NYT: Kapor Says Chandler Due in April

< Next Topic | Back to topic list | Previous Topic >

Posted by Daly de Gagne
Feb 12, 2007 at 12:06 PM

I saw the following on the PIM list:

‘Recasting the Word Processor for a Connected World By MICHAEL FITZGERALD, NY Times Published: February 11, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/11/business/yourmoney/11proto.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1171256802-oTmA0kQA/TiIqn6xxi1dDA

‘“At the moment, Mr. Kapor is trying to avoid those shoals himself. His current project is an open source personal information manager called Chandler, which started as a complete rethinking of the way calendar and contact-management software works, and is about three years behind his original schedule. A version that people can use, he said, will arrive in April — and it will, by design, be a gentler break with the past than he intended at the start.”’

My take is that the world caught up with Kapor, and his notions of information handling, so in a sense it would not matter how much of a break Chandler was with the past; the three year delay referred to in the article was bound to make Chandler look less innovative than it sounded when Kapor first talked about it.

The big question in my mind is why did Chandler take so long. Kapor had something many independent developers do not: money. I suspect that he forgot the importance of keeping things simple, and created a development organization that, by definition, was not quick moving.

Perhaps I am wrong on my view—but a three-year delay when you have the resources Kapor had doesn’t make sense.

In any event, it will be interesting to see what Kapor et al have come up with, and to learn whether the emperor has any clothes.

Daly

Posted by Jan Rifkinson
Feb 12, 2007 at 12:40 PM

Look @ Alpha v0.7 & you’ll get a sartorial glimpse.

—
Jan Rifkinson
Ridgefield, CT USA

Posted by Gorski
Feb 12, 2007 at 03:54 PM

This book on the Chandler project will explain why it took so long: http://www.dreamingincode.com/

Back to topic list