[mythtv-theming] The MythTV-Themes project on github (was Re: The version of the TintedGlass theme available via the theme chooser for trunk (0.25) is very old.)

Michael T. Dean mtdean at thirdcontact.com
Thu Mar 1 19:28:42 UTC 2012


On 03/01/2012 11:46 AM, Chris Pinkham wrote:
> * On Wed Feb 29, 2012 at 03:59:39PM -0600, Harley Peters wrote:
>> git clone git://github.com/hpeters/TintedGlass.git
>>
>> https://github.com/hpeters/TintedGlass
> Thanks, my packaging script was still pointed at your old repo
> at git://vps64.biterror.net/TintedGlass.  I reran the packaging
> script and after the ftp rsync happens tonight, I'll update the
> themes.zip index on the webserver.
...
>> This could be moved to your MythTV-Themes project if you want to.
>> Doesn't matter to me as long as its available via github.
> One of the advantages of having themes centralized is that it
> makes it easier for new (and existing) themers to browse around
> other themes for hints or help.  It also helps promote a theming
> community.  Michael Dean can move your theme in if you want and
> you'll still retain full control over access to it.

Yeah, and here are a few other things that themers may want to think about.

First, it's not "my" MythTV-Themes project.  It's "yours".  :)  The 
project belongs to all the themers, for their use, as desired.  Any 
theme in the project gets its own repo and the theme "owner" (currently 
authors) is given administrative control of that repo--about equivalent 
to a https://github.com/<username>/<reponame> type repository, in that 
you decide who can and who cannot work on your theme.  And, you can even 
delete your own theme repo and move it elsewhere, if you later find a 
reason to.

As you can see from the above, if your theme is in a separate github 
project (or, SVN repo or ...), the Theme Chooser packaging script can 
handle your theme just as well as if it's in MythTV-Themes project.  
Therefore, moving isn't required.

However, ...

Having your theme in the MythTV-Themes project can help you to remove 
clutter from your own personal project page.  If you have a lot of repos 
on your page, finding your MythTV theme among those listed repos may be 
challenging for other people.  If you have no other repos on your page, 
moving to MythTV-Themes will allow you to remove that repo and, instead, 
generally just work out of the MythTV-Themes repo, where you'll also see 
a bunch of other themes and, even, be able to keep up with their 
development.  Also, not having your theme in your personal project page 
means that it doesn't count toward the github 100MB limit for the github 
free plan.

Having your theme in the MythTV-Themes project may also (though it 
really shouldn't) lend an air of trust to the theme, since it's in a 
project with the MythTV name and with a lot of other themes--if nothing 
else, a user (or, more likely, prospective themer) who finds the theme 
exists there may see it as more likely to be developed for widespread 
use than a theme on a random github user's page.  In reality, the only 
real difference that may exist is that we will attempt to clearly 
identify the status of themes in the project--i.e. to move out-of-date 
themes into an Archived status after a while (something which may happen 
to metallurgy "soon", if we don't find a volunteer to update and 
maintain it--a volunteer that Stuart M decides to give commit or admin 
privileges to, since it's his theme, so his decision to make).

Having your theme in the MythTV-Themes project may also help you to find 
and exchange ideas/approaches with other themers more easily.  If 
nothing else, it makes it easier for themers to find your theme repo, to 
view its history or see its current code.

Oh, and as far as moving your repo, depending on how you've configured 
your current repo, switching to the new location could be as easy as 
running a single git config command (that I can provide for you) 
or--worst-case-scenario--doing another git clone to check out the new 
repo.  Even if you have to re-clone the repo, it's likely to only 
require 10MB or less bandwidth.

As I said, it takes me only seconds to set up your repo (and likely less 
than a second for you to copy/paste the command to switch repo 
locations).  The only reason I haven't already set up repos for the rest 
of the themes in themes.zip/Theme Chooser is because I want the theme 
owners to decide that the approach would work well for them rather than 
forcing the idea upon them.  I think the potential for benefit to the 
themers is high.  And, if any of you think of ways we can improve on the 
idea, we're open to suggestions--after all, it is /your/ project--so we 
can make changes to better support your use, where possible.  (I'm still 
looking at github features to see if there are any we can take advantage 
of to make things easier for you--from their project web pages to their 
issue tracker (and making it easy to find from MythTV web pages) to 
commit notifications (and, potentially setting up a 
mythtv-theming-commits mailing list you all could subscribe to) or ...  
Please let me know what you all would like to see.)

So, if anyone is interested in hosting their theme at the MythTV-Themes 
project, please say so and I'll get you set up.  :)

Thanks,
Mike


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