Some anime fansubbing groups report the progress of their work on individual episodes like this:
I find that a simple but effective way to visualize progress of any sort. It uses a simple forum post, that is edited, if progress is made (colour and font weight is changed for the completed task). It could probably be adapted for software development progress visualization. Instead of episodes 1..n, it would name the respective features 1..n that are to be implemented. Instead of the routine tasks, that are usually the same for each episode to be fansubbed, it would list the anticipated implementation steps for the respective feature. Once a step is finished, it would be visually marked. As an additional documentation, the date of completion could also be added in parenthesis behind the task. This might be nice to have for software historians at some point. Also, if work is not linear, additional colours could be used, like yellow for work in progress (tasks that somebody is currently working on). It is also easy to make the task name a link. That way, it could point to an issue tracker or somesuch, if that seemed useful in some cases.
The PC-BSD project also has a nice wiki page for its roadmap to visualize the work in progress, that's worth a look: http://wiki.pcbsd.org/index.php/PC-BSD%C2%AE_Roadmap It uses red, green and yellow colour in the status column besides a textual description like percentage of progress, notice that something has been deferred or other short remarks.
To make Otter attractive to security-concerned folks, I think, a lean and well-documented cryptography library should be used. OpenSSL was apparently an early implementation that got patched again and again until it became unmaintainable, underdocumented and hard to use correctly. I would suggest to look at <a href="https://polarssl.org/">PolarSSL[/url]. It seems to care about documentation, which is essential for developers, lest such a critical component is used the wrong way. Unlike LibreSSL, it is already a solid library, that was <a href="https://polarssl.org/tech-updates/blog/providing-assurance-and-trust-in-polarssl">not affected[/url] by Heartbleed back then and receives constant maintenance. The project recently became <a href="https://polarssl.org/tech-updates/blog/polarssl-part-of-arm">part of ARM[/url].
I think, using a properly documented crypto library is crucial to feel confident about Otter. I would even go as far as mandating special developer's documentation for that part of Otter. That would allow more eyes to look at it in an informed way. Not sure what Qt requires cryto-wise, though. But this is definitely an area were the code should be written so clear, that its obvious correctness can be seen. A lot of software seems to do it wrong by presenting itself as so complicated, that the eye merely cannot find any obvious incorrectness. This should be avoided.
Since you didn't mention it, did you also look at <a href="http://0install.net/">Zero Install[/url], as I suggested earlier, regarding getting targets for free? It's <a href="http://0install.net/why.html">About[/url] page describes it as a cross-platform installer, that uses some XML file, that describes the software and dependencies to be installed. The file needs to be published somewhere by the developer and is apparently to be used like an RSS feed by the user (for updates). There is a <a href="http://0install.net/injector-packagers.html">packaging guide[/url], which describes how to create such a software description file. That way, the software developer only needs to maintain the XML file and the installer will fetch the necessary files for the user's system from the description. Zero Install itself seems to be available from the package installers of a <a href="http://0install.net/distribution-integration.html">number of distributions[/url] already.
There's also the <a href="http://nixos.org/nix/">Nix package manager[/url], which seems to implement similar functionality, although Zero Install seems to come with more conceptual forethought, like digital signatures for software packages. Nix seems to be available for some Linux distributions and Mac OS X, but unlike Zero Install, not Windows.
Although I'm not sure if it is possible to have static build of QtWebKit and if it is doable for QtWebEngine. We can at least try. ;-)
I think, static builds should still be preferred for maximum compatibility. Fully custom build options might also allow for minimal file size. I'm not sure how the <a href="http://alpinelinux.org/about/">Alpine Linux[/url] folks do it, but since they're using <a href="http://www.musl-libc.org/intro.html">musl[/url] as their libc, which was designed for static linking, and they seem to have a <a href="http://git.alpinelinux.org/cgit/aports/log/?qt=grep&q=otter">package[/url] for Otter, they might have built it and their Qt5 statically. I did not look into it though. But static builds should be possible. In the case of using musl as the libc to build, it might also help keeping file size low, <a href="http://www.etalabs.net/compare_libcs.html">compared[/url] to other libc implementations.
we would need to think about dedicated VPS in next weeks, something cheap but powerful enough.
The cheapest dedicated server I've seen is <a href="http://www.online.net/en/dedicated-server/dedibox-scg2">Dedibox SC Gen2[/url]. Availability seems to be limited though. Last month, it was the same picture: 42 available, but at some point, availability switched to "victim of its success", so there might only be a limited number of systems per month, after which one has to wait before they can be ordered again. If just any VPS is enough, there are of course cheaper bare minimum box <a href="http://lowendbox.com/">offers[/url].
How about using some distribution-independent packaging system? http://0install.net/ reads interesting. I think such would make sense for Otter.
What might also make sense: a static build with no dependencies (Opera had one, I think). It might take a while to build, but since betas are published only every few months, it should be done. That way, even users of unusual platforms could test this promising browser.
We don't have enough man power to handle all kinds of packages and these were targeting Ubuntu anyway, it's a shame that Debian haven't picked it yet itself, while there exist packages for other major distributions and ports for FreeBSD and OpenBSD (in progress, blocked by Qt5 state).
How about using some distribution-independent packaging system? http://0install.net/ reads interesting. I think such would make sense for Otter.
