Comment 2 for bug 294933

I don't want to sound respectless, because I greatly value the work of the devs here... but Cesare, I pretty much disagree with you.

1. Not all users have temperature sensors in their hard drives, and not all users with such sensors want to read the temperature. Should we disable the hddtemp variable? Same goes for almost every single tool in conky: they mostly increase the executable size.
Of course one might argue that the nvidia functionality adds more size, but hey... executable size?? What kind of people makes up the vast majority that runs conky? Users who like eye candy (== Conky compared to CLI based monitors) and run stuff like Compiz on machines with at least 512 - 1024 MB RAM or folks who try to run conky on low-memory embedded systems? And how much difference does the few KB make? How much is it actually?
CPU cycles is a completely different issue, because this would waste performance and battery life (on laptops, which will probably be the majority of end user computers in the future), but I don't think the nvidia variable will increase that one if it's compiled but not used (by users with an ATI card... and Nvidia people then at least have a CHOICE).

_Perhaps_ some undesired side effects? Everything may or may not have undesired side effects... but you know: innocent until proven guilty. Or at least some kind of suspicion, based on reproducible clues.

2. Ubuntu alters packages from Debian if it benefits their users. Your point sounds to me like pushing off responsibility.
And there is obviously benefit because at least two users went to find the right bug tracker and report. As always, only a few actually report, but there's a plethora of other folks who'd like this implemented. For example one of my friends who is new to FOSS and not yet familiar with the user-dev interaction.

I know one shouldn't make assumptions about other people's opinion over the internet.. but still I can't help thinking that you personally dislike Nvidia (mainly because of your 1. reason).

Hopefully you can see my points, even though they might sound a bit harsh.

Regards