SourceForge Eliminates DevShare Program (sourceforge.net) 454
SourceForge has officially eliminated its DevShare program. The DevShare program delivered installer bundles as part of the download for participating projects. We want to restore our reputation as a trusted home for open source software, and this was a clear first step towards that. We are more interested in doing the right thing than making extra short-term profit. This is just the first step in a number of improvements we will outline in the coming weeks. SourceForge and Slashdot were acquired in late January by BIZX.
Too late (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Too late (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Too late (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah and we are focused on fixing all the issues that have caused projects to move.
And that's the good part, the alternative is that it just permanently stays the way it was. If Whiplash (and friends) are willing to work to make it better, I'm willing to keep an open mind about it, and you should too.
Re:Too late (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Too late (Score:5, Insightful)
At least you folks are answering questions. I'll take a wait and see, buff SourceForge was once great, and it would be nice to see regain at least some ground.
Re:Too late (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Too late (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd say it's fair to approach them with some skepticism, even to avoid them until they've had a chance to fix things, but to continue to boycot? Give them a chance to fuck up, first.
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I'd say it's fair to approach them with some skepticism, even to avoid them until they've had a chance to fix things
Which is what it sounds like you're doing. That's not a boycot and we're not arguing, so "Nope." wasn't really a valid response. Carry on with your blocks and check it out when the time is right, like you just said you're going to do right after I suggested it.
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I'm not sure what you're nope-ing. I flat out said:
I'll help. This is what I was noping:
Give them a chance to fuck up, first.
I took that as an admonishment from you to remove the blacklist I've put them in, more or less immediately, due to the expressed intentions by Logan. Call what I'm doing whatever you will - self-protection, blacklist, boycott, blackball, etc. It's the same effect for me, there is no free pass here. Demonstrate actual change on the scale of the bullshit that killed SourceForge in the first place, THEN the names come off the lists.
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Re:Too late (Score:5, Insightful)
Well said.
On a related note, I've noticed that, for the most part, the quality and amount of interesting news has gone up since the new regime took over. Keep it up, Whipslash et al. So far, so good.
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Re:Too late (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not going to wade into the minefield regarding the sexual misconduct case, but I'd most definitely consider the Jeep story to be pretty damn relevant for anyone building computer-controlled devices. Let's see: computer-controlled car with a radically different user interface compared to almost any car in the last 60 years or so. And, unlike Windows 8 or GNOME 3, we're talking about something with potentially life-threatening implications.
Back to the subject at hand, I'm very glad to see Sourceforge getting repaired, even if a lot of projects have moved elsewhere. Monocultures are a Bad Thing in my view.
Nerds aren't just in IT (Score:4, Insightful)
Of the stories on the front page the only ones I wouldn't consider "news for nerds" would be the sexual misconduct case and the Jeep gearshift story.
Believe it or not there are other types of engineers here besides folks who program for a living. The jeep gearshift story is about an engineering/design screwup and personally I find it quite interesting. Judging by the number of comments so did others. That sort of story definitely fits slashdot and would have before Dice took over. Furthermore the motto of Slashdot is "News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters." Nerds come in many forms and I certainly am one but not of the IT variety. Stuff that Matters extends beyond IT.
I agree however that the stories seem to be more focused lately so that is a good thing in my opinion. Of course the number of comments is still WAY down from 10 years ago. Used to be that slashdot attracted a fairly elite technical crowd. That hasn't been the case for a few years now for the most part. I still find it interesting but not like I once did.
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Re:Too late (Score:5, Interesting)
For what it's worth, we're keeping our NCI-funded cancer/biology projects there for the time being. (We just posted our 3-D diffusion code there in December, and we're about to post 3-D agent-based models and parameter estimation code.) SourceForge was a good and user-friendly home to me when I just got started in open source, so I'm happy to keep trying it now and see where it goes.
We may have some feature requests down the road (some of which may already be there, but hidden behind UI design) ...
Thanks for all your work. -- Paul
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Re:Too late (Score:5, Informative)
A bit unrelated: I was just browsing your website (the one in your signature), and was noting that I couldn't watch the embedded youtube video (talking about this video [youtube.com]). They are included as html object element and require flash to be played (which I don't have). Its better to support HTML5 as well by using a more modern embedding code via iframes. It will still offer a fallback for users who can't play back html5 videos, e.g. on outdated browsers. You can get the embed code by clicking "share" and then "embed".
Re:Too late (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Too late (Score:4)
Ah, thanks for the reminder! I worked on embedding those videos back in the HTML4 strict days. (And before YouTube, we had XVID-encoded AVI files, with a support page on how to play the videos. :-/ Embedded video has come a long, long way!)
I completely agree--they should be embedded as real HTML5, particularly as browser support is much more widespread now. And the "share / embed" code works very well for that now. I'll try to get back to it over the weekend.
Thanks for dropping by and giving the work a look! I plan to submit a method paper on PhysiCell (the 3-D agent-based model in the video you linked) and open source it soon. I should have some much cooler videos available for you then. ;-)
Very best -- Paul
Re:Too late (Score:5, Interesting)
Are the people who were previously infected still generating recurring revenue?
If so, what are you going to do with that money?
Re:Too late (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Too late (Score:5, Insightful)
I, for one, welcome^W am willing to give you the benefit of the doubt. Whatever motives BIZX has, you at least seem to be accepting and acting upon feedback. I find GitHub's politicizing to be rather irksome, so it would be nice to see SF rise from its ashes and provide another alternative.
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Re:Too late (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't mistake all the noise about Github's policies for a mass of users just waiting to migrate though. Look at Reddit, you would think the internet nearly imploded to read about it, but actually the great saviour Voat is still a distance second place and now full of people the average Reddit user wants to avoid anyway.
Better to focus on features and utility. Sourceforge used to provide a nice way for open source projects to offer binary downloads. Github allows it, but you have to set stuff up manually, update links etc. With Sourceforge you just released and it pointed users in the right direction.
I think there is a gap in the market for a more user-focused hosting web site. Github has bug tracking and wikis, but they could both be improved on. User contributed documentation is something that could be great if implemented right. Often it kinda builds itself around forum stickies, but I'm sure it could be done better if formalized.
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Re:Too late (Score:5, Informative)
The majority of the good open source apps have moved to GitHub over this
At the rate Github is going, it won't be around much longer either.
Re:Too late (Score:5, Insightful)
PGP sign git commits, or at least the tags with published binaries and all security issues are fixed too.
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but it's things like this [slashdot.org]. You can see that Github is becoming an unpleasant place to work, and focusing on hiring salespeople instead of programmers, and at that rate the good programmers will leave, and the bug tracker will start filling up, and the product will get worse and worse. That's the way things go.
Don't forget (Score:5, Insightful)
The goal is to hire non-white sales people. Github's boss has declared that she can't even interview white people. Worse, she has declared that white WOMEN are the enemy. Racists are racists, no matter which race they are denigrating.
Re:Don't forget (Score:4, Interesting)
Fuck racists. Anything but total race- and gender-blindness is not acceptable.
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This is all untrue.
As an example, her PowerPoint slide said "white women can be some of the biggest obstacles", which is quite different from "white WOMEN are the enemy". The other claim is just an outright lie.
Re:Too late (Score:4, Insightful)
I think most people just ignore any SJW/whatever/controversy issues, but it's things like this. You can see that Github is becoming an unpleasant place to work, and focusing on hiring salespeople instead of programmers
And this is why I think anyone who uses the phrase "SJW" without irony is a complete and utter idiot. Seriously? Growing companies hiring a sales team is now an SJW issue? You have described every medium to large sized business ever.
The argument goes like this:
SJWs are resonsible for traffic calming/sales teams/dystopia in scifi/buffer overflows in C/being worse than the Nazis[*] and are the ultimate evil becuase they're responsible for everything wrong. You/him/$COMPANY is SJW so they are EVIILLL!!!
You of course have to provide no rational argumet or reasoning, you just compare them to the biggest evil and hope to shut down the conversation.
A clue for you: companies need sales teams.
I mean you could have focused on a real problem like the blatantly racist and sexist "diversity" team. But no, instead you go off on paedoterrorsbogeymen (i.e. SJW) and sales teams for some reason.
WTF, dude, WTF?
[*] Those are all insane things I've seen SJWs blamed for on slashdot.
Good (Score:2)
I think we're done here.
Now if you would just bring Fresh Meat back (Score:5, Interesting)
Never understood why it was killed. It was a great way to find out about new and interesting projects/ideas.
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A good start (Score:2)
SourceForge has a long way to go to regain mind share, but this is a good start. I think the type of folks that are posting to Slashdot are the type of folks who might be willing to help support it again. Let's see what comes next.
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Good job (Score:2)
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i do like a clean gravesite... (Score:5, Insightful)
Nobody else has said so, so let me say: Thanks for trying to fix things, New Management. I appreciate efforts like these. Keep it up.
The others are probably right about it being too late to make much difference, of course. Broken trust is a mother. And none of us are really sure how reputable the new bosses are, of course. But I feel it's important to recognize and encourage any steps in the right direction. So thanks again.
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Re:i do like a clean gravesite... (Score:5, Funny)
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Of course, as widespread as the internet is now, you can find excellence as easily as any of your other surfing preferences... but when you think you're smart, come post here.
You will be rapidly corrected.
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Haha thanks. Been a long time reader of /. , but I figured I'd wait till I owned it to start posting ;)
pfft that's how *everyone* justifies having such a large UID.
Re: i do like a clean gravesite... (Score:5, Interesting)
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Yeah I'm aware of the sentiment directed at the previous owners. I hope everyone will see we are different in the coming weeks, if it's not clear already
It's clear to those of us who are conscious :-) Ignore the ACs who are flaming and/or trolling you - pretty much everyone in the know already knows that SF is under new management. Most of us here (myself included) will happily give you a fair shake in light of your actions with SF and interaction with /.
Relatedly, you're in a prime position here even if you do not realise it. Github appears to be having a nervous breakdown of some sort. SF is well-positioned to transition Github users. In short - you shou
Great! Where do I send money? (Score:4, Insightful)
Give me my "Turn this ad off because you've got good Karma" option back, and there's another $10 in it for you.
It's been 2 1/2 years since I've posted. I see the potential in this for something I loved to come back. So I'll post now.
Who else will support these guys?
Re:Great! Where do I send money? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Great! Where do I send money? (Score:4, Interesting)
Please do make a donation option. I use an Ad Blocker because I find the ad business toxic. I will not turn it off. Not even for Slashdot. But I do want /. to earn a living.
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Too early.
Right now it is all talk and a start, if the actions live up to the talk long term then I would consider it.
Reputation and Trust (Score:2)
Reputation and Trust take years to build up, and it can all be destroyed in minutes by the wrong decisions. Back in the day, SF used to be the go-to place, but not anymore. I avoid it like the plague, like many, many others.
Good luck trying to build it again, but remember what I posted about reputation and trust...
Re:Reputation and Trust (Score:4)
Congrats on the efforts so far. (Score:5, Informative)
Off topic I know but I wanted to say I appreciate the changes that have happened to slashdot as well. I look at the front page and there is only 1 story I would remove (The Anthropology sexual abuse one) and the rest are ones that I was actually interested to read about. I compare that to a fortnight ago and the difference is massive.
So thank you Whiplash.
And if you are interested these are the reasons why I would remove the Anthropology story
* Click bait headline - There is no way a single incident would "Rock" an entire global sector or industry.
* It isn't related to science, technology or anything that I would call Nerd worthy. You could change the word Anthropology for anything and the story doesn't change. It is a people story.
* Read the comments. There isn't anything to really discuss. Either you think the guy was a fuckwit or you think someone over reacted. There is no grey zones to discuss. No expert that could come in and give me a nugget of information that I didn't know.
* Sciencehabit is a posting bot. He / She / It isn't part of this community. I suspect there is a multi-poster somewhere with their credentials loaded into it and the only thing they are doing is trying to drive traffic to sciencemag.org having posted the same stuff to every site they could.
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Just wanted to say that I appreciate the anthropology sexual harassment story. It's about an important issue in science and education, both things highly relevant to many nerds. There seem to be particular issues in the sciences and in education, which we do occasionally manage to have a discussion about before the anti-modding starts.
If you look at the discussion as it is now, there are some good points being made about the nature of the issue and why it is hard to deal with. The only way these things impr
Re:Then pay up (Score:5, Informative)
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It is a long and proud tradition here to not read the article. The summary given does not mention the sale, so it is a pretty easy mistake to make.
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Re:Haha, NOPE. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Haha, NOPE. (Score:5, Insightful)
First, good on you to start fixing things in the first week. I know that I miss the days of being able to download things off of sourceforge.
Secondly, do you have an overarching philosophy you can share about how you plan on running your new acquisitions. I know a mission statement is often a lame thing, but I think something that clearly explained your vision, and that people could judge your future actions by, would be nice..
Re:Haha, NOPE. (Score:5, Informative)
Re: Haha, NOPE. (Score:5, Informative)
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this is apropos of nothing, but i read that as "how you plan on ruining your new acquisitions" and literally laughed out loud.
Re: Haha, NOPE. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: Haha, NOPE. (Score:5, Funny)
APK's days are numbered.
I think we were just hoping you'd mute him, but that works too.
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Re:Haha, NOPE. (Score:4, Insightful)
Really? Ok, put it in site ToS for both publishers and the users/downloaders, that 1) you will never never NEEEVER bundle ANYTHING or in ANY WAY try to alter the files placed there by uploaders/project owners. 2) also NEVER you will post ADs that could be mistaken for The Download, and in addition all ads will be very clearly marked e.g. with red border and red text saying "3rd party advertisement". And any banner/AD will lead first to outgoing banner saying clearly "You are now leaving sourceforge.net! and going to xyz.com - we take no responsibility for that site or any downloads on it" 3) of course you can never delete or take over a project then e.g. to kick out legitimate owner and push own "enriched" versions Put that it in ToS and guarantee e.g. up to 10,000$ per project damages. Then we could talk. Btw. anyway what imo could be more interesting now, would be an guthub.com clone, just like github but without the SJW nuttery that results in censorship that is going in there. How ever I doubt you could do it, as Slashdot seems quite leftist too, with frequest bullshit stories about "closing the technical gap" and other anti-white-male whiny propagana bullshit. But sure - feel free to impress us on these fields, we will see.
Honestly, I don't understand your viewpoint. They've made progress towards improving both sites they bought - this is a huge step forward for Sourceforge, and Slashdot's quality of news has drastically increased. We're actually getting News for Nerds, and I for one have greatly enjoyed reading stories that are actually pretty interesting for once. They've answered many questions patiently, they've taken the abuse expected from a cynical community, and Whiplash and Co. haven't done anything yet that would make my eyebrows raise. Why would you write such a puerile response for a site whose old owners have left, and a new owner is actually trying to breathe some life back into it? This is a good thing, and I'd love some competition to Github. If BizX turns into what Dice was, then we'll talk, but so far they've shown that they actually do care about the site and are interested in our community. Hell, if you look through, you can see that Whiplash has actually read a lot of posts here, or at least responded to some that aren't close to the top.
Frankly, Mr. Freeman, you are coming off as a troll and that doesn't help anyone. A clause against backdoor additions or advertisement bundling would be nice, but that whole damages spiel is unnecessary, and you're in no position to make demands of someone who will host your programs, maintain a site, foot the monthly internet bill, and provide tools to help you with your open source project for free.
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Re:Also eliminated grammar (Score:5, Insightful)
That's bigger news than the article itself.
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Fixed
I'm not sure I like the new direction Slashdot is going. :-)
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Re:Bullshit (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Isn't this a bit disingenuous... (Score:5)
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Re:Isn't this a bit disingenuous... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Sorry Assholes (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Sorry Assholes (Score:5, Insightful)
You have no idea how glad this makes me. I've had that site blacklisted for years. The first time it had shitware bundled in I was done. Thank you for just straight up buying the whole goddamned thing and fixing it.
Re:Sorry Assholes (Score:5, Interesting)
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Never underestimate the potential for the developer community to change their minds (or the hosting company to 'add extra value' at any time).
Github may be the current darling, but I recall when it was Google Code and Freshmeat. I even remember Codeplex for all the Microsoft stuff and even that now seems to be migrating to github.
So keeping Sourceforge going, and preparing it with some much nicer navigation and website functionality would go a long way towards being ready for when github stops being cool an
Re:Sorry Assholes (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm already returning to Slashdot more regularly and it's only been a week since you took the reins - so keep it up.
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You guys need to advertise that far and wide. The reputation was earned from the scam tactics of the previous owners, and nobody will come back to see if it has changed if you dont make it a core part of your advertising.
The new sourceforge, under new management and it is back to the pure form with nothing shady going on.
Re:Sorry Assholes (Score:5, Insightful)
You do understand this is a new crew right? Like if you had bought sourceforge a year ago, and then immediately fixed the shitware problem, you'd expect people to be happy with that, right? Well that is what happened.
Re:Sorry Assholes (Score:5, Insightful)
This is Slashdot, home of the perpetually dissatisfied user. If Microsoft, Mozilla, Sony, or whoever simultaneously ended world hunger, cured cancer, and gave you shiny red balloon, they'd bitch about the color.
Re:Sorry Assholes (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Sorry Assholes (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Sorry Assholes (Score:5, Insightful)
Even when that 7-digit user is the new *OWNER* of /. ???
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