Metisse / Façades : did I fail promoting it ?

Before I forget, thanks to Luis, I have a new hackergotchi. If you are aggregating myblog in a planet, please update my hackergotchi. Thanks.

Back on the main subject : I'm both happy and sad to see Jim talking about Façades. I'm happy because I'm no longer the only one talking about the various features of Metisse. But I'm sad, because Jim seems to discover Métisse and Façades, while we have been promoting Metisse for more than two years in Mandriva Linux and I've created screencast and doing demonstrations in various conférences. Our goal was to try to raise awareness of those kind of technologies (resulting from a lot of research and user testing done by Metisse team) in Free software desktop environment, hoping interested people would help Metisse team in develop their software or integrate some of Metisse ideas in "common" desktop environments.

I have mixed feeling about the results : we succeed because Metisse team was able to get a funding for hiring someone to work on Metisse code (Rémi Cardona) and helping to either port it to last Xorg technologies or get relevant Métisse technologies merged in Xorg platform (input redirection is handled in Métisse for a long time, for instance). But I also have the feeling I failed on promoting Metisse, since people are only discovering it now, instead of two years ago :(

So, if you want to refresh your views about Metisse, you can view screencasts I did two years ago (created directly from Metisse), either on Dailymotion (now available in high quality) or download them there. I also suggest you read their various research papers, they are extremely interesting. And of course, you can grab Mandriva Linux 2009 (or earlier versions), where Metisse is available as an option, just like Compiz Fusion.

I'm weak

Two weeks ago, I was invited in a Playstation event in a nice loft near Trocadero to test upcoming games on both PS3 and PSP, so I mostly tested Little Big Planet (on PS3), Locoroco 2 on PSP (I'm a fan of the first Locoroco on PSP) and Resistance 2 (I'm really bad at this kind of game). I mostly wanted to test Little Big Planet, since I first saw some videos from the game and next Prince of Persia (but it wasn't there to be tested unfortunately). And I wasn't disappointed (compared to two years ago where I was invited to a similar event, before PS3 official launch in France and almost no game was incentive enough for buying a PS3, unlike Wii). So, I was just weak : I waited until official launch of Little Big Planet in France (last Friday), available in a PS3 bundle and I bought it. And I really don't regret my decision, this game is great.

Since Friday, I have innoculated Little Big Planet virus to 6 other players (4 who had already a PS3 and now want to buy the game, and a couple who were waiting for good games on PS3 before buying one and plan to now ;), and I also contamined another friend, by just talking to him on Friday after over irc (and I must confess I was sure he already had a PS3 when I discussed with him, but he only had a PSP :D).

I'm weak, I know that now. And if you want to be weak with me on Little Big Planet, just add "UnFred" as your PSN contact...