Reward for Coders
 

Should there be a reward for Advanced coders or Master Coders for contributing their hacks and their hard work? I am not talking about money (that would be the best reward i think), but for example Advanced Coders and Master Coders could get free license for vb for 1 year (for example) :)

I believe it will increase the number of hacks and the quality of hacks

what do you think?

I agree totally. There should be a reward. Not because of our demand but because Jelsoft should show some appreciation to them. They have contributed in making vbulletin so famous!

My $0.02

Most coders own owned licences so your suggestion of something like a free licence for a year is totaly impractical as few coders will actually make any use of this.

Also, the number of Advanced and Master coders seems to have rocketed recently (or maybe that's my imagination) so it would cost quite a lot to set that up.

However, back in the days when things like HOTM was first starting out the following applied:
(link to full post)

I'd be quite happy with something like this applying again. You get recognition more visably here and you can put a little something on your site too.

The other thing is that sometimes you can get a fantastic hack from a coder (not advanced or master) and there are other coders who do pretty specific stuff that only gets a handful of installs but they churn out lots of releases. These types of coders are unlikely to make it to the advanced coder level for a rather long time but also deserve recognition in some form or other.



So I guess my answer is:

Maybe, maybe not. But if something is proposed then somehow linking it with HOTM would be worth looking into.


[high]* peterska2 doesn't vote as I'm sorta on the fence.[/high]

there is NO WAY i would accept to have any kind of reward because i'm an Advanced Dump of Codes...

loosing my time answering threads and providing a list of about 10 small hacks made me an Advanced coder... that's not a reason why i would receive any reward...

the coders that REALLY provide real efficient support and help and codes are rewarded when they want, by giving their paypal account and receive your donations... some others receive some contracts from clients requesting paid jobs... and some others are hired by Jelsoft as developpers and techies...

i also provide a lot of support and discussion on some parenting websites, would it be good if i'm rewarded with a given baby ?! (ok, this one is absurd...)

i voted yes.

so here's your reward, all you coders here. :D

http://asuaf.org/~thatoneguy/cookie.jpg

nexialys, most people become advanced coders after much more than just 10 hacks. Personally I have more than that but I'm not an advanced coders.
Advanced coders and higher devote the time equal to a part(or full!) time job here. They should receive some kind of reward I think...

I think we should be able to moderate our own hack threads. Then I could clear a load of crap from some of them ......

... and have a private forum for Advanced / Master coders where we could discuss things away from the busstle of the main site.

...... oh, and cash would be nice of course ;)

yeah, i don't know btw why i'm an advanced geek... maybe because i'm flooding the forum with alerts and bad comments...

when i give support, it's because i took responsability to provide some when i release a line of code... i did not released these codes waiting for a reward... the only way i ask for a reward is when i charge my clients with the fees i apply on my paid jobs... releasing for free is related to the "free" fact...

that's all... and i know i'm not like everybody, because i'm a guy from Qu?bec, a strange country in north of the biggest commercial racket of all...

The reward nexialys shouldn't necessarily be materialistic ;)

Paul M that would be nice!

yeah, not materialistic... my paypal account is virtual, for god sakes... lol
i like the Cinq's reward... need some of these when you come visit me in my humble place, cinq!

It would be nice to have some sort of rewards for contributing members in general, not necessarily to only advanced or master coders. As for the title, it's pretty useless to me cuz I didn't see any change in my membership.

Paul M :up: :up:

this is a good idea, a place where coders can discuss privately about things like "building mega projects in teams", or "a mega overtake of vb.org"...

YES! the first two anyway. Maybe not delete posts, and piss peeps off about their post count. But the ability to hide posts would be cool. Too many useless posts clutter up the hack threads so no one reads the useful ones.

A private forum for all that release hacks. Everyone that releases code to make vBulletin better deserves a discussion forum, not just the ones that have been around longer.

hell yeah cause if they dont do them no one will

Naa, there would be a flood of crappy hacks to get hack status.

- I get recognition form people now and then that enjoy what the hacks does for their site. :)
- Some that value the hack alot might toss a few bones @ me now and then. :)

I do not need a gold star no.

- I do not see this happening. Many people get in a pissing contest " you Deled my post blaw blaw blaw"

- Another problem w/ the idea is relevance of someone's post. To you it may be moronic what a person might of posted, but I may find it usefull on a project I may be stuck on. I may be off in "left" field, but it sounds like a can of worms.

[high]* Zachariah goes back to his cave.[/high]

Nope, there wouldn't because the coder status depends also on the install count, not only on the number of hacks. If the hacks were crappy then they wouldn't have many installs and the poster wouldn't achieve coder (let's not mention advanced coder!) through them ;)

all your coders are belong to us

Well that's not the problem really back in the day when vb 2 series was our or even when early 3.0 came out tons of people wrote hacks it was packed here but since 3.5 came out thought its great mods have gone down and tons of people I knew here haven't made new mods or updated anything, infact most of them aren't even here hardly. Gosh I miss those good old golden days :(

Did you call me a Northern Mexican? ;)

I thought Quebec seperated from CanAda.

Oh and I vote for an aweome pat on the back. ;)

I like the idea, even if I wouldnt really benefit from it. Some type of nice 'perk' would be nice.

However I wouldnt make it based on number of releases, but rather number of installs over a period of time (say 1 year) to prevent people flooding .org with cruddy hacks just for a cookie.

I agree that in theory the main reason for the creation of the Advanced and Master Coders was purely probally to create a sense of acheivement within the vb.org community, which, i feel admitly contains the bulk of active vBulletin "modifiers" - and therefore to be recognized, even if it is just through a Custom Title would be an appropriate distinction and against other users. Although it would be nice to provide them with additional incentives to help encourage more people to take up coding and develop the overall "value" of modifications posted i feel it would only end up creating more segregation and discontent between those coders who feel they deserve some sort of recognition or "prize", and those whom obtain the position contriversally or perhaps undeservedly in the eyes of the community.

And besides some sort of vBulletin themed award isnt going to attract many, especially considering how these guys are coders therefore will already have access to a copy of vBulletin in order to publish their work. Although, with the possible introduction of this new Commercial Modifications Directory it would be interesting to see perhaps Advanced and Master coders have their commercial modifications some how emphasised against others. Although of course this would just link back into how perhaps encouraging, or even acknowleding the process of commericalising modifications could lead to an overall reduction in the quality of work published for free at vb.org with coders resulting in wanting to (and rightly so) get something in return for their hard work and support provided.

Yeah it would be a nice idea to have some sort of strict critea with which could be automatically applied to any user who surpasses a total value of, for example, 1,000 installs would become an Advanced Coder, and 1,500 to become a Master Code. (Of course these values are mere generalizations and i myself dont have that much of an idea as to the overall consensus of what constitutes a successful hack, therefore this could be adjusted accordingly to decide "install" milestones)

There are such levels as far as I know. The staff won't say what they are however to stop people begging/spamming for installs etc.

That said, I guess I'll have to do at least a couple more myself to get such a title :(

I agree - If there was that kind of reward, I'd definatly be more inclined to produce more :)

I dont see why these sort of levels should be kept secret, i mean if someone can beg their way to 1,000 installs, (let alone 100) they surely must deserve some recognition of some sort :nervous: . I personally only install programs i am either running or interested in keeping up with modification developments and updates - i would assume the majority of users here would do likewise, therefore i doubt the minority left will have any great impact in influencing install counts, or else HoTM polls would be fixed each month too.

Perhaps tying this in with the commercial hacks idea. Advanced/Master coders get to post commercial hacks, maybe?

I've never understood the reason for keeping the levels secret. You cannot force people to install something. I personally think a few more levels would be nice, or a display similar to the reputation display, but based on hacks/installs. :)

not good... some commercial coders never participate in the forum, so they would need to "spam" the forum before being able to post their own commercial tools, and this is not good.

keep the coder level to something, and the content released on a different path...

I like the private forum idea for AC and MC's. :)

i vote YES.......because Vbulletin would not have too much advantage over all the free boards if it was not for the hard work and the extra's you guys are making

I think that you misinterpretated the suggestion, instead of commercial coders becomming Advanced, or Master Coders instead those that have accertained the title have the ability to promote their commerical work also. And with regards to "spamming" a forum, i would find it very difficult to think that a commerical user would have the time to deviate away from his/her paying customers to dream up a selection of "spam" worthy modifications which would just happen to acculmulate the required amount of installs needed to obtain the Advanced/Master Coder title. Which judging by the amount of coders here, is something which even those who regually participate and interact within the forum are still unable to obtain.