Re: [SPAM?]: Bug#361418: Debian menu and the Apps/Science section
Frank Küster wrote:
>> I have only located a single medicine-related application, but there are
>> more in other sections. The whole bunch of gnumed-* packages is a good
>> example.
>
> That may be a general problem (or feature). I have none installed, but
> I guess there might be a couple of medical imaging programs: Should
> they be in Science, or graphics, or even viewers? One would have to
> look at them in detail.
Neither have I. But gnumed, for example, currently contains entries in
"Tools". This is wrong by default, so I do not consider that a feature.
They will have to be moved anyway, so why not to "Science"? This would
keep them organized and, most importantly, in predictable locations.
>> I added another section named "Analysis", that contains general data
>> analysis/plotting/calculation applications.
>
> If we get this, it should be named "Data Analysis", since "Analysis" is
> also a subtopic of Mathematics. But I'm not sure it's a good idea:
That was the best name I managed to come up with at the time. It is by
no means final.
[...]
> You didn't put everything there that contains "analysis" in its name -
> probably you took only "general purpose" things. Hm.
Correct. Anything that can process and/or present generic data. Is there
anything wrong with having such section?
> Currently, grace(6), which you forgot, is in math.
"Math" was outside my scope.
> I think that there
> is no clear border between spreadsheet calculators (Openoffice Calc,
> gnumeric, ...), which can do a little data fitting and plotting, and
> full-featured data fitting and plotting programs (fityk, mn-fit,grace),
> which often can do less data manipulation, but still some.
I think there is. They are targeted at entirely different user groups.
> qtdmm looks like it should be in electronics. kboincspy is probably
> less scientific than a performance monitor - after all it's the central
> server who does the serious evaluation of the data that the distributed
> clients calculated.
It is really up to package maintainer to decide. I am not familiar with
any of those, so that was only a rough guess.
>> libncbi6-dev
>
> Uups, this one has a menu entry?
Yes.
>> I find them very similar to
>> what is found in "Math", so I consider moving "Mathematics" to "Science"
>> a good idea.
>
> No, I don't think so. Others gave the arguments already.
Yes, I have read them. There is one mail from Ben Burton I would like to
comment on. I will do it here, as it summarizes many arguments people
have made.
Ben Burton wrote:
-----------------------------
> Again: we see that scientists make heavy use of mathematics, so all
> mathematics packages should be classified under "Science"? We might as
> well file all mathematics packages under "Economics" for the same
> reason.
Whether mathematics is science or not is a philosophical question. In
some languages mathematics is considered a subset of what is referred to
as science. It may not be so in English, but let us not forget that menu
will be translated to various languages. A section name is nothing more
than a certain compromise, a word that has similar meaning worldwide.
> I think it's wonderful that scientists get so much value out of
> mathematical software, but they are not the only ones -- why does this
> mean that every piece of mathematical software needs to be filed in the
> science drawer?
Because it is not always possible to draw a clear line between
mathematical and (other) scientific software. Often you would have to
check both sections to locate an application. Having both of them closer
together could reduce confusion.
> Currently mathematics and science have their own sections in all the
> places I frequent (debian archive sections, the KDE menu, the debian menu
> system); this seems quite sane to me, and it's not clear to me why this
> needs to be changed.
And these are exactly what we are trying to improve.
-----------------------------
The same applies to "Engineering" and "Electronics". I suggested moving
them to "Science", but nobody commented on that. They are not sciences,
but can be considered close enough.
If is hard to understand, your fellow neighbor Joe has little idea on
how that works, and you cannot do it while watching TV, it must be
science. That is as exact as we absolutely need to get.*
That said, I have been proven wrong numerous times, and my opinion is as
important as anyones else. My world will not stop spinning if
mathematics is not considered to be science enough.
* Lamest definition of science ever, I know...
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