Awards poll for 2019 initial discussion

I would say there’s a strong case for a 7th entry in best non-commercial. I get that you try to limit it, but I think we should probably champion the fact that there is more cool free stuff this year :) After all, the awards are as much about awareness and celebration of all things RISC OS, than they are about winning gongs.

Iris/OWB could go in “most interesting project” since only 5 entries?

However, if I was an awkward cus (no comments from the back!), I’d say it is more relevent than Pi4 for 2019 (although I may have underestimated Pi4 progress). I’m sure/hope Pi4 will win big in 2020 ;) Basically, Pi4 hardware is a board not designed for RISC OS, whereas the web browsers are specifically (big) RISC OS projects, and I think that’s quite significant.

Basically, Pi4 hardware is a board not designed for RISC OS,

Uh… And the other ones were? ;-)

In truth, given the abilities of RISC OS, the only things the Pi4 could offer RISC OS is more memory (not that that’s a big issue now most models have 1GiB), and getting away from the lameness of shoving everything through a single USB port. Though, what actual benefits this would have in practice, I don’t know. One must way “faster data transfer” against “only using one of the four cores”.

Therefore, as Iris/OWB is not “available” in the click-and-download sense, it would make sense for it to be a “Most interesting project” entrant.

than they are about winning gongs.

You got a gong?! I only got a JPEG! I must call my agent……

While I see the logic of expanding the number of entries, when I said the six option limit is immutable, what I actually meant was that the six option limit is, er, immutable. I am not going to budge on that.

I’d say it’s not up for discussion, but I can’t stop anyone arguing that we should expand it (“just for this one special reason, honest guv and it definitely isn’t the thin end of the wedge that would see people saying ‘you had seven there last time, so you can have seven here this time’ followed by ‘seven here’ and ‘eight there’ and ‘what about this ninth worthy contender here’”).

I can tell you, however, you that you would be wasting your breath trying to persuade me to change that rule.

Don’t forget that there actually is a seventh option for all the categories that have six (and a sixth for all that have five, etc) in the form of the additional option.

You, as someone who is keen to see a particular item/project/whatever get recognition could try pushing your customers/users to vote for that thing – which includes getting them to use that additional option field. Indeed, that applies to all developers/companies/etc. (This is something I’ve thought about before, but never really followed through on and said anything about – everyone with a vested interest should be pushing people to vote for their particular item(s), whether they’re a listed option or need to be entered in the text field.)

Good point on the most interesting project field. That’s fine with me – I’ll add them there after posting this. (There’s an almost self-compete here in that the browsers are a ROD project, as is RISC OS Direct, but with the latter being a joint venture with Whiffy Wi-Fi Sheep I think that’s okay.)

The addition of the Pi 4 to best new development was because it was suggested to me on the basis of it being something that shows promise (or something to that effect). I hadn’t added it to the best hardware category because the OS doesn’t (yet) run on it, and since there was space in the category I felt that seemed appropriate – but at the same time I wouldn’t be too bothered it it came off. I could therefore be moved on that, if it wasn’t for one problem:

There then would be the self-competition, because ROD is there for acquiring Impression, and ROD would be there for the browsers. (I accept you’re suggesting it to give recognition to the developers, but the bottom line is that they’re doing it on behalf of ROD – it’s a ROD project.)

However, on the basis that I’m adding them to most innovative/interesting project – will solve the issue?

Of course, a truly interesting development would be to have the DDE compiler able to handle VFP floating point, with additional support in the Wimp like a flag to Wimp_Poll(Idle) to handle changing contexts on behalf of the app, so it can be used fairly transparently like FPE today.

Hmm, does our APCS even specify VFP (and NEON?) registers?

everyone with a vested interest should be pushing people to vote for their particular item(s)

Uh… in other votes in other contexts, that ranges from “immoral” to “illegal”. It also risks calling into question the validity of the vote itself – would people have voted for something given a free choice, or did they vote because they were pushed? It’s probably best to consider “it might happen” but nothing is obvious and nothing is said.

I think you’re confusing how I meant “push” with something else.

There is absolutely no problem with Andrew (since it was a reply to him, I’ll use him as an example) putting on (say) the Armini mailing list something like “Hey guys, we have nominations in the RISC OS Awards for [this], [this], [etc], and it’d be cool if you could vote for us”).

This is no different, for example, from a political party campaigning to get votes, or the host of a TV show pointing out to their audience that they’ve been nominated in the BAFTAs or whatever and would like people to vote for them.

I’m not suggesting Andrew puts a gun to his customers’ heads and says “Vote for us, or I redecorate that wall behind you” or offers cash inducements to vote for them. (If nothing else, he’d only ever have people’s word for it that they did.)

While I see the logic of expanding the number of entries, when I said the six option limit is immutable, what I actually meant was that the six option limit is, er, immutable. I am not going to budge on that.

I can only speak for myself here, but others may agree, if I suggest that now is not the time to add to the entries.

If there have been more than 6 suggestions fitting one category then with a quick count of the repeats you establish the top 6.

Ah, stage 1 and stage 2 voting you say – hmm tricky.

Never is the time to extend the number beyond six. :p

But there could be a way to sort of do stage one/two voting – if I remember (and/or if someone helpfully reminds me) this could be worth a try for next time.

I should still have the framework for the second year’s poll, where I used a free-form text field for all categories and NO selectable options. If so, I could adapt that as necessary and pop that on the site a few months before the end of the year and allow people to use it to suggest things – purely as an experiment for next year to see how it goes.

When I compile the draft poll, then, I can take that into account, perhaps adding a count of mentions on RISCOSitory to the count in the suggestions, and then make the final poll the top six in each category.

(Or at least the draft poll as posted here for discussion.)

But there could be a way to sort of do stage one/two voting – if I remember

I refrained mentioning…

I think campaigning like that would be pretty tacky – not something I’d be comfy with, really. I don’t even mention the awards to family, because I think trying to influence things like that is a bit shady. Although, it is tempting !!!

Anyway, rules is rules, so there we go. Only other place for Free Impression Style is in “best show of initiative”?

It was actually quite a good year for free stuff – Brian Jordan’s “What 3 Words” client app is worth checking out, and similarly KevSoft’s TrainTimes saw significant updates. Both compliment RiscOSM too, I believe.

I agree with Andrew. I buy PCs and related parts and other hardware as part of my business. It annoys me when I get emails from suppliers prompting me to vote for them at some awards or other. If they need to solicit votes then they are saying that they aren’t good enough on their own merit. Even more so the ones that solicit votes alongside some form of promotional discount or other offers, or those that reward you for ‘liking’ them on Farcebook or some other social platform.

I bought a printer on Amazon a few years ago and posted a review of the supplier that was mostly complimentary with a small caveat on delivery times, and one star knocked off. They emailed me back offering a £50 cashback for updating the review to remove the caveat and add the extra star…

Impression Style in best show of initiative on the back of it being released for free works for me – I’ll update the list after posting this. (It does now mean Impression [manual] is competing against Impression [Style] in that category).

On campaigning, fair enough – if you don’t want to do it, don’t do it. In the same way that I corrected Rick by pointing out I’m not suggesting you put a gun to customers’ heads to get them to vote for you, I don’t have a nuclear missile primed and targeting your location in order to get you to campaign. It’s entirely your choice. But I will leave these numbers here:

~150, ~100, 161, 147, 106, 120.

On the other bits of software mentioned, as I pointed out earlier, my source list was much longer and I had to whittle it down to six (this is usually the case for the non-commercial category, actually).

That said, I don’t remember seeing What Three Words – and a quick search on RISCOSitory doesn’t throw it up. So this is something I’ve never encountered before.

It’s therefore absolutely no surprise that I didn’t even consider it as part of the initial, longer list of possibilities, let alone the draft list I posted here.

I can guess what it is, since the name makes that obvious. Personally, I think the whole notion of three words to locate someone is a bit silly – but that’s beside the point. ;)

Side note: On reading the above back, I spotted that I’d searched for What Three Words, while Andrew said What 3 Words – so I then searched for that; still no results. Whenever it was released, it slipped completely under my radar.

No worries, Vince. And I’d forgotten things like ClassicRip and others – there’s a lot of stuff going on!

Also, I kind of agree with the whole three-words thing – not really sure why it is any better than GPS co-ords, or tracking a phone (since you’d need a phone to get the three words). I always assumed I’d missed something entirely obvious, after all the government/emergency services would never just jump on the bandwagon of every new startup idea peddling their wares, would they? (cough, splutter).

Equally, though, it was nice to see someone develop a RISC OS front end for it, so that we’re included “in the club” for popular apps. Makes a nice change :)

I’m glad I’m not alone that opinion of the three silly words idea. (I can also see flaws, too. What about language? If the location is somewhere in France, are the three words French? What if it’s an English speaker on holiday that needs to provide their location – can they correctly pronounce the words? Hell, what about English speakers and English words – even that’s not 100% guaranteed. And what about accents? And so on!)

Aside: My first smartphone (which predated the first iPhone) had a built-in quick-send emergency text message. You configured a number and basic text message, and in an emergency a long press on a particular button would send that message, with GPS co-ords, to the configured number. Handy if you’re out hiking and accidentally fall off a mountain or something.

Well, provided you remain conscious in order to press the button, the phone isn’t damaged and is accessible to you, and you have a phone signal – so still flawed (some also affecting three silly words) but a damned site better IMO.

But yes, agreed that a RISC OS front-end for something new and trendy is a major plus point. (Ditto MTD in Prophet, which is why that’s in best new dev – I had that in mind even before I started working on the list.)

Since you mentioned ClassicRip, I guess that means it’s been updated at some point recently. I’ve just searched RISCOSitory, and it was last mentioned there – i.e. it last came to my attention – in 2014.

If you’ll excuse me, I just need to repeatedly bang my head against the nearest wall.

On reading the above back, I spotted that I’d searched for What Three Words, while Andrew said What 3 Words – so I then searched for that; still no results. Whenever it was released, it slipped completely under my radar.

Hidden away in a comp.sys.acorn newsgroup conversation.

Searching for Brian Jordan and RISC OS gives the hit(s) on that and the info that the name isn’t that long so searching for w3w is a better idea because “brian jordan w3w” produces a link (2nd) to this google groups scoop from the comp.sys.acorn.apps where the link is 404

Aren’t you glad you hadn’t made that much effort?

My comments about searching were specifically about searching RISCOSitory, in case I had seen and mentioned it before, and somehow missed it when compiling the draft poll list – I hadn’t.

I would probably have searched more widely to check it out for myself (and therefore post something as a new nybble) when I got home…

I am home now, but given the time don’t feel like switching on a computer – so you’ve saved me the effort of discovering that I wouldn’t have been able to find it because it’s no longer there. 🤦‍♂️

(Thanks Steve)

Okay – I had to put this to one side for a while, but I’ve now uploaded the poll source file to create this year’s voting form.

Which was fun. My program that takes the source list as a CSV file silently failed at first – generating an empty form. I guessed the problem was that I’d b0rked something in the file, so instead of working out what I proceeded to update the program to match the file. And that in turn broke other bits and highlighted other bugs. :)

I will leave it a few days before I announce it properly (or update the site’s front page), but for the benefit of readers of this forum the voting form is here (or here without SSL).

I’d appreciate it if folk here could vote first because they’re more likely to spot if I’ve messed something up (such as silly things like forgetting to update the text to match the year etc).

Looks okay, except for this:

The results will be counted up in late February, and published shortly thereafter

February? ;)

February? ;)

2021 If Vince does a rush job :)

2021 If Vince does a rush job :)

That’s okay. Excepting those who don’t make it (which I sincerely hope is none of us), nobody is going anywhere…
…maybe for quite a while…

We’ll just have to adopt the patience of a cat staring at a hole. 😺

2021 If Vince does a rush job :)

Damn it Steve – you stole my joke! ;)

I’ll leave the poll open until the end of May, so just over two months, and aim to tot up the results in June.

I’ll fix the text later this evening. A nice hot bath awaits right now.

The poll is now properly open – I’ll compose an announcement (well, rehash last year’s..) next.

As well as (I think) fixing the minor errors pointed out to me, I have made one other change following the sad news about Jim Nagel – Archive is no longer in the broken cog section.

following the sad news about Jim Nagel

Wait…what?

<click> <click> <click>
https://www.riscository.com/2020/rip-jim-nagel/

Oh well f..k.

:-(