later in 2008, I asked his permission to continue this work, and started by
first writing a C library for google data protocol (libgcal) implementing
both calendar and contacts. And at the same year I re-wrote the opensync
gcalendar plugin and wrote  a new contacts plugin.

In 2009, I started akonadi resources using libgcal. You can read more about
both in here:
http://savago.wordpress.com/2010/06/11/libgcal-0-9-4-released/
http://savago.wordpress.com/2010/06/20/libgcal-0-9-5-plus-a-video/
"

So, I don't know what is really implemented in the opensync plugin; but
libgcal provides all these features. According to Adenilson, he has already
given up altogether of maintaining the opensync plugins and decided to
maintain the akonadi resources (which can be used with Kontact and
Kaddressbook).

Ok, so far so good, I hope things will evolve the best as opensync deserves.

Best regards and nice work,
Quentin Denis
<http://savago.wordpress.com/2010/06/20/libgcal-0-9-5-plus-a-video/>

[1] Some work has been done on it quite a while ago; but it seems to have
been removed from svn:
http://websvn.kde.org/trunk/playground/pim/
There you will also find discontinued projects like kitchensync
(discontinued because of the constant API changes, too).


On Thu, Aug 12, 2010 at 7:44 PM, Chris Frey <cd...@fo...> wrote:

> Hi Quentin,
>
> Thanks for your message... I'll reply to the list, in case others wish
> to join in.
>
> I guess you could say that I'm the latest in a line of maintainers
> for the google-calendar plugin.  I'm interested in getting opensync
> 0.39 working for personal reasons.  I'd like to see opensync continue,
> and I think 0.4x is so close to being useful that it would be a shame
> to drop it now.
>
> The primary issue is lack of ported plugins, and I'm working on that
> slowly.
>
> I think I might be the only developer committing code at the moment,
> though.
> And slowly at that!  But the 0.39 engine is useable, and arguably better
> than 0.22.  If the plugins were up to date, I think we could release it,
> and get more interest from users and maybe developers.
>
> I haven't followed Akonadi too closely.  Does it have the same range of
> syncing abilities that opensync 0.22 has?
>
> As for adding tasks support to the Google plugin, that would require
> support to be added in libgcal, and I don't think it's there yet?
> If libgcal had that support, I'd be interested in updating the plugin
> to support it.
>
> Adenilson, does libgcal support tasks and I just don't see it?
>
> - Chris
>
>
>
> On Thu, Aug 12, 2010 at 10:28:31AM +0200, Quentin Denis wrote:
> > Hello,
> >
> > I have sent this message to the authors of the google-calendar plugin, it
> > might interest you, too. I would be especially interested in getting
> status
> > update of the Akonadi plugin; this would bring back a lot of KDE users
> and
> > make opensync revive.
> >
> > Best regards,
> > Quentin Denis
> >
> >
> > ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> > From: Quentin Denis <que...@gm...>
> > Date: Thu, Aug 12, 2010 at 10:00 AM
> > Subject: Google plugin for opensync
> > To: ade...@in..., cd...@fo...,
> eha...@ra...
> >
> >
> > Hello guys,
> >
> > thanks to you, opensync has a powerful google calendar plugin. Lately,
> > Google has improved it's features and now offers "Tasks" and improved
> > "Contact". It would be nice to sync both with my Gnokii "Notes" and
> > "Addressbook", so are you interested in extending the existing plugin to
> > include these new features? It would bring a lot of users back to
> opensync
> > since this is a very useful synchronisation element. Opensync is too
> > restricted to Gnome users (evolution, tomboy, ...) and a complete Google
> > plugin would enable other users to escape this lack of plugins (KDE4
> plugin
> > being as dead as it has never been...).
> >
> > By the way, could enlighten me about the actual development status of
> > opensync? Is it still very active or is it moving to a dead end? Are all
> the
> > plugins compatible with the latest opensync api? What about Akonadi
> support?
> >
> > Thanks a lot for your work and looking forward to enjoying a more
> complete
> > Google plugin,
> > kind regards,
> > Quentin Denis
>
> >
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