#RUN GOOGLE APPS VIA TENFOURFOX SOFTWARE#
I edited one paragraph that got very TenFourFox-specific, but as someone who has received unhelpful bug reports and vague user complains about software I wrote the rest of it absolutely resonates. Politeness, courtesy and understanding didn't go out the window just because we're interacting through a computer screen. Value my work so that I can value your insights into it. That's how you create a relationship where I can see you as a person and not a demand request, and where you can see me as a maintainer and not a vending machine. Tell me what's good about it and what you use it for.
Acknowledge the costs in time and money to bring it to you. Say this in words because I can't see your face or hear your voice. Make it clear you don't expect anything from the report, you are grateful the software exists, you intend to keep using it and this is your small way of giving back.
#RUN GOOGLE APPS VIA TENFOURFOX FREE#
Post your reports with the attitude that you are just one user, using free software, from the humility of your own personal experience on your own system. If you want me to fix it, especially if you are unwilling or unable to fix it yourself, then you need to stick with it like I'm sticking with it. But if it's actually a problem I can't observe, then it won't get fixed assuming it actually does exist, because I don't see that problem on Version X+1 myself and the person who can see it, i.e., you, has bailed out. If it actually is a problem that can be fixed, and I do fix it, you're using the previous version and may or may not be in a position to test it. But the other part is because you've already reverted to the previous release, you don't have any actual investment in the problem being solved. Part of it is, like the last report, making the sometimes incorrect assumption that everyone else must be seeing what you're seeing.
But consider you may also be saying that you don't care about solving the problem. Please let me know when it's fixed."Īs a practical consideration, if you have such a serious issue where you can't use the browser for your desired purpose then I guess you do what you gotta do. Here is another unwelcome bug report, sometimes part of those same reports: "Version X+1 does something bad that Version X didn't, so I went back to Version X (or I've switched to another browser). Most of the time my reply was to point out that my reply was being made in the browser itself, and to point out that we had regular beta phases where the alleged issue had not surfaced, so no, it must not be that pervasive, and let's figure out why your computer behaves that way. But you should also consider that asserting the software has such a grave fault effectively alleges I either don't use the software or care about it, or I would have noticed. I'm not doubting what people say they're seeing. The bug report would inevitably add something along the lines of this should be obvious, or talk about the symptom(s) as if everyone must be experiencing it (them). Invariably this was that the browser "was slow," but startup crashes were probably a distant second place. The bug reports I liked least were the ones that complained about some pervasive, completely disabling flaw permeating the entire browser from top to bottom. Unfortunately, the ones that are unhelpful are at best annoying (and at worst incredibly frustrating) because they mean unhappy people with problems that may never be solvable. Many are legitimately helpful and improve the quality of the browser, and I did appreciate the majority of the reports I got, but even helpful bug reports objectively mean more work for me though it was work I usually didn't mind doing.
This is true whether or not your request is reasonable or achievable, but it's certainly more so when it isn't.Īs kindly as I can put it, not all bug reports are welcome. Whining is exhausting to read and "doesn't work" reports are unavoidably depressing, disparaging or jokey comments are unkind, and making reports nastier or more insistent doesn't make your request more important. There is a human at the other end of those complaints and unless you have a support contract, that person owes you exactly nothing. If you aren't paying for the software, then please don't be a jerk. Here is what you should have learned from TenFourFox (much the same thing users should have learned from any open-source project where the maintainer eventually concluded it was more trouble than it was worth). For this reason I've chosen to disable comments on this entry. Now for the mildly controversial part of this post and the one that will make a few people mad, but this is the end of TenFourFox, and a post-mortem must be comprehensive. I'm going to quote a huge chunk of that post because I think it might help some people on this sub (especially those who click on Bugzilla links and post comments there):
0 kommentar(er)
