for those who have left

[nitro]

Interesting thread. Has to be said its a bit sad if .org is going down certain closed doors route which is what is happening if certain hack development tips and discussions are now out of reach, thats a huge distance to where .org started out. It also wont help future coders as the new plugin system means users who install really see nothing but the results (I started a thread on this a while back).

No I dont write many hacks, yes I have released even less, barely at all here. Most hacks are allready here that I would use, many do what I want many need more work to do what I want, I dont generally pester for the extra I try to take that part on myself, having been installing hacks for some time I have had the benefit of seeing the code and where its going in the past and have some understanding of that code, and have taught myself by trial and error and the search button for extra info how to make some things do more what I want. The extra info to me is as important as the hack itself.

However I fully understand releasers needing a venting room to throw stuff, I have seen many completely ridiculous posts which seems to be getting worse and not just here on .org either by users who say nothing but it dont work and a flame away at the author.
Perhaps hack authors should be able to click an uninstall for such abusive installers and deny support above whats allready posted until its fit to reverse that.

There will allways be those who have no respect for anything and there will allways be those who appreciate whats contributed be it info or complete releases.

Its harder to force any respect into those who cannot respect but its dead easy to lose the appreciators by penalising them for the actions of those who dont.

[tgreer]

Originally Posted by nitro

Interesting thread. Has to be said its a bit sad if .org is going down certain closed doors route which is what is happening if certain hack development tips and discussions are now out of reach, thats a huge distance to where .org started out. It also wont help future coders as the new plugin system means users who install really see nothing but the results (I started a thread on this a while back).

Bingo!

Originally Posted by nitro

However I fully understand releasers needing a venting room to throw stuff, I have seen many completely ridiculous posts which seems to be getting worse and not just here on .org either by users who say nothing but it dont work and a flame away at the author.

That's what moderators are for. Delete the post, warn the user. If the abuse continues, ban them. Plus, the coders discussion is NOT a venting room. Any such posts would be explicitly against the rules of that forum.

[nitro]

Originally Posted by tgreer

Bingo!



That's what moderators are for. Delete the post, warn the user. If the abuse continues, ban them. Plus, the coders discussion is NOT a venting room. Any such posts would be explicitly against the rules of that forum.

In which case if the coders/stylers forums is purely code tips & discussion with a few mods security issues then all the tips and discussion posts need to be seen by all licensed members, this is most useful to all us old skoolers here (I know lots of these have moved one for whatever reason, but theres still some of us left) and one of the only areas newcomers will get to see much code. Remember not all newcomers are total noodles that have less intelligence than a bean. I am no master coder by any means but it doesnt mean I cant get the basics and work with it. But if it cant be seen then it cant be worked with, thats getting to be closed source, which I beleive is against the sites rules. Also those who tweak do provide much support in addon threads to those who dont have the knowledge or have got lost in trying.

Closing a coding discussion forum to oldies and newcomers is inevitably going to reduce future mod makers and tweakers who all contribute in one way or another, some more than others, some much more. It will become an almost comeplete segragation users will contribute no more than click install and maybe rate and rarley learn anything and the coders club will become there for the few which will dimminish in numbers.

Results inspire appreciation, visibility insires new talent.

Security issues are another matter whereby the how tos for replication etc should be relativley private in the first instance at least, a fix should be provided asap by whoever has the power to do so and if thats going to take a while longer all who clicked install should get an advisory mail, and that should be inside 24/48 hours, most mods carry a page which has some form of easy google search term so finding sites with a modification that has a security flaw is easy for those wishing to cause harm.

[EasyTarget]

its not a coding discussion forum, its a forum for coders (people who have released hacks). From what you guys are saying, the problem isn't that there's a private forum for them, its that people don't contribute to threads about coding.

As far as closed source, talking about code in a private forum doesn't qualify as that as far as I can tell (I'm sure there's some code talk in the moderator forums as well). It would be releasing a hack where people can't access the code wouldn't it?

Maybe a good idea would be for moderators to copy threads which don't have sensitive/personal information from the private coders forum into a pulic area once the thread has run its course.

nitro, even though you may not think its useful, you could always post what edits you have done or tips that have helped you for others to see because you never know who might find it handy. This will help bring more content to the coding discussion forums, which in turn will bring in more users/contributors to it.

I also agree that coders should have some more control of their modification release threads as well. They shouldn't have to deal with members who are tearing them or their work done (as long as they can distinguish between contructive criticism and pure contempt).

[nitro]

If you read my post you would see I say tweakers do contribute greatly, some more than others, and not just in advising on specific tweaking questions but you will find many minor support answers come form those who perform personal tweaks but dont actually release much if anything.
This is why my post count is not that high despite the fact that I am actually the oldest member thats participated in this thread, because some people do read the threads/use search and mostly get the answers needed without asking a Q thats been answered a dozen times, releasing is another game altogether as theres a responsibilty to it, which I like many others dont have the time for, doesnt mean whats been posted by us has been useless or we have just grabbed any hack possible and ran off saying nothing.

If every tweaker was to simply post every tweak made the modification threads could get very dificult for the author to support, but tweaks do have a good input in the past here and some authors also take some of the select extra ideas on board and even improve them at times. That said the way some rules are tightening up its also becoming more awkward for tweaks or even temporay updates/how to update to be posted when the authors away for sometime for whatever reason, this is bad side effect to being a .org that permits strict copyright in releases, as it leaves many who cannot work it out in a prevoius series or dropping features they have become acustomed to. Good job Jelsoft is proactive for security in most of the series but still doesnt help those left behind to move on. yes coders need time out like everyone. On this I think coders should accept a set time limit for releases here to make an new series update else permit it to be passed on for the new series (other terms could be made to help this work better aswell).

So if a coders forum isnt discussing code and coding methods, doesnt seem to be much of a coders forum then really.

[EasyTarget]

I wasn't trying to say your posts were useless, I'm trying to say that you should post even the little things that you do because they really aren't useless.

As you said its not good to keep posting it in the authors thread, but maybe if you kept it all in one post it wouldn't be so bad. I know there's lots of hacks that go unsupported and there's many kind users that end up taking over or just posting their changes in them.

The coders forum is a coders forum for the people that use it, not for the content inside of it.

[tgreer]

For the last time, and this time please listen, EasyTarget: the private coder's discussion forum is about detailed coding discussions. That's all it's about. Anything else is strictly against the rules for that forum, which I posted. It is not a "contributors' lounge", as you are tending to paint it. It's about hardcode coding discussions, the kind that this forum is supposed to have and be about. The kind nitro wants to see. Please stop posting about an issue you've already stated you don't care about, especially since your preconceptions and speculations about it are wrong. Thank you and good night.

[EasyTarget]

I obviously care about it or I wouldn't be posting.. nice conclusion though. I said I don't care to have access. I think coders deserve recognition and other benefits for the work they do, a private forum is a very small part of that. More benefits for coders = More coders that contribute = more modifications = more users = more coders, etc.

If the coders forum's purpose is just for detailed coding then they need to change its purpose to just be a private forum for coders.. *If they still want to talk about coding in it, great, but then we wouldn't have people whining about some little detail like what the forum description is.

*yes I agree, it'd be beneficial for some of those discussions to occur in the open

[Gio~Logist]

Originally Posted by EasyTarget

I obviously care about it or I wouldn't be posting.. nice conclusion though. I said I don't care to have access. I think coders deserve recognition and other benefits for the work they do, a private forum is a very small part of that. More benefits for coders = More coders that contribute = more modifications = more users = more coders, etc.

If the coders forum's purpose is just for detailed coding then they need to change its purpose to just be a private forum for coders.. *If they still want to talk about coding in it, great, but then we wouldn't have people whining about some little detail like what the forum description is.


*yes I agree, it'd be beneficial for some of those discussions to occur in the open

Your appreciation is appreciated heh

[LJR]

Create a coders' forum if you must but allow other members to apply for access to the usergroup which will allow them access to it. To me, as a simple peddlar of tin, a forum should only ever be hidden if there is sensitive information in there which should not be viewable by the general membership database (for example a staff forum). There is absolutely zero benefit to creating a forum, making it hidden, when the information could be of interest to those who have not yet written a hack. Make it viewable, even if it's read only unless you have posted a hack (in which case you can then create threads and reply to others too)