Abandoned Themes/Uploading corrections??

[thenrik]

Hi:

  I've been using the Ajax theme since I got my Rockboxed Toshiba F40 around January 20th of 2007. The Ajax theme was developed by Ajax on December 26th of 2006 and as far as I can tell never updated. I've manually updated it twice to reflect code changes and it is working with the July 30th, 2008 build. It's simple and easy to see, even in bright light. Using Unifont, I can see all of my Chinese and Japanese songs.

  All that being said, it's a broken theme twice over, still sitting unmodified on the theme page.  It seems silly to keep all of the abandoned/broken themes online when it just will cause frustration for users and give Rockbox a black eye of sorts.

 Can we as users upload a corrected  theme to a moderator, who after confirming it works, would then upload it to the theme page?

Tom

[AlexP]

If it is licensed to that you can, please by all means fix and reupload.  It is a wiki - you don't need a mod for this.  If it is not under a suitable license, nobody can.

[thenrik]

Hi:

  The zipfile itself just contains files without a readme or license. The description on the themes page is:
Ajax

This is my theme, named after myself. I'm not that good at graphics so most of it is code but it all looks pretty well. I will be updating this again soon so check in every few days.

Can I upload the corrected theme?

Thanks,

Tom

[AlexP]

Who wrote the theme?  First you say:

The Ajax theme was developed by Ajax

and then:

This is my theme, named after myself.

If you are the author, then you can make the changes and then please when you upload the new one license it as CC-BY-SA (as that licence is likely to soon be required).  If you are not the author, as it is not currently licensed I'm afraid you cannot do anything with it - except contact the original author and ask him to release it under a suitable licence

[MarcGuay]

I believe he was quoting from the author's statement when he wrote "This is my theme, named after myself."

[AlexP]

I believe he was quoting from the author's statement when he wrote "This is my theme, named after myself."

OK, I didn't see that at all, it was less than clear that it was a quote!

thenrik:  In that case, no, you cannot upload it without contacting the author and getting him to put the theme under a suitable licence.

[MrMEC]

That still doesn't address the issue of abandoned themes.   Say if the author is contacted and could care less about updating the theme, what then?  If no one can upload changes and the author will not update it himself I think it makes sense to either remove the theme entirely, mark as it "broken" or "outdated", or move it to a new, separate page containing similar abandoned themes. 

It makes no sense to feature broken themes on the wiki if they are abandoned and will never work since no one else but the author is allowed to fix them.

[AlexP]

Very true - if the author couldn't care less or doesn't respond or whatever, and they don't work, then yes, they should go.  You might see this rather soon...

[thenrik]

Hi:

  I have no idea how to contact Ajax. Is there a way to find his/her contact information? If not, I believe it's best to take down the broken themes.


Tom