sometimes the open-source sucks

[legacy]

Facts: everything starting from the Linux kernel to u-boot is usually a mess of code which is continuously full of bugs, the documentation is usually something devs do not produce, and when you find yourself in trouble because source is a complete mess, things completely unclear, and what you get from a git clone behaves like a deranged dog on speed ... well ... do you find reasonable to subscribe yourself to a mailing list asking for a piece of advice?

Be prepared to a shock: nobody will ever reply to you if  - what you ask is not mainstream - and - you are not willing to pay 50 USD / h -

Stefan Roese at Denx replied this way, and  I might accept it, but what about my time spent signaling bugs? tests? etc? I have to contribute for free, and when I need help ... do I have to pay for it?

it is not fair 

[mansaxel]

I should know better than feeding trolls. 

[madires]

OMG! If I'm writing open source software people will report bugs and even demand support for free. How horrid!

[legacy]

I should know better than feeding trolls. 

First, learn respect. "Troll" is not appropriate, and rather offensive.

I am a bit shocked by his response. Let me clarify what I mean. I asked a bit of clarification regarding a board of which he is the maintainer. Something like no more of ten min of his time which could have addressed in the right direction. But, the only thing he specified is that he could reply only if paid. Therefore I spent two months on this, and now he wants the patch back, I have spent hours and hours of my time fixing stuff, and I have never asked a penny for this.

[senso]

Define wants the patch back.

[rjp]

Open source is what people are prepared to do for free, on their own time, for their own amusement.
If you cant deal with that premise, its best you dont participate in it.
Personally, sometimes i fix things, sometimes I walk away, their is literally nothing to complain about, their is noone who cares.
 

[legacy]

demand support for free

One thing is "full support", one thing is "a piece of advice" to address someone in the right direction.

Would you ask me 50 USD/h to give advice WHICH will help your software to be fixed for a board of which YOU are the maintainer?

He said that he is the maintainer, but he is no more interested in the board, in fact, he dropped everything in 2017. And ok, I might understand it, but ... now the problem is

he asks money for advice, and then he wants my patch back (to resume the board-support into the 2019-2020 tree?) for free: precisely this is the not fair point.

[legacy]

Define wants the patch back.

Code: [Select]

diff -u OriginalFile MyFixedFile > myPatchFile


[legacy]

Open source is what people are prepared to do for free, on their own time, for their own amusement.
If you cant deal with that premise, its best you dont participate in it.
Personally, sometimes i fix things, sometimes I walk away, their is literally nothing to complain about, their is noone who cares.

OK. Therefore, my perception of open-source was a naive bug, since I give it the meaning of the immortal words of Bill and Ted, “Be excellent to each other” 


My fault, sorry.

[Monkeh]

I am a bit shocked by his response. Let me clarify what I mean. I asked a bit of clarification regarding a board of which he is the maintainer. Something like no more of ten min of his time which could have addressed in the right direction. But, the only thing he specified is that he could reply only if paid. Therefore I spent two months on this, and now he wants the patch back, I have spent hours and hours of my time fixing stuff, and I have never asked a penny for this.

Perhaps he does not have months of time to address a board he considers a dead end?

Or perhaps it's just the tone of your emails.

[SiliconWizard]

Facts: everything starting from the Linux kernel to u-boot is usually a mess of code which is continuously full of bugs, the documentation is usually something devs do not produce, and when you find yourself in trouble because source is a complete mess, things completely unclear, and what you get from a git clone behaves like a deranged dog on speed ... well ... do you find reasonable to subscribe yourself to a mailing list asking for a piece of advice?

You sound in a very bad mood, so I think you should let it go before a discussion can be fruitful.

That said, even though you're inflating all this probably because of the above, I agree with that on a general level. But if you don't want to be bothered by that, just write your own software from scratch, or use commercial solutions only.

If, like many others, you're using/exposed to open source because doing without it would either take you way too much time, or cost too much (which in the end is the same), well... you know why you're doing that.

it is not fair 

Yes it is. It's free and open. Drawback is that you're not entitled to expect anything including support.
I don't know if you've released open source software before, but if you have, and it has gotten any kind of traction, how did you feel about being constantly bothered with support you'd have to give away for free? That's just not how things work. As to documentation... yes that's often very lacking in many open source projects. But again, how much documentation do you yourself produce during your developments? Why expect more from others (and for free!) than you'd expect from yourself?

Open source doesn't "suck" any more than gifts do. You may not like what you're given, but you can't complain.

And yes, when designing products, open source is to be used knowing fully well what you're getting into.

[free_electron]

Facts: everything starting from the Linux kernel to u-boot is usually a mess of code which is continuously full of bugs,

To paraphrase one of the most common heard things about 'open source': "You have the source ! You are now all powerful, can examine and modify anything you don't like ..."

More commonly encountered as Open source coded by broken sours. Half finished stuff in perpetual state of flux encumbered by religious wars between vi vs emacs and gnome vs kde. Total anarchy reigned by (pitch)forks.

[magic]

That's sadly true. We should just agree to settle on vi and xfce already.

Define wants the patch back.

Code: [Select]

diff -u OriginalFile MyFixedFile > myPatchFile


I'm sure the question was "define wants" rather than "define patch"

And yes, Linux sucks. Anything other than the latest and greatest that every hipster is salivating to nobody gives a damn. Sometimes even working patches take some whining to get accepted because maintainers who weren't around when the code was originally written treat it as "here be dragons"

[newbrain]

Open source is what people are prepared to do for free, on their own time, for their own amusement.

Looks at payslips of last 3-4 years: .

And, though not always the case, many of Legacy's complaints are sadly true, especially where no payslips are involved.

[Marco]

he asks money for advice, and then he wants my patch back (to resume the board-support into the 2019-2020 tree?) for free: precisely this is the not fair point.

He asks 50$/h to consult on open source software ... have you tried to negotiate a fee for consulting on a closed source version? He might be willing to do that for more.

If he no longer is an active user of the code but integrates patches and gets the project release ready as charity, ie. be the maintainer, your patch has no value to him. The patch might have value in general, that might even be approximately equal to the value of his consultation ... but it still has no value to him. What you're essentially doing is saying that if you do some charity you get the moral right to tell other people how to be charitable.

[legacy]

I'm sure the question was "define wants" rather than "define patch"

Yup 

Code: [Select]

def do_patch is ... #previous def
def do_wants is
{
    apply do_patch to each modified file
    tarball modified files
    email.attach tarball
    email.send "attaching patches"
}


Linux sucks.

Starting from Linux 2.6.26, the PowerPC branch went more complex due to a lot of facts.
PPC and PowerPC were merged into one, the PCI stuff was merged too, and ... whole "platform" stuff was definitively merged into "DTS-ONLY".

Hence, during this process, and starting from 2.6.27, a lot of stuff started to be broken, removed, confused, screwed up, and not documented at all.

Anyway, you see his name in a lot of source: I supposed his name was there as the person to ask to. Yes, he is, but wants money, even for a piece of a piece of enlightenment regarding what he and his collegued did on the firmware and on the kernel.

Anything other than the latest and greatest that every hipster is salivating to nobody gives a damn. Sometimes even working patches take some whining to get accepted because maintainers who weren't around when the code was originally written treat it as "here be dragons"

Yup. For MIPS this is very frustrating. I have direct experiences.
But, PowerPC was (note the past verb) a bit better years ago.

[legacy]

Perhaps he does not have months of time to address a board he considers a dead end?

He motivated this reason: EOL board. So why did he request my patches?

[nctnico]

Open source is what people are prepared to do for free, on their own time, for their own amusement.

You couldn't be further from the truth. The serious open source projects are backed by large companies who join forces to create a piece of software which they need but isn't part of their core product. Open source (or better put: the various GPL licenses) are very effective frameworks to share the work load in an informal, no so structured way.

[Monkeh]

Perhaps he does not have months of time to address a board he considers a dead end?

He motivated this reason: EOL board. So why did he request my patches?

Because if someone is using it and you happen to have improvements which are of reasonable quality, why not take them?

[tunk]

Was the original source released under GPL (or similar license)?
If so, you may legally be obligated to release your patches etc.

Also, you're using words like "team" and "we", suggesting you're
a commercial business. If that's the case, then I'm surprised you
expects others to work for free.

[legacy]

Drawback is that you're not entitled to expect anything including support.
I don't know if you've released open source software before, but if you have, and it has gotten any kind of traction, how did you feel about being constantly bothered with support you'd have to give away for free? That's just not how things work.

I have never promoted my products/projects (for which I do not get a penny) telling "oh, OpenSource is great, we are all friends, everything is for free, come, relax, enjoy it, ..."

During 2005-2007 DENX did it with several PPC eval boards promoted to universities (Do you remember old XILINX boards? They had a PPC405GP core aboard, therefore u-boot was the promoted firmware), therefore, I believe they should thank students and volunteers.

how much documentation do you yourself produce during your developments?

Enough

My "crew" is composed of four heads including me, and none of us talk talk the same language native, but we do comment on each critical section, at least. In English. This helps us, as well as it helps people outside the squad.

Open u-boot, and you will wonder what a lot of code is  written for. We spent three weeks just for understanding why the SDRAM was set in a certain way (and, in the end, it was a bug). There is no comment about anything. Open Linux, and you will wonder the same. And I have the feeling this happens for a precise reason: because this way you have to pay to have the answer.

you can't complain.

I do complain because I feel taken fool.

[newbrain]

Was the original source released under GPL (or similar license)?
If so, you may legally be obligated to release your patches etc.

It depends very much on what the code will be used for.
And, in any case, code needs not be made public but only available to the users (for a limited time). You have no obligations "upstream".

In my direct experience, the users have never cared!

[legacy]

Was the original source released under GPL (or similar license)?
If so, you may legally be obligated to release your patches etc.

Precisely my feeling. I am afraid we will probably delete the whole folder and abandon it for an home made firmware. This way there won't be any problem.

Also, you're using words like "team" and "we", suggesting you're a commercial business.

Good point, but in order to avoid any confusion I had added in my email a link to our website, where we declare the area as no-profit.

Isn't enough? 

Group and team mean "hobbyists" and "students", nothing done for the business. We do not sell anything, and the only things we report on our page is a voluntary donation, which is more for "hardware" donation than "money" donation 

[mansaxel]

I should know better than feeding trolls. 

First, learn respect. "Troll" is not appropriate, and rather offensive.

And perhaps fitting, still, because the first post in this thread was all frustration (that we, now, understand quite well) and neither explanation nor background. It was a good example of flamebait.  Had you counted to 10 before you wrote, and supplied some context, I'd nodded in agreement. (I know this, because I've made this mistake too, frequently.)

On a more general note, FOSS community is not as easy to navigate as one might think. When one is only paid in reputation, recognition becomes a hard currency, and feuds tend to escalate, since people can't move along and earn money somewhere else with the same ease as one can (must!) drop a consultancy gig in the more traditional IT environment. 

Some projects are better than others, and it indeed seems that the PPC part of Linuxland is not a happy place. Not surprising since all the world is an Intel or an ARM. According to some.

[madires]

he asks money for advice, and then he wants my patch back (to resume the board-support into the 2019-2020 tree?) for free: precisely this is the not fair point.

I fully understand your frustration. But that's a typical business model of open source businesses. They offer some fancy open source software for free and earn money by selling support. Back in the Amiga days I've written a few tools for FTS networks (Fidonet) for my BBS and published them as shareware. I knew that my tools were used by others but I didn't make any money. Instead I received messages like "I like your tool and I will pay the shareware fee if you add such and such feature". Lovely, isn't it?