I use Amarok on Arch and was wondering if there is anything wrong with this (security concerns, other possible downfalls) because the listing of KDE’s apps on its website says that it is no longer maintained. I did note though that the Gitlab page for Amarok does get new commits fairly often. I also noted that Amarok isn’t in Debian 12’s repos anymore and that Amarok has to be installed on the AUR for Arch, so is this a symbol of a lack of security or stability as a result of using the app? I’ve heard that unmaintained apps are not necessarily a bad thing if they still work but I struggle to believe that. I’d love to discuss thoughts on this.
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It looks like the commits it gets are almost entirely just translation changes/fixes. The app is for all intents and purposes unmaintained. What does it mean to be unmaintained?
- Don’t expect bugs to be fixed
- Don’t expect new features to be added
- Don’t expect for it to receive the porting and maintenance work needed to keep it compiling with newer versions of compilers or the frameworks it’s built on top of
Basically, expect for the software to degrade as the world around it changes and it doesn’t adapt. It might work today, but it could stop working at any time.
You can use unmaintained software, of course. But you’re on your own, and keep your expectations realistic!
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I get ya! I think your thoughts here are valuable because it tells me that unmaintained software isn’t something I should avoid just for the sake of it being unmaintained.
I expect that software like Amarok that go unmaintained will probably become more shaky as we eventually move on to Plasma 6, but considering that Amarok has seen updates in the Qt/Plasma 5 era, it should be fine while we continue to use that suite of software.
I guess the best move would be to prepare to move to something more maintained like Elisa or Strawberry for a Qt music player that will work well when all the 6-series stuff comes along. For now, I’ll continue in my KDE4 nostalgia with Amarok and its powerful features.
It’s also worth mentioning that unmaintained software can get re-maintained, if anyone decides to take care of it again.
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