
WiringPi – deprecated - kbumsik
http://wiringpi.com/wiringpi-deprecated/
======
guardiangod
First of all, sorry to hear that WiringPi is deprecated, and I would like to
thank the author for all the effort he put into this project.

When I read his blog post on his reasoning, I can't help but be reminded of
the feud between xscreensaver's author and Debian maintainers. Debian
maintainers refused to upgrade the app's version and refused to remove the
'For support contact the author's email' notice. The author's fed up with all
the support emails he gets from Debian (outdated) installations' users and put
in a message prompt blasting Debian. It was very ugly for both sides.

I think that there can be an extension on GPL that says, if you bundle this
library and is not using the latest official version from the author, you are
not allowed to include the author's contact information. If you insist on
bundling the author's email with your outdated software, then you are in
violation of GPL.

As for people stealing his code. Sorry to hear this. I got nothing except to
try to contact EFF.

~~~
dogecoinbase
_I can 't help but be reminded of the feud between xscreensaver's author and
Debian maintainers._

For the curious, the post: [https://www.jwz.org/blog/2016/04/i-would-like-
debian-to-stop...](https://www.jwz.org/blog/2016/04/i-would-like-debian-to-
stop-shipping-xscreensaver/)

And the instigatory thread: [https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-
bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=819703](https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-
bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=819703)

~~~
steve19
Because jwz appears to have a very short fuse and at one point in time one or
a group of users on HN didn't agree with him (as best as I can remember),
referrals from HN are redirected to an image of a testicle.

Here is a wayback machine link to avoid the image:

[http://web.archive.org/web/20190810115358/https://www.jwz.or...](http://web.archive.org/web/20190810115358/https://www.jwz.org/blog/2016/04/i-would-
like-debian-to-stop-shipping-xscreensaver/)

~~~
dtech
Wow, if you pull shit like that that immediately is 1 point for the other team
in whatever beef he had

~~~
DanBC
Links on HN were generating huge amounts of negative traffic.

I don't blame him for having a redirect.

~~~
jnbiche
OK, a redirect, but to a pornographic image?

~~~
lallysingh
It's a testicle. Not people having graphic sex.

------
cannonedhamster
The author owes nobody anything. He's already done enough. If you've given
away something for free, don't expect support or anything free in the future.
It's literally like taking a gift from someone and then complaining that it
doesn't have enough for you to act indignant to people who give things away
for free. Don't like it? Don't use it or improve it and contribute back. Want
more? Pay them to build it and add it to what's available for everyone as a
way to say thanks.

~~~
jnbiche
As someone who maintains open source software, I sympathize with the author
and agree that he doesn't owe users personalized help.

However, he does have to comply with the legal requirements of the license he
uses. Personally, I don't use GPL/LGPL licenses, but if I did, I'd be careful
to comply with the provisions of the license.

~~~
shakna
> However, he does have to comply with the legal requirements of the license
> he uses.

No, the author doesn't. Not really. The license governs the use of people who
don't hold the copyright. That's why the author of a project can just turn
around and release under a new license.

~~~
jnbiche
No, that's incorrect. The license governs the conduct of _both_ parties (here,
the creator and the users).

Yes, he can release new software under a new license, but any past software he
released under a certain license, he has to follow those terms.

If you come to an agreement with another party (like you agree to license a
movie, or book to them), you can't just unilaterally cancel that agreement.
That's not how contract law works.

~~~
dtech
He can release the software under a completely different license. Even if that
is the exact same software. He can remove all downloads of the software from
the websites etc. He owns the copyright.

He cannot prevent people who obtained a version of the software under a
license from doing what they want with it under the terms of that license.

~~~
jnbiche
> He cannot prevent people who obtained a version of the software under a
> license from doing what they want with it under the terms of that license.

And that includes getting the source code for a binary released under the GPL.
That's _exactly_ what was at issue.

~~~
dtech
You're misunderstanding

Author releases software version A under GPL, source code and a binary.

Anyone can do anything they want with A under the terms of the GPL.

Author releases software version B. People cannot force him to release source
code just because A was released under GPL.

Even if he says B falls under GPL but hasn't released the source code (yet),
people at most can say he did not comply with the terms of the GPL and refuse
to treat/use it as such , which means they cannot use or redistribute it since
that is not allowed under normal copyright rules. It cannot be used to force
the author to release Bs source code.

~~~
jnbiche
I agree completely with your interpretation of the GPL. However, from my
limited understanding, it seems that the situation in question was indeed
about a "version A". I'm not suggesting the author can't release a future
version under another license, or none at all. Of course he can.

I'm saying, if he releases version A under the GPL, he has to comply with the
terms of the GPL for that release.

In any case, I'm no fan of the GPL, so it's no sweat off my back. But I don't
understand someone releasing a software version under a certain license and
then getting upset because someone asks him/her to abide by the terms of that
license.

------
coleifer
I haven't used this library but I maintain a couple moderately well-used
python libraries and completely sympathize with these frustrations. The
absolute worst was a guy who asked for all sorts of changes then, when I had
made it clear I was going a different direction, he tried to start a public
shaming on Twitter, this site, Reddit, and even the Wikipedia page (since
removed at my own request). It was un-believable. He was the cto of a company,
too, at least at that time.

It is sad that there are people out there who will try to ruin your day if you
don't do what they want. Especially considering the work we put into these
libraries.

~~~
oefrha
Big fan of peewee (I love the interface and use it more than SQLA). I’ve
reported a few bugs and each time the bug was fixed within at most a day or
two, and a release was cut a few days later. As an open source maintainer
myself I admire your commitment and productivity.

------
SaberTail
The complaint about leaving the author's email as the support contact reminds
me of sqlite having to change their temp file prefix to "etilqs_" because they
were getting support calls and abuse for unrelated applications [1]

[1]
[https://github.com/mackyle/sqlite/blob/3cf493d/src/os.h#L52-...](https://github.com/mackyle/sqlite/blob/3cf493d/src/os.h#L52-L66)

------
TheOtherHobbes
I've used WiringPI, it's a solid library, and - like a lot of people - I'm
glad it exists.

But here's a contrarian view - I'm not sure why someone offering a project for
free _in the educational space_ would expect users to act like paid
professional customers. Or expect them to be non-noob experts who can modify
and build the project without hand-holding.

Or assume that email would be a viable line of support for a project with
literally tens (hundreds?) of thousands of users.

Or even expect them to be adults.

So while I sympathise with the rage quit, I don't think it's realistic to
release code and just expect users to understand - never mind accept - the
terms you set for its use.

All open source projects comes with politics included. You have to have an
understanding of the space you're working in, the kinds of users who inhabit
it, and the kinds of relationships they're likely to have with them.

You need to know what your support boundaries and support technologies are.
And if you work in a space where some of your users are likely to be assholes,
you need to have a plan for that - even if it's just knowing that it's fine to
ignore them.

Edit: to be clear, I think this is more of a general open licence problem than
the failing of this one specific author. Open licences don't encourage authors
to define boundaries, or even to understand that boundaries are necessary and
terms need to be defined. So it's not quite a surprise that things like this
happen.

~~~
jeroenhd
> So while I sympathise with the rage quit, I don't think it's realistic to
> release code and just expect users to understand - never mind accept - the
> terms you set for its use.

I think it's perfectly fine to expect users to understand the terms. They
downloaded a piece of code for free from a website with no company or support
programme other than "hey I hope this is helpful, if you run into any issues I
might be able to help over email". If it turns out that the author can't or
won't help, accept your loss and fix it yourself, pay someone to fix it for
you or wait for another volunteer to fix it.

Alternatively, they bought some kind of product that included the code. If
this product breaks, they must go to the company that makes the product, not
the author of some library it uses. It's not like you're going to expect some
sparkplug manufacturer to come up with a fix for your car when it breaks down,
do you?

People who feel entitled to anything when they get something for free are
selfish assholes and should not be defended. They know fully well that they
don't have any right for support, but they will make demands regardless,
hoping that the other party will break and give in.

I agree that you need to have a plan for people like this, but in most cases,
that plan is "I'll just drop the project if it becomes too much of a hassle".
And in my opinion, that's a fine plan.

------
ddlsmurf
If you read this Gordon, thank you for all you did for so long, it was way
more generous than we deserved. I'm sorry for how unappreciative it all turned
out, I appreciated your work and you're right you definitely should not put up
with that shit. Best of luck =)

------
john_moscow
I have used WiringPi along my side of work and I am thankful to the author for
creating and maintaining it, but honestly I don't understand the motivation
behind offering a free product with email support.

There are many different people on the Internet with different cultural
backgrounds, experience levels and work ethic and unfortunately it's not
realistic to expect each of your users to share the same values as you do.
Anecdotally, charging a license fee for your library/tool is a very good way
to filter out 90% of the unprofessional behavior.

Also if you rely on your free product to promote your consulting business, I
would highly recommend creating a community forum where users can advice each
other, and maybe offering paid support on top of that. Also using an open-
source helpdesk app to semi-automatically send canned replies to commonly
repeating inquiries saves a ton of time and keeps the assholes off your back,
as long as the canned replies are reasonable and polite.

~~~
lloeki
I’ve been maintaining free software for a while and people have been actively
hunting for my email for support, completely ignoring clear guidelines in
README and ignoring GitHub issues.

------
edoceo
I also make free software. It's a battle dealing with folks who want both free
code AND free work! Making code GPL is both a blessing a curse. Tales lakie
this make me stop and double-check my choices

~~~
LeonM
It's not just free/libre/open source software that has this issue.

I run an email security SaaS business. It's closed source, but the suite is
free of charge to use for personal, non-commercial domains.

We get numerous support requests each day of users on the free tier (who are
obviously commercial users btw) that DEMAND us to fix all sorts of email
problems for them. They regularly threaten that they will write a bad review
on $_SOCIAL_NETWORK if we don't fix their email delivery issues for free. It's
frustrating and also exhausting to try to stay professional towards these
'customers'.

Interesting observation: This behavior seems to be culture dependent. I'd say
about 90% of our over-demanding free-tier users are from the same region on
the planet.

~~~
inferiorhuman
As someone who's gone back and forth on licensing for personal projects over
the years, tried to engage user communities for said personal projects, and
tried to use various open source projects — I totally sympathize with the
maintainers. As with a lot of things in life, user engagement is a two-way
street. If folks want constructive engagement from the users, there needs to
be constructive engagement from the maintainers.

From the user POV it can be very frustrating to use open source projects.
Gordon's highlighted some real bottom-of-the-barrel end users and it would be
hard to invalidate his experience with a straight face. OTOH some projects are
incredibly hostile to users. Projects like Elixir/mix, Electron/VSCode,
Thunderbird, and GIMP. How are users supposed to react when the sole
maintainer packs up and leaves indefinitely? Or when patches are submitted
upstream and the maintainers tell the users to pound sand?

Currently I'm working on a car-related Pi project. I'm not a hardware guy
though, so I've done some research and discovered a piece of hardware that
looks nearly perfect for my use case. They even have the specific version I'm
interested in listed on their store. The only catch is that it's listed as 4-6
weeks out (and has been for a while). Their response? Sorry, we've moved on to
something more interesting to us at 3x the price. No the store hasn't been
updated (same with their blog and forums). I'm ready to fork over money, but
with only sporadic signs of life it's difficult.

~~~
exocos
> How are users supposed to react ...

Answers:

1) fork the project, and do a better job yourself

2) suck it up quietly

~~~
inferiorhuman
You've articulated two great reasons why end users generate angry comments.

------
Accujack
Creating or running an open source project can be a thankless task, made worse
by the sheer number of entitled jerks who can find you and your project via
the Internet.

If you're selling software for pay, at least there's money in your pocket to
compensate you for having to deal with the various types of a __*oles in the
human race, but without that it can rapidly become a chore to maintain even a
small or niche package. That 's why lots of software becomes orphaned.

I salute anyone who has ever had the courage to try to write, maintain, or
organize development for open source software.

------
alanbernstein
I can empathize with most of this, but I can't say I understand the "last
straw" bit. How is there anything wrong with DanielK's request?

~~~
ShakataGaNai
"Not to be a complete ass" ... but then proceeds to be a complete ass. People
love to preface statements that they know are going to be rude.

If you need to preface a statement like that, reword it so you're being
polite. The bit in question just as easily could have said "Hey, Thanks for
releasing this! Do you know when the source code will be available? Thanks for
all you're hard work"

~~~
BeeOnRope
I don't think asking the author to comply with the license, or at least enable
others to comply with the license, is being a "complete ass".

~~~
aidenn0
Aside from whether or not he was being an ass, he was incorrect. The license
are rights the author grants other people. The author can release binaries
without sources or under any license they desire; just because they also
release it under the LGPL does not compel them to provide sources when they
distribute it.

~~~
BeeOnRope
Regardless of the legal situation, it would be very unusual to release
something under a GPL-like license without the source, since then no one else
could comply with the license since they would be unable to provide the
modified source.

I think we can agree that it would not at all be weird to expect that GPL-
licensed project would provide the source. Any project with multiple
contributors may be legally compelled to do so. Simply _asking_ for it is
probably not being a _complete ass_ , even if the author was wrong about the
legal ramifications.

At most it could perhaps be "annoying" or a "slight ass". Being a "complete
ass" would perhaps be insisting after an initial request was rebuffed or
whatever.

~~~
kbumsik
> Regardless of the legal situation, it would be very unusual to release
> something under a GPL-like license without the source, since then no one
> else could comply with the license since they would be unable to provide the
> modified source.

Each releases of the software can have different licenses. This means that if
the author released a new version of the software binary without the source
code nor any copyright notices (like Gorden did) it is not yet released under
LGPL. So nobody need to comply LGPL until he releases the source code with the
license.

Even if the binary is released under LGPL without the source code, although it
is odd, people still can comply the License because it is LGPL - people just
need to provide a way how to link the new binary.

------
MisterTea
This is why I stopped thinking unfriendliness in hacker circles is
unwarranted. It's massively frustrating when you get people
berating/harassing/stealing from/etc you when the reality is there really
isn't a product, just a passion or hobby.

This is why any open software I author comes with the express warranty of
"Help: No." If no is misunderstood then any reply will be along the lines of
FOAD.

------
exabrial
Major bummer but I totally understand. Poor guy.

------
pjmlp
Sad to see it go like that.

Yet another example how ungrateful many people are towards free software.

The only difference to piracy, is that not only do they not give back
anything, they feel entitled to all kind of requests.

So the result ends always being the same, moving to something else.

~~~
girvo
I wonder what "pirating" your own software to handle the "free trial"/free
tier case would be like? Weird thought, uploading your own software in a
particular guise to BitTorrent or something, to allow for free usage but
change the expectations of the user...

That said, I distinctly remember a number of blog posts over the years where
users using obviously pirated versions demanded support, so it seems
impossible to avoid entirely haha

------
jlg23
Or just open a ticket on the package and inform the user one "has
'technically' done all one could do given time constraints"?

I get the frustration, but this looks like a case of improper idiot handling
that just escalated...

------
groundlogic
Step 1. Person A makes some piece of software under an open source license.
(GPL)

Step 2. This piece of software becomes widely used, _primarily since_ it's
open source licensed

Step 3. (Modern variation) Person A feels cheated for not getting rich and
creates some kind of drama.

This doesn't make any sense at all, to me.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
Open sourcing something is deciding to share it. It isn't committing to
support it or update it or help you make money with it. It's not shocking
people get burnt out by constant harassment by entitled people who demand the
developer "support them" for free.

~~~
groundlogic
> Open sourcing something is deciding to share it. It isn't committing to
> support it or update it or help you make money with it.

Exactly. This and nothing else. I really don't understand why this is so hard
to understand.

------
flyinglizard
I read this and still don’t understand what is the issue behind the drama. If
you don’t want to support it, then don’t; if someone stole your public domain
work, contact the EFF or more realistically just understand it’s cost of doing
business.

We all get tired at some point and move on, you don’t owe anyone anything. And
thanks for the library!

~~~
cryptonector
It's not "public domain work". The "drama" is that the community abused the
author, so the author quit providing free labor to the community.

