When I read the help forums at http://www.ubuntuforums.org/ , I tend to
see the same thing. People are complaining about the developers (How
could they *possibly* allow something like this to happen?!?!?) or ease
of use (I should have to go through *all this* to get it to work!
Ubuntu sucks!). Usually someone chimes in and says something to the
effect of: "Ubuntu is free software. You're not in much of a position
to complain about something when you're getting it for free."
Tim Ruppert wrote:
I just wanted to move this topic to something that would be less related
to one particular topic and more related to what appears to be a
deteriorating tone in the user community.
As everyone knows, there is a A LOT of work constantly going on around
the user & dev communities here at OFBiz - and thanks to this we're
starting to see a bunch of new, potential "power" users coming into the
fold - which is exactly what this community needs.
When I take a step back from what is going on in my regular work life
and concentrate on the mailing lists, my personal opinion is that there
is a lot of baggin' on OFBiz going on around here! Most of the people
around here are experienced developers who have worked on a number of
different open source projects, so I guess I'm a little surprised by
where things appear to be heading.
Without going into specifics and calling individual people out on the
carpet, I would like to have everyone just think about these things:
1. All committers and experienced OFBiz developers are all working
towards the same goal - to better the project.
2. When you're not finding something that you need, it's much more
effective to ask where things are found - rather than criticize the
current set up.
3. If something you want is not available, you can either head a group
that wants to develop / document it, develop it yourself, or get someone
more experienced in OFBiz to champion your cause.
4. If you NEED something committed back into OFBiz and are on a strict
timeline, build in a small amount of funds to get a committer to look at
it. Often times people are too busy with paying work to look over
EVERYTHING - cash can, at times change priorities for everyone. This is
not to imply that being a committer is a paying gig - just that if your
stuff is a priority more for you than the community, this can help.
5. It's far less stressful to try to get what you want than it is to be
right! What I mean by this, is think about what you're saying and how
you're saying it. It can go a long way towards getting you what you
really want.
Anyways, thanks for listening and I hope this helps people start to
structure their requests & needs in a way that motivates people to help
them. We need everyone to come in and be productive community members
so that we can all work more efficiently - let's see what we can do to
rally around the project!
Cheers,
Tim
--
Tim Ruppert
HotWax Media
http://www.hotwaxmedia.com
o:801.649.6594
f:801.649.6595
--
David Shere
Steele Rubber Products
eBay Programming and Sales
http://stores.ebay.com/Steele-Rubber-Products
