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Back from being banned ...

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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby IAHM-COL » Mon Sep 14, 2015 10:57 pm

I am very happy to read your answer Stuart, and realize that there is hope in understanding.
I totally agree with your post above.

1. About JWocky ban. We already interacted about this. You have your feeling of what was needed, and you did it. I can't agree or disagree. I never saw or read what happened. all the facts that motivated the decision were clean out. So for what's worth, you are right by default.

I thank your group for good sense, and not using moderation as a weapon in a flame war. I know you can realize that with great power comes greater responsibility.

2. Apologies accepted. The comparison sickens me. FPS can go to hell, and my alliance is 100% to the flightgear project.

Truly FGMEMBER can be a challenge (and it is a challenge) to the project. We are all learning to realize the full potential of FGMEMBERs and how it can help the project growth, aircraft testing, and developers base. I had seen lots of interest and popularity on FGMEMBERS as it eases not only contributions, but also new contributors to learn both SCMs and aircraft development. FG grows faster and stronger thanks to FGMEMBERS exist.

At the same time, FGADDon is providing a safe heaven, and a more robust and solid platform where aircraft is protected from the fast currents of FGMEMBERS.

I am definitely interested in see how FG project adapt to these challenges and funnels them for the common good of our community :D
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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby cain071546 » Tue Sep 15, 2015 1:56 am

can someone clarify some things for me?

1) FGADDON is the official aircraft repo correct?

2) and people seemed to think it was too difficult to get aircraft accepted into FGADDON so they created FGMEMBERS correct?

3) why does FGMEMBERS impact the flightgear community at all? other then as a benefit ie: haveing models from all over the internet in one place

4) why don't the core developers simply continue their day to day work and just "cherry pick" the nicest aircraft in FGMEMBERS for admittance into FGADDON?

5) why is that hard?

6) and why did this "argument" have to be taken this far?

just asking =)
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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby IAHM-COL » Tue Sep 15, 2015 2:33 am

Hi Cain. These are my answers to your very valid questions.

cain071546 wrote in Tue Sep 15, 2015 1:56 am:can someone clarify some things for me?

1) FGADDON is the official aircraft repo correct?


Correct. FGADDon is the Official Aircraft repo. FGMEMBERS was offered to the core developers a few months back for replacing FGADDon with FGMEMBERS but they considered better to stick with the good old. From that day they make the decision to today, FGADDon stands as the Core Developers endorsed Aircraft repository.

2) and people seemed to think it was too difficult to get aircraft accepted into FGADDON so they created FGMEMBERS correct?


It certainly ain't easy. We have, per example, the DASH aircraft, which was rejected inclusion on several accounts, under several arguments. The core developers had drafted and will soon release a "modus operandi compendium" of what are the methods to include or not aircraft in FGADDon. But certainly it cannot be all inclusive. Also, gaining commits rights is a negotiation of its own, and new and inexpert developers may not have that clear of a path. Stability, safety reasons, others.

More importantly, FGADDon operates on the basis of Aircraft maintainers. Thus, people that have a final saying on what can be modified and what cannot. Some of them can be extremely jealous of their artistic creations. And thus, new changes or contributions have a very slim option to ever be accepted, if ever.

FGMEMBERS was created not only to ease those transitions, but also as a mechanisms to decentralize aircraft development for FG effectively. What this means is that aircraft can be developed elsewhere. The venerable hangars are an example of decentralization efforts that take a limited subset of aircraft.

FGMEMBERS had strived for inclusion. Even very old outdated aircrafts can be found. As well as the more modern and updated fleet of our simulator, and for this reason, and the fact that getting single aircraft from FGMEMBERS with the lastest of the changes the developers made (the most updated bleeding edge) is sooo easy, it has become rapidly some defacto library of Aircraft for flightgear, very popular and beloved. (except by a few).

3) why does FGMEMBERS impact the flightgear community at all? other then as a benefit ie: haveing models from all over the internet in one place


FGMEMBERS only impact the community as a benefit. Aircrafts are there rapidly available. It allows most users to become beta testers --that is, to potentially feel and fly the latest version, and produce bug reports on the latest aircraft (not an outdated stable). It also allow rapid incorporation of fresh blood of new developers that may or may not be very experienced in aircraft development, but be placed in a bench of creativity with other more experienced developers, allowing new users to get faster up to speed in both Source Code Management, and aircraft edition. All this with the added advantage that they are not compromising critical core infrastructure.

It is a big win win for the community.

The fear of a few core developers that FGMEMBERS is foreseen as the official aircraft repository leads to continuous flaming wars in the forum, and some had even proposed that speak about FGMEMBERS should be forbidden for the alledged good of the community. The flaming war is all caused by their continuous antagonisms when other forum users (FGMEMBERS proponents and not) are trying to guide other users into how to benefit for this really awesome tool in the FG ecosystem.

4) why don't the core developers simply continue their day to day work and just "cherry pick" the nicest aircraft in FGMEMBERS for admittance into FGADDON?


Great question. I really hope they do.
FGMEMBERS is benefited from their efforts concentrated in positive production as well. Weekly a cronjob upates all aircraft with changes they made, and keep the organization up to speed with the changes they --the core developers and FGADDon commiters-- propose! :D

Clearly the FGMEMBERS content is opensource, and the GPL area is clearly delimited. They could cherry pick nicest aircrafts, and even nicest commits in a two way road. and Let FGADDon and thus the community in general have the greater benefit.

The main leaders of the infrastructure could also see the great synergy FGMEMBERS has brought to our community and rejoice, for the great thrust the project has and thus benefit: So much new blood pushing hard and strong for a more inclusive and more open Flightgear Flight Simulator.

5) why is that hard?


Great question. I have no much to say.
There is a past written, and there is fear and uncertainty of, how Stuart says, how the Flightgear will face the new challenges. But certainly, the support of the core developers, will help ease the difficulties. We, in the user level, can't.

6) and why did this "argument" have to be taken this far?


Well... I guess you have to understand that the presence of an active FGMEMBERS is an unexpected benefit the core developers weren't calculating. Again, there has been fear of what there is for the project; which I find myself at great ease, because we all belong to the community, and we all belong to the project.

just asking =)



Thanks. I wonder what others have to say :D

Best,
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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby cain071546 » Tue Sep 15, 2015 3:05 am

this doesn't make sense to me.

so we all know the core developers job can be hard, but they are the reason that Flightgear is here today, i respect that alot.

if they are so concerned with what goes into FGADDON then why do they still have lots of low quality models in the repo?

why not unload all the low quality models onto FGMEMBERS?

it would decrease the number and size of files in FGADDON making it easier to maintain, they would have 20-30 of the best models to include in future FG releases.

if one of the devs wants a model added to FGADDON then it should be just as hard for them and should be of the same very high quality ie: f-14/a-10/777/cap10b/cub ect.

otherwise why cant we (devs and community members) just work out of FGMEMBERS until it becomes apparent that the model should be added to FGADDON?

if the original author wants to LOCK access to an aircraft why not let them?
many of the authors also have the original version on their own websites/hangars
just fork it, but please rename it so i can have both installed!

that's all my ideas.
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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby IAHM-COL » Tue Sep 15, 2015 3:57 am

cain071546 wrote in Tue Sep 15, 2015 3:05 am:this doesn't make sense to me.
so we all know the core developers job can be hard, but they are the reason that Flightgear is here today, i respect that alot.


I don't know how hard it is. But it certainly requires intimate knowledge of the code and all its components. The project is large and complex, full of sub-routines, and dependencies. I personally don't understand core development of flightgear, even thou I had glazed over the source code, so others are more fit to enter in this topics if needed. We both respect that a lot. The most important thing is how the software had largely improved on the last releases, and continues an steady increase. Furthermore it is alone in the landscape of free flight simulators that are truly openSource [* or is it?]. (XPlane people will excuse my opinion here, I guess!)

if they are so concerned with what goes into FGADDON then why do they still have lots of low quality models in the repo?


:evil: :shock:

FGADDon inherited every aircraft previously existing on the FGDATA git repositories that existed in Gitorious until FG 3.2
Quality was not considered as a limit of exclusion for these.

Quality is, again, a new parameter of inclusion; and apparently, new aircrafts need to prove themselves worthy of the collection -- with this probably meaning they have to be better than the bunch.

Keep in mind thou it is a matter of classes. (Classes of people, off course). FGADDon commiters could easily add a new aircraft. They don't need votes or agreements. So, inclusion of both code and full aircrafts by a committer goes easy; almost unchecked. For people without commit priviledges, that seems not to be the case. New contributions go via the devel list where they can end up sparking a series of controversies, and be rejected unless a certain set of criteria are met. Think of HerbyW Antonovs series, which by the way are much better than most FG aircrafts!! Sure, they were spun off Helijah's Aircrafts, and thus it became hard to understand why allow a new aircraft when another variant of the aircraft (much undeveloped) existed.

Similar fate suffered by Herby's spun on the Shuttle, which faced heavy competition by Thorsten and his group, and with a similar fatal fate. The contributions as new aircrafts did not meet an unexplained quality value. While other aircrafts brake the unknown quality thresholds and either come in (dhc6, b788) or get scheduled for inclusion (crj700).

Finally, more directly addressing your question (again, purely my perspective) -- it is very hard to decide an aircraft is of an unmet quality and send it to the "Attic". How to judge an aircraft is tipically subjective, and determining thresholds very complex. Again, active maintainers could not only block contributions to certain un-impressive aircraft, but also be very jealous of letting their beauties go. And how they say in the devel list, aircrafts can be very useless for some, but great treasures for others.

All together, I do not say the core developers letting go a set of aircraft under pretenses of low quality. And we all are aware that some of those aircraft qualities are very far from the best of the lot.

why not unload all the low quality models onto FGMEMBERS?


They are already there!
Every aircraft in FGADDon also exists in FGMEMBERS!


And some of the low quality ones, have a few commits that make them more useable in their FGMEMBERS' variant! So in certain cases, the FGMEMBERS' version is already arguably better and more functional.

This happens thanks to the fact that so much more contributors have an easier path to fix bugs. And the fact that contributors find a more expedite way to feel themselves of use to the project.

I can ease your worry thou that a low quality aircraft in FG is an excelsior in FGMEMBERS. We don't have those. We just have them a little less worse.

it would decrease the number and size of files in FGADDON making it easier to maintain, they would have 20-30 of the best models to include in future FG releases.


That's a cold-ice hardcore threshold :S
besides, why would the core developers rely on aircraft maintainance elsewhere (?!)

if one of the devs wants a model added to FGADDON then it should be just as hard for them and should be of the same very high quality ie: f-14/a-10/777/cap10b/cub ect.


Truly, other users, such as Vincent KL666 also have your same point of view, that FGADDon should really honor the guarantee that is the collection of La creme de la creme of aircrafts for Flightgear. I just find hard to judge who honors inclusion in such conditions.

otherwise why cant we (devs and community members) just work out of FGMEMBERS until it becomes apparent that the model should be added to FGADDON?

This is the really hard pressing question. Why can't we just work on FGMEMBERS and enjoy FG, and share planes, and enjoy a platform that allows us to modify aircrafts and have fun with them; while learning a lot and creating community?
Why there has to be Official Rejection, or Consider that Officially we should be limited to enjoy FG in this new way [*within the Official infrastructure such as the Wiki and the Forum]?
Who said we had to fly the aircraft as officially made, and we can't use the GPL license to modify them, and experiment them [* and easily distribute our variants]?
Why if we, as a community, enjoy of this, we had to be made prey of prosecution, and aggressions, of core developers that have to come every day with the same repeated you are not official storyline?

That is, I repeat, a really hard pressing question!

if the original author wants to LOCK access to an aircraft why not let them?
many of the authors also have the original version on their own websites/hangars
just fork it, but please rename it so i can have both installed!


That's the point. An author can fork the aircraft and manage his own fork as he seems fit. He can Lock access to every contribution as he seems fit, or allow openly the community to share and collaborate development. Currently, FGMEMBERS fork (repo) is open access to any "Member" as they have push access to the repo.

Github platform make completely possible to organize a very granular push access control on individual repositories to subgroups called teams. FGMEMBERS has about 18 teams. But not a central coordination to determine which team "owns" the write priviledges of any of the repositories. So, Yes, it is possilbe. No, currently we don't operate that way.

that's all my ideas.

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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby cain071546 » Tue Sep 15, 2015 4:27 am

it seems like everybody is upset over things that we all ready have answers for

i still like my idea

we just need to come up with a criteria for what aircraft constitute (better) and should go into FGADDON

then all the rest should be in FGMEMBERS
Last edited by cain071546 on Tue Sep 15, 2015 6:05 am, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby cain071546 » Tue Sep 15, 2015 4:35 am

and if only the (better) models are in FGADDONS and can be distributed with the main program (because there are less of them maybe they could all be included)
then it might make a better impression of the quality of the simulator to newer users, any body who is interested ends up finding FGMEMBERS/FGUK and the Hangars Wiki Page
many other models are always there for those who want them, or want to work on them

but maybe FGADDON needs to be cleaned out and made smaller

maybe some way of determining the quality without bias cane be thought of

there is no reason why we cannot figure out a solution that benefits all party's
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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby Thorsten » Tue Sep 15, 2015 6:14 am

can someone clarify some things for me?


Basically, there's by now about a hundred pages of history which show that what Israel claims here doesn't work in practice. We've had discussions about messed version control on FGMEMBERS, copyright violation on FGMEMBERS, you name it. So there is no feasible way to ever merge anything back.

In addition, we have a few tens pages of insults and personal attacks onto the core team into the fray.

Israel happens to have the time to give you his spin on the situation, the people who represent the Flightgear project do not have that amount of time to answer to clarify right now, but there is much more here than meets the eye. There will be an agreed-upon statement by the core team soon.

But I will perhaps state a few things:

1) FGMEMBERS is factually a fork of Flightgear. It is infrastructure not endorsed or supported by the Flightgear project, controlled by other people. Stating otherwise is just desinformation.

2) The reason FGMEMBERS was created is that after a long discussion (2+ years) a way to split aircraft from the data repository was agreed upon by the development team. Despite the broad consensus and the long discussion, a handful people felt they could not live with that decision and created their own repository.

3) There have been numerous attempts by FGMEMBERS to establish itself as a replacement of the official infrastructure - that replacement being under the control of the very people who shout 'tyranny' and 'censorship' all the time. These attempts ranged from editing the Wiki articles and forum posts to establishing the 'better' repository by e.g. deliberately (and illegally) changing licenses to be able to ship planes the official distribution can not ship. FGMEMBERS proponents have talked openly of 'slaughter' with respect to the official project. There is by now every reason to consider the fork hostile, and simply stating that it's not doesn't change the evidence of things that have been done.

4) There is no plan or consensus to have a 'high quality' and 'low quality' airplane repository if you think in terms of how detailed the models/the FDM is. Repositories are not for the end user and can contain unfinished models, the download page is for the end user and allows to filter models by completeness. Quality control on repositories means that it is established that the licensing is okay (we can legally distribute the planes) and that they are automatically updated to match core changes. Any talk of 'quality control' by completeness of the aircraft is desinformation.

What FGMEMBERS does is fundamentally its own business (because it is a fork), however Flightgear does not need to provide a platform for this fork to insult people, promote violations of copyright by playing down the importance of adherance to correct licensing or to establish itself as a replacement of the official infrastructure.

If you see people claiming 'FGMEMBERS is not a fork', just remember that these people could not live with a broad consensus of the devel community and rather wanted to have something where they would not be bound by majority votes.
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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby Thorsten » Tue Sep 15, 2015 7:56 am

Thus, to ensure freedom of speech, you forced reaction.


I think you're making a rather common mistake in what 'freedom of speech' implies and what it does not imply.

In the US, 'freedom of speech' protects you from being censored by the government. You can voice an opinion that the president has character deficiencies or is acting stupidly and you won't be prosecuted for that (try this in some other countries, and you'll learn the difference).

In Europe, 'freedom of speech' is usually more restricted, but still by and large protects what you say in public from government censorship. But for instance in Germany, you may not deny that the holocaust happened, such statements can be censored (for whatever it's worth, you can say this in the US without censorship).

Freedom of speech generally meets a restriction where slander is concerned, i.e. at some point you can be prosecuted for saying wrong and denigrating things about another person - the precise point depends on the country.

However, 'freedom of speech' doesn't protect you from consequences at all in a private place such as this forum - which is owned by the FG team. You can't say whatever you want here and expect to suffer no reaction. What you can and can't do here is specified in the forum guidelines.

So basically, you can't take steps ensure what you don't legally have in the first place (I would guess that probably the forum even has the duty to restrict personal attacks on other users to avoid being liable itself in case of slander - at least German legislation works that way). So it would seem Stuart just follows the law.
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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby ludomotico » Tue Sep 15, 2015 10:09 am

These arguments remind me of the ubuntu/debian issue. Many Debian developers complained that Ubuntu was "a fork" of Debian but "didn't give anything back". There are plenty of references in the internet about this issue. For example: http://madduck.net/blog/2006.05.24:ubuntu-and-debian/ You will find there most of the points we are reading here between FGDATA/FGMEMBERS supporters, and some suggestions also.

(Change FGDATA/FGMEMBERS by Debian/Ubuntu and you'll see they are pretty similar)

- 1: FGMEMBERS currently uses FGDATA without giving anything back
- 2: Even if this is fixed in the future, the legal requirements to accept content in FGMEMBERS seem significantly lower than the ones to accept content in FGDATA. Non-GPL content can't be allowed in FGDATA and it must be filtered out manually, which could be extenuating. This means an automatic update from FGMEMBERS to FGDATA won't be ever possible.
- 3: FlightGear core, including default data, must be without any doubt under the GPL. This means FGMEMBERS won't be able to substitute FGDATA, ever.
- 4: FGMEMBERS makes easier for a user to download a collection of state-of-the-art aircraft.
- 5: FGMEMBERS makes easier for a developer to distribute his/her work to many users without the necessity of announcing the existence of a private hangar.

I believe the main concern for the core developers is point 5: if FGMEMBERS attracts enough developers, their content won't be easily merged into FGDATA (point 2) and this could hurt the quality of the entire FlightGear project (point 3) No one is complaining about point 4, in the same sense everyone believes Ubuntu is probably the easiest Linux distribution to install.

There are also some "political" issues: FGDATA was created after a tiring year-long discussion, and everybody wanted to move on after that. Then, FGMEMBERS appeared and it was "oh, not again, this issue was already settled!". In the same sense that: "oh, please, not another Linux distribution! Improve any of the already existing distributions instead!"
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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby bugman » Tue Sep 15, 2015 11:58 am

ludomotico wrote in Tue Sep 15, 2015 10:09 am:- 2: Even if this is fixed in the future, the legal requirements to accept content in FGMEMBERS seem significantly lower than the ones to accept content in FGDATA. Non-GPL content can't be allowed in FGDATA and it must be filtered out manually, which could be extenuating. This means an automatic update from FGMEMBERS to FGDATA won't be ever possible.


The official FlightGear infrastructure simply follows the legal requirements as governed by the GPL v2.0 licence and copyright law. Any legal requirements lower than that are by definition illegal.

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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby Thorsten » Tue Sep 15, 2015 12:07 pm

- 4: FGMEMBERS makes easier for a user to download a collection of state-of-the-art aircraft.


I would guess that most users actually work with a stable version. The whole repository infrastructure is not designed with users in mind at all - and the fact that an increasing number of users is trying to use devel versions of FG without being able to do the kind of tweaks to run work in progress is no small concern for me. Repositories are primarily development infrastructure.

And devel repository content is often better characterized as 'untested work in progress' than with 'state of the art'

- 5: FGMEMBERS makes easier for a developer to distribute his/her work to many users without the necessity of announcing the existence of a private hangar.


Provided we're talking about GPL, that's actually not true because FGAddon content is automatically packaged and offered on the download page - which is the access point for the vast majority of users.
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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby ludomotico » Tue Sep 15, 2015 1:03 pm

bugman wrote in Tue Sep 15, 2015 11:58 am:The official FlightGear infrastructure simply follows the legal requirements as governed by the GPL v2.0 licence and copyright law. Any legal requirements lower than that are by definition illegal.


I know. As the "717 sound overhaul" thread shows, FGMEMBERS is currently distributing non-GPL content without labelling it in any way. This is why I said enhancements in FGMEMBERS cannot be automatically merged into FGDATA. I would say that FGMEMBERS cannot be advertised in the FlighGear main page for this same reason.

Thorsten wrote in Tue Sep 15, 2015 12:07 pm:I would guess that most users actually work with a stable version


FGMEMBERS ("FGDATA with submodules") is not for the common user, it requires some serious git skills. I would say users of FGMEMBERS are perfectly aware what a git repository means, and they should know how to revert to a stable version of the aircraft using git commands and labels.

From the perspective of a developer, using FGMEMBERS is much easier than using FGDATA: there is no control of any kind, so I can submit anything to FGMEMBERS at any time and request users to test my changes. From my point of view, FGMEMBERS is just a collection of "private hangars". To submit anything to FGDATA, I have to submit a change request that may or may not be attended this year. This is where I see the main risk for the FlighGear project: a GPL developer may believe that submitting his/her enhancements to FGMEMBERS is enough and he might "forget" to submit them to FGDATA.

Please, notice I can see the benefits of FGMEMBERS from the perspective of the "lazy" users and developers, but also the risks to the FlighGear project. This is why I prefer not collaborating actively with FGMEMBERS.

(In fact, I believe FGMEMBERS can be perfectly substituted with a list of private hangars, which already exists in the wiki)
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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby Jabberwocky » Tue Sep 15, 2015 1:57 pm

Obviously, someone is floating wrong information around again:

1.) The legal requirements to be added to FGMEMBERS are NOT lower. FGMEMBERS contains FGMEMBERS (for GPL)and FGMEMBERS-NONGPL for obviously non-gpl aircraft.

2.) Therefore, the argument, one has to sort it out by hand is void, it is already sorted.

3.) Actually, the only planes in FGMEMBERS that were lately in discussion about whether they are GPL or not were planes, FGMEMBERS pulled from FGADDON. Which makes me wonder, what would happen if someone from the outside really takes a closer look at FGADDON's aircraft.

In general, the story, something is "a fork" and "doesn't give back" is the usual cover story that everywhere pops up if one group does things, the established group perceives as a threat for various reasons. It is not about "giving back". None of us is a core dev, none of us would be for political reasons even accepted as core committer if any of us would try. But we put a lot of work in it on other fronts. Aircraft development, helping new users, organizing MP events, all that kind of stuff. Of course, a core-dev maybe considers this as second class contribution, not really counting, but then, FG is a whole, not just C++ code. I mean, it's nice and great that some program C++, but without planes your C++ would be a bit empty. And obviously, without the C++ core, the planes would be quite useless and without the program and the planes, MP events wouldn't happen. So one depends on the other and therefore, in my opinion, ALL contributions count. So this is not about "doesn't give back". That's just a propaganda trick born from a struggle that started on a technical level and then got too much psychology into it.

The same is with the argument "version control". Since FGMEMBERS has a working commit log, there is no problem with version control. There simply isn't. How can there be one. Every single commit is logged and can be rolled back if the need should arise. I honestly don't know whether this is possible in FGADDON, but then, that's a problem of FGADDON, not of FGMEMBERS, right?

And there is this argument, that there is no control who pushes what in FGMEMBERS. Which translates to, developers can't rotect their work from others who may break their planes. Now, that is at least worth a closer look. Most developers have own repositories. I have for example stuff under Github.com/JWocky. There, I have control what I allow. Admittedly, I am quite open in my personal attitude to it, so I just allowed FGMEMBERS to play back changes from there into my repository. If I would be more afraid of other people, I may would say, do it all by pull-request and I check out every little change before I commit it. Actually, despite having rights to merge, FGMEMBERS still sends me pull requests and has me merging them myself. Bottom line: I can protect MY repository.
FGMEMBERS is not supposed to be overly controlled, that would be exact the opposite from what it is supposed to be. FGMEMEMBERS is supposed to be the place where sometimes a dozen people put their work on one and the same plane together. Of course, there will be a point, where someone things, it is funny to push something bad with malignant intent, maybe just to prove a point. Actually, some tried already. So what? As soon as someone notices, it can be rolled back. Working commit log, you remember?
So this argument is as far fetched and non-existent as all the other arguments brought up against FGMEMBERS.

The quality argument. Well, since the same people who claim here, FGADDON is a higher quality discuss on the dev-list that they would rather fly a less developed plane than an excellent one just because the less developed is in FGADDON and not in FGMEMBERS, I don't even know where to go with this argument. We wait since months for a list of quality criteria. The question came up when FGMEMBERS wasn't even created because aircraft were rejected from FGADDON for "quality reasons" and nobody was able to say whar quality reasons they were. Which was one of the triggers that led to the creation of FGMEMBERS in the first place. Today, we are still at the same point. FGADDON defines itself last but not least via "quality" without defining what are the criteria not making sure, the criteria are all the same or even checked for all contributors ... I don't want to be banned again, so I don't quote Animal Farm again.

In the end, this whole hostility is not fact-based. Look above, all those arguments against proved as non-existent, constructions to create perception, not real. Which shows, this is not a technical argument, nor is it a legal one. This one is purely emotional. If the situation would be different (as in we would be all in the same time zone and the whole thing would be less emotional driven) I would suggest, everybody leans back, grabs a coffee and does for some hours something else. Just to take the edge off of it. But after some months of perpetual attacks with always the same constructed non-arguments, I have doubts a few hours will suffice ... or one coffee. Now, after political bans and deletions of posts became the new reality of FlightGear, I am at a loss what even to suggest because one side refuses even to discuss the real technical level here with the killer argument "we are official, we silence you". So there is no room for any kind of compromise left as long as this attitude continues. Instead, the escalation on the "official" side has forced us now not only to run a repository and an organization but also a new forum to ensure, free speech is still possible. So how far will this go? Neither of us want to leave, neither of us want to "fork" FG and neither of us want to "kill FG", those are all just those emotion-making manipulative accusation thrown at us. We put a lot of time and effort in FG and we still do while we are under perpetual attack. Do you really think, we would do that if we would be already out of the door with one foot? Not even active harassment and open discrimination (for example the MPSERVER 12 trick against IAHM-COL) could make us leave. So how on Earth can you believe someone who says "you want to go anyway and make your own clone" just for propaganda reasons?
But it really doesn't matter, doesn't it? In the end, the third party in all of this will decide. Those who are rarely post here or on the dev-list (they aren't even there, I assume). The silent majority, as usual. They will load aircraft from FGADDON and from FGMEMBERS, wherever they find, what they like to fly and the same has to be said for any other kind of functionality. Under that consideration there is only one difference between FGADDON and FGMEMBERS relevant: If FGMEMBERS messes up, the FG project per se is not endangered. If FGADDON and its proponents mess up, for example by changing the way, we discuss such different approaches to political bans and silencing of any opposition, the FG project takes irreparable damage because there is no community anymore, only those who rule and those who can't speak anymore because they have to fear to be banned for it. And that is a sad picture. Now it is a repository, who knows, next year you say, there is a problem with the FDM in aircraft x and because it is an "official plane", who knows, maybe you get the ban then. Once this starts, there is usually no way back.
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Re: Back from being banned ...

Postby MIG29pilot » Tue Sep 15, 2015 2:07 pm

IAHM-COL wrote in Tue Sep 15, 2015 2:33 am: and some had even proposed that speak about FGMEMBERS should be forbidden for the alledged good of the community.

Due to the "flame wars" you mentioned to lines later. And which are going on right now. And, if certain person's don't flaring up on the subject will go on into the indefinite future unless the moderators decide it's enough. Given the flaring-ups that have been going on lately on this topic, (flaring-ups which do absolutely NO good to the community or the project, and which don't get anywhere near solving any problem) I find it no surprise that the moderators would consider banning talk on this subject.
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