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RE: gEDA-user: strange build failure
On Tue, 5 Dec 2006, Adrian Nania wrote:
[snip]
I agree with Ales -- a Windows port would open the floodgates to hords
of whining clueless fools. Why should we subject ourselves to that?
Supporting the clueful users (and there are quite a few) is already a
big job which we do exclusively for fun. Better to keep the barrier to
entry a little high since it's not fun to support the clueless --
particularly without any compensation.
As you put it here, gEDA project must accessible to a handful of
software developers only. Maybe I am wrong to suspect the main audience
for this tool must be on the hardware developing side. You're being
funny to name anyone else clueless fools.
Different people have different opinions on this issue. One, easily
defendable position is this: The main target audience for this
software is *ourselves*, the developers. We do it for our own
amusement, and for our own use. However, we *do* share it with the
world, and *are* responsive to feature requests and bug reports since
it's part of the fun. But only as long as the feature requests and
bug fixes are *fun* for us. Supporting a Windoze port is not my idea
of fun, so I won't do a Windoze port. But if somebody else
creates a Windoze port, I say: good work! I just don't want to
support it.
The secondary audience for gEDA is users clueful and resourceful
enough to get it working on their own boxen themselves. I am
personally happy and proud to have contributed to a project which
seems to have thousands of downloads, and certainly scores -- if not
hundreds -- of active users. Their enjoyment and productivity is part
of my fun. For that reason I also try to make it reasonably easy to
install and use the bits of software I have contributed. I *do*
expect that they require only minimal handholding, however.
In any event, my goal is *not* to emulate a private company and
product software for as many users as possible. Working on gEDA only
provides me fun (and not money), so I am only prepared to work on
things which are *fun*. Producing *commerical* sofware involves doing
many things which aren't fun, like maintaining current documentation,
running lots of regression tests, and supporting angry, cranky,
idiotic users. I only do unpleasant things when I am *paid* for it
(or if my wife insists). I don't know why you expect that I -- or any
other open-source developer -- would do something unpleasant just
because it would make your life easier or easier.
Therefore, if you want a Windoze port, try doing it yourself.
Or be prepared to pay my consulting rates.
Cheers,
Stuart
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