Adopt a hack forum?
 

Would it be feasible to establish a forum (public or private) for Coders who wish to retain credit for their original code, but who no longer wish to continue upgrading or developing their hack? A forum where other coders could reply via pm to "adopt" their hack? And with mutual consent the second coder be added as a "Supporter / Co-author"?

Please give this some serious consideration as this is a serious suggestion (not a criticism). I love vB.org! And I only wish for it to continue to grow and evolve.

Thanks.

This is quite a good idea actually.

What would also be nice:
If the supporters/co authors could edit the hack aswell, or atleast the hack info and attachments :)

I don't think there is an overwhelming demand for this. If people want to join as a co-author could they not just contact the author privately :)?

While it is a nice idea, it would have to be done in a way such that the original author explicitly gives terms of use for the code and modifications and that they are enforced. Both of those are not likely to happen.

If the forum was set up like the paid mod section, the negotiations would remain private. That way a the coders could reach a mutual agreement. There would be nothing to enforce because credit for the original work would remain and the person adopting the hack given credit as "support or co-author".

I have every sympathy with coders who for whatever reason decide they are "done" with a particular hack. But, why should their hacks become obsolete when others might be willing to carry on with them?

The present method lacks the ability for these nice people to "hook up".

Dean C, the idea is to give the original coder a way to attract attention to hacks they wish to turn over to someone else ... a way to "bow out" gracefully ... and with the knowledge that their work will be carried on by someone they trust.

As a "consumer" of hacks, I would LOVE to see something like this!

It would make me feel all warm and cozy about installing a hack. It would be just, oh so peachy!

Right now, I have to worry if tomorrow the hack author gets hit by a bus, and no one will pick it up.

With such a database, there would be a very clear list of hacks, showing activity, when was last updated... wait... sounds just like sourceforge.net!!! Yeah baby! THAT would be nice.. A sourceforge style DB of mods/hacks with activity level AND the option to contact authors of abandoned codes!

Whoa, libertate!

I love your enthusiasm ... but, since we're dealing with change here ... let's keep the notion of baby steps in mind so the powers that be don't blow the whole notion out of the water because it's too complex.

PM the hack author and offer to take over its development. :)

That only works if the author is actually still around.

Why ask for site feedback when the most anyone ever gets as a response is a defense of the status quo?

Respecfully, Erwin, do you not feel the present system could be improved?

i would agree with such a forum.. i would be more than happy to see my work taken by a coder i know, because i'm going to quit the community soon, and want the codes to be supported as they are used by some - or at least discussed for other tools..

so if we have this forum, i will post in first and offer my scripts for adoption... but i have to know the guy that will take care of my beasts...

I dun think it is as much a 'defense' as it is a pretty logicial suggestion/solution.
I mean if I were interested in helping take over the development of a buggy or outdated and unsupported hack, I don't need a forum to do it, I'd just drop a note to the hack author to check if its alright to take over the development. :)

problem with "contacting" the author, is that we don't always have the availability of a coder when he quit the community...

a forum like this would speed up the process: example:

i'm quitting in 4 weeks (may 22th) and i know my codes are needed... i simply have to drop a note in the adoption forum, and someone available will take care of my codes...

if i don't have that forum, i have to tag my releases as "unsuported", and make an announce in my sig about the fact...

also, this is not always the case that a coder will be willing to be contacted after some work done, and i see also in the releases some hacks released by non-coders not interested to support the scripts - because these scripts were done in a paid process, etc.. any reason is good.

this would become mostly a dropbox for codes...

I'd love this. I hate installing a hack (After making sure it has worked for people.) Getting it installed having problems and seeing that the coder as vanished from Earth. Not good...caused me way to many errors. vB.org could write it into the TOS of when you sign-up and force all current members to agree with it.

This would excellent though. :)

nah, no TOS.. this is stupid... people here have to agree to the jelsoft license, and when they hack their board, the jelsoft license is broken, so why ask for a TOS...

Contacting the author works. It's really that easy.

If the author aint around and you are passionate about the hack, just do the necessary support in the existing thread. Post your "patches" or "mods" and gain the respect of the other users of the hack.

If you are up to par, things will fall in to place naturally.

Thanks for the input from everyone!

The objective of this forum would be to "hook up" those that would be willing to adopt a hack with a hack in need of adoption ... plus the added security for the original author that he was leaving his hack in the hands of someone he/she trusted.

Unless as a hacker you spend countless hours reading through the threads of other mods, I doubt you realize how many times a coder announces they are regretfully "moving on". And frequently, when they do, there remains no way to contact them.

If this were ever your choice, wouldn't you prefer to have an option to place your hack(s) up for adoption?

I figure this could take place in the lounge and doesn't need a special forum. I don't see it happening very often.

The thing is, nobody really needs to get permission to support another author's hack or to post bug fixes. All they have to do is start helping out in the hack's thread. I have posted help or fixes to countless hacks in the hack thread when the author was busy or I found a bug. Others have posted fixes or additions to my hacks. That's the way this place is supposed to work.

Ultimately, a hack is sort of like a used car. It's given to the community "as is" and you have no reason to expect otherwise. What makes this place work is that if the hack is useful, others in the community chime in with fixes and feature additions.

If you see a hack that needs work, do the work and then share it in the hack's thread. Problem solved.

Perhaps instead of a special forum, simply provide a flag which hack creators could make to mark their hacks clearly as some modified open source type of licensing that would cover the "grey" areas between following the VB rules in regards to releasing hacks here to not be displaying VB's code to everybody and a true open source code file. Or people could just say that when they release it....

I wasn't being defensive, I was just stating the obvious. :)

The issue is whether we need a whole new forum for this or not.

A few things:

1. Anyone can contribute to a hack by posting improvements or bug fixes directly into the hack support thread itself. No need to get permission for this.

2. Anyone can contact a hack author to ask to actually release a new version of the the hack that is substantially improved. Usually this is done via a PM. If that doesn't work, you can email the author using the email form.

3. If you get no reply from the hack author, then you cannot go ahead and re-use the hack authors code to make a new hack out of it.

If a hack author has left vB.org, having a new forum does not necessarily make any difference - if he or she is not reading a PM, why would a new forum be any different?

Possible solutions:

1. Have a checkbox when you submit a hack to say "Yes I allow this hack to be taken over by another hacker" or "No I will not allow anyone else to develop this hack".

The problem with this is that initially not many would choose to say "Yes".

2. A hack author, when he or she feels there is no longer an urge to continue developing a hack, can post in his or her hack support thread and just announce that the hack may be taken over.

I don't see why option 2 is not used more often.

I guess what I am trying to say is that a whole new forum may not be required.

Thank you for your thoughtful reply. Of course, this is what is happening now:

My reasoning for suggesting a new forum has to do with probability, simplification, and organization. I doubt many coders have the time or inclination to surf through all the threads here. Even if the author of a particular hack announces that they are "moving on" on post #57 of their 30 page thread ... who in the heck (realistically) would spot it?

On the other hand, if they posted in the suggested forum, everyone would easily be informed.

This seems like a "win-win" suggestion to me (but then it would; wouldn't it?). :)

Why not just change the "Supported" tick box to a username instead. Then you can see the name of who is supporting a particular hack (which could be blank if no one is). The author could simply change this to someone else if they are no longer going to support it themselves.

I don't think many coders are around just looking to take over projects. If someone wants to take over, then it is because they re interested in the hack and probably using it themself. They would know if it is was posted in the hacks thread.

I or Xenon would be happy to implement any ideas that have the support of the majority of members here. :) As long as it is going to be used. Nothing worse than an empty forum. :)

yea, .. there should be another option available alongside "Supported" ... eg. "OPEN".

If the author doesn't mind if their code is used elsewhere (on another hack or extending the hack itself) they tick "OPEN" (or something similar).

This will enable others to extend/support the hack on a separate thread.

NOTE: Once "OPEN" is ticked it cannot be unticked.

something like that ... would help

just throwing ideas :)

We prefer having only one support thread for a modification. It prevents clutter :)

if someone takes over hack (modifies / extends it)
... they should get credit by allowing them their own thread

now, if the mods are just small additions -- yes, I agree

As a vB's hack user I think that the problem with the system now is that it gets frustrating browsing thru the thread to see if there is any patches/fixes released by coders other the the author of the hack.

What I would suggest and love to see here is maybe another box/table under the hack download file table where anyone(or just coders) can upload patches and fixes which can be easy to spot by the hack consumers and maybe just make it aware that the author is not responsible for patches released by any other coder other than himself. This would probably also get rid of the "Add-On Releases" forum aswell which can be a good thing for coders and consumers.

This would be very easy to do with a few hacking to hack release threads and would not require author permission or a separate forum.

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As far as getting the permission to take over a hack, I would think that maybe erwin can adapt the Un-register Yourself(not the actual name) hack that I seen released somewhere here to this board and maybe if the user is CODER have a checkbox option if he/she would'nt mind if other coders takeover thier hack project and depending on the coder choice mark thier hacks with a flag/image so other coders would know if they can take over or not. Cool thing about this is that this could all be hidden from regular board users and viewable by coders only :)

OR

If un-register yourself doesn't sound like a good idea, maybe have an option under the usercp of coders to allow such permission if going inactive/leaving forum.

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just my 0.02cents worth of thoughts!

I'm actually in this situation right now. I took over a hack (with permission) and released a new version. However, the old thread is still there and it can't be updated because no one seems to be able to get ahold of the original author.

What I'd do is create a vb.org license that applies to all submitted hacks and basically states that if you're inactive for a certain period of time, others can take over your hack as long as they include you in the credits.

Only problem with this is that then the risk is that there could be multiple people claiming ownership of hack so all of a sudden there are multiple versions of the same hack.

Personally I like the basic idea of this thread but if a system was put into place I'd prefer that's a clean break.... that hack XYZ by user John Doe is transferring the overseeing of it to user Jane Doe; that way there is still only one version of the hack and it's clear who has taken over development of it.

There is a lot of presumptions, primarily that whoever is using the hack/mod is willing and able to code it.

That is not the case for me. Although I could code, I am not willing. So where does that leave me with a hack that is crucial for my site, and yet abbandoned by an author?

As for "just contact the author", more often then not, the authors abbandon their code suddenly. That is, by completely disappearing and not leaving sufficient contact information.

I am not looking for a "thread" or "forum". I am looking for a DB.

A database will have additional benefits. Currently to find any hack you have to scan through hundreds and hundreds of threads to actually find the link to the hack itself. If there is a better way, then I don't know it - ergo I also presume that a lot of other non-tech savvy individuals are forced to scan through just as I do.

Having an organized method to manage hacks, for searching, commenting, updating, and providing future life after an author leaves it is beneficial for the community. A solid repository of code would be an extreemly strong resource.

Right now, no disrespect, but vB.org method of categorizing code is very limiting. "Beta Releases", "Full Releases" and "Premium Releases". Thankfully, the "Full releases" is broken down further... Could at least the primary thread be stickied?

I agree that there are problems with the current setup, but I'm also not sure a new forum would help.

It seems to me that like others have said, most of the coders who abandon hacks do so because they disappear from here entirely. So they probably won't be around to hand their hacks off to someone else anyway.

Also, while it's true that people can just take over support of a hack in the thread itself, the problem is that non-coders (like myself) end up having to wade through 25 pages of comments where there might be a dozen different "fixes", some of which are unnecessary, others that have already been added to the first post, some that are just wrong, etc. And it's very difficult for non-coders to separate the good from the bad, the necessary from the superfluous.

So why not just make it part of the deal that when people post a hack, they implicitly agree to surrender their code if they disappear, unless they specifically request that it be removed? That way if someone wants to take over a hack they can just PM a staff member or something, and if the staff can't get a response from the autor either then the hack ownership is turned over to the volunteer.

I can't imagine why anyone would object to having development of their hack continue after they've obviously given up on it and moved on.

Because many of us would never release a hack here again. Our code is free for you to USE but is not free for anybody else to claim credit for.

Over time, bugs get worked out and the same installation errors repeat themselves. After that, questions are generally posted by people too lazy to read a thread or by people who want the hack author to make niggling little customizations like - I want to restrict this so only user x can do that, etc.

Once a hack gets to that point, I don't always waste my time replying to people. It doesn't mean the hack was abandoned. It's just my way of preserving my sanity by not answering the same questions over and over again and by not being begged to death for subtle changes that a simple glance at a php manual could resolve the need for the installer.

Amy

I didn't mean to suggest that the original author should lose the credit for their work, just that a new coder who wants to bug fix and/or keep it updated with the new releases of vBulletin should be allowed to update the original post. Maybe even leave the original files intact and let the new coder upload a v2 or whatever.

I was under the impression that vb.org was about open-source community sharing and all that. Why would you stop posting hacks unless you could be assured that development of them will stop when you lose interest in them?