Need for an App store for RB programmers

[FiftyOne]

With the upcoming launch of boards, I wonder if a semi moderated app store, much like chrome or FF has, would be appropriate?

Having a centralized place where developers can upload projects, code, information, apps & even operating systems (if people feel energetic) would be a really good way to feed the development of the initial board sales

[steaky1212]

Just dont call it an app store. otherwise the vamps from apple will try to shut you down...
Imagine the claim - "Not only do they call it an app store, but they are named after a fruit - unbelievable infringment"

Would be cool for the app store name to be connected to the "raspberry" brand tho - unfortunately I'm in design and not marketing - draw your own conclusions

[clivef]

Quote from FiftyOne on November 8, 2011, 07:16
...Having a centralized place where developers can upload projects, code, information, apps & even operating systems (if people feel energetic) would be a really good way to feed the development of the initial board salesThe idea is sound but you'd have a job to make something as featured or robust as e.g. SourceForge or, say, Alioth (Debian) , which do all of that plus things like version tracking, collaboration etc. One USP might be to make a simplified, less techy/geeky "store" to appeal to younger people and people just getting into programming who might be intimidated by e.g. SF. A big job though .

[tufty]

If the preferred OS is debian, then surely all that's "needed" is a package repository, and a distro that's preconfigured to prefer packages from there rather than the "official" debian one?

Simon

[jacklang]

Some people may prefer to sell their content rather than place it in a free distro

[tufty]

That's true enough, but does that mean the Foundation should be spending time and money providing the infrastructure for them to do so? For an "app store" to work, it would (at least as far as I'm concerned) have to be controlled by the Foundation; the amount of infrastructure required just to provide that is massive (not to mention the other overheads like approval and testing, complaints handling and so on). Given the "market" for RasPi is educational, you'd need strict controls to keep the pr0n-downloaders, rootkit development tools, and so on *off* a hypothetical app store.

As soon as you get into centralising "paid content", you have to start working on "piracy protection" (which is a pretty-much impossible task when you have a platform that's open and not necessarily permanently connected to the 'net).

The major "app stores" out there at the moment are Apple's, which is controlled in a somewhat draconian way, but works if you can get your apps onto it, and Android Market, which is about as far from being a workable system as you can imagine - the only way to make money from Android as far as I can tell is to have an ad-supported business model. Ad-supported doesn't work if your platform is likely to be "offline".

My advice would be to hold a package repo, or even just a centralised git/svn/cvs repo, and let anyone who wants to sell stuff deal with it any way they see fit.

[chip273]

I also think that a totally moderated appstore would be just wrong. But there is definitively some need for a place for R-Pi compatible software, so that it can be found easily.

As for the "projects, code, information, apps & even operating systems" from the initial post. Most of the information and project ideas will -I guess- be formed in this forum and on the R-Pi wiki that is linked on this page. Probably most of the sample code will land on github.

So I think that the needed space is there already..

[FiftyOne]

What I mean to say about an 'App store' is more an App repository of some kind. Its really just a place that all the code & apps people want to share can be stored to make sure its easily searchable & so on

[Montekuri]

I think we don't need to worry about it.
When the R-Pi has been launched and a big R-Pi community has been consolidated (someday in 2012), a lot of sites of distro repository will appear.
And in a lot of languages.
And the R-Pi users will be the supervisors of such distros or applications. They will say such app work and the other don't work.
Things flow naturally.

[jamesh]

Quote from chip273 on November 8, 2011, 11:46
I also think that a totally moderated appstore would be just wrong. But there is definitively some need for a place for R-Pi compatible software, so that it can be found easily.

As for the "projects, code, information, apps & even operating systems" from the initial post. Most of the information and project ideas will -I guess- be formed in this forum and on the R-Pi wiki that is linked on this page. Probably most of the sample code will land on github.

So I think that the needed space is there already..

Well, the place for prebuilt apps would be the Debian (or whichever distro) Arm archive. It already works for sudo apt-get for most apps.

As for code depositories, any of the online systems would be fine - Sourceforge, github, bitbucket to name but three.

I think it highly unlikely that the Raspi foundation will have the staffing and servers levels needed to have their own systems.

[Chris Tyler]

Any of the modern distros has repositories into which anyone can -- in cooperation with the distro's open source community and taking the time and effort to go through the appropriate review processes -- add quality software; and furthermore, anyone can create their own add-on repository as well (even with horrible software!). And there are plenty of good browsing tools for repositories.

But "repository" sounds a whole lot more formal and scary than "app store" or "marketplace". We need a new, friendly name that won't attract lawyers...

[ukscone]

Quote from Chris Tyler on November 9, 2011, 15:37

But "repository" sounds a whole lot more formal and scary than "app store" or "marketplace". We need a new, friendly name that won't attract lawyers...


Bakery?

"Get your application from the Raspberry Pi Bakery"

that sounds like it'd be lawyer proof although you know that these darn lawyers could find a way to sue nature for patent/trademark infringement if they try hard enough. no offense liz, you are the exception that proves the rule. i wonder why lawyers are always practicing? you'd think they knew how to do it by now although at least they aren't soliciting.

Why does NJ have all the smelly factories and CA have all the lawyers? NJ had first choice.

[Montekuri]

R-Pi Soft Center?

[anakinpendragon]

you can use synaptic, to install software from debian repositories. It's easy to use.


It isn't beatiful like android market, but it's ready to use.

[tnelsond]

Why not have a testing repository for software that hasn't been "approved", and then once it is and has been well tested it goes to an unstable repository and then to a stable one. Kind of like debian works now. If people want bug-free software they'll go to the stable repo, and if they want experimental stuff they'll go to the less safe testing repository.

[tnelsond]

Quote from anakinpendragon on November 9, 2011, 16:05
It isn't beatiful like android market, but it's ready to use.

But the Ubuntu Software Center is (surely there'd be some way to either clone that or install it on Debian):

[abishur]

Well, you can add repositories so there's no reason not to have a developmental repository and a stable repository. I'm not a big fan of the new software center in ubuntu, but I'm not sure if that's because I'm stubborn against the change because it's change, or because they're listing all these "buy me" items now.

[tnelsond]

I don't like the software center either because it's really dumbed down, but it is android-like. I hope the R-Pi doesn't aspire to be android (shudders).

EDIT: I run Arch Linux and install all my software from the command line.

[liz]

We do have aspirations, but that's not one of them. 8)

[ukscone]

Quote from liz on November 9, 2011, 16:43
We do have aspirations, but that's not one of them. 8)

I want to be a steam engine when i grow up

[mard0]

Quote from ukscone on November 9, 2011, 17:02
Quote from liz on November 9, 2011, 16:43
We do have aspirations, but that's not one of them. 8)

I want to be a steam engine when i grow up

I still wanne be a eletrical engine when i grow up. But this just might be the newer generation talking

[obarthelemy]

Time for some flower power:

[Burngate]

When I grow up I want to be a Philanthropist - they always seem to have lots of money

[tufty]

Growing up's for losers.

[Method]

Hmm, should be called the Fruit Stall (that doesn't sell apples).