You must register a new account to report a bug (was: Python 2 to 3 conversion - embrace the pain)

[Gene Heskett]

On Monday 16 March 2015 02:17:44 Ben Finney wrote:
> Cameron Simpson <cs at zip.com.au> writes:
> > To quote Graham Dumpleton:
> >
> >  For years have seen people make vague grumbles about something not
> > working with mod_wsgi. Not one ever reported bug or described
> > problem.
>
> Hmm. How easy is it for someone who, say, an hour ago had no idea they
> would ever want to contact Graham Dumpleton; and then encounters a
> problem with mod_wsgi?
>
> * Searching for ‘mod_wsgi’ leads to a GitHub page. Want to submit a
>   one-off bug report? Too bad, you have to sign up with yet another
>   service.
>
>   No email address is provided for reporting bugs. The person named is
>   Graham Dumpleton; no email address for him is provided.
>
> * If you're persistent enough to contact Graham Dumpleton directly
>   outside the context of the ‘mod_wsgi’ project, what does that get
> you?
>
>   Searching “Graham Dumpleton” on the web gets a bunch of inconclusive
>   hits.
>
>   He has a Twitter account. Want to send him a single bug report? Too
>   bad, you'd have to sign up for yet another service (Twitter).
>
>   He has a weblog, at Blogger. It gives a specific profile for him.
> With no email address. Want to send a one-off bug report there? Too
> bad, there's no contact information given.
>
> * Are there other ways to report a bug? I can't find them, and I
>   searched for rather longer than someone would be who just wants to
>   describe the problem.
>
> I am unsurprised that people don't end up reporting bugs; there's no
> simple way to do it. No wonder Graham Dumpleton finds a lot of people
> grumbling and not reporting bugs.
>
> >  Sadly becoming the norm. People will just whinge and complain but
> > never actually report issues in Open Source.
>
> Sadly becoming the norm. People will run a software project and just
> assume that users will be willing to go through a registration process
> for every project just to report a bug.

Ben Finney, I hear you, and to me its the most valid lament I have read 
in weeks. I could replay this exact scene for several packages over the 
last 2 or 3 years.  It's BS to have to sign up for yet another stream of 
pure spam from sourceforge or some other equally guilty spammer just to 
report a bug. I object to being more useful as a source to add to  a 
spam list, than as someone who is trying to improve the software by 
reporting the bug.

So guess what?  It doesn't get done. Because of the last 2 bug reports I 
tried to file, I am now getting 5 to 15 spams a day from sourceforge 
that have zilch to do with the package I tried to file a bug against.  
IMNSDHO if the author of a package cannot be bothered to subscribe to 
the mailing list related to his/her package, and accept feedback from 
that mailing list as being the equ of a bug report, perhaps querying the 
user for more details so it is a good bug report, then his buggy package 
deserves to be nibbled to death by ducks.

I am on several lists where the authors do hang out.  And I am the author 
on one of them.  Those lists are the ideal list model all should follow.  
Sadly they are the exception that proves the rule.

I am on the linuxcnc mailing list because I am also a cnc machinist, 
retired hobby grade, although that software certainly is not.  I can 
post about a problem, and how to demonstrate it, and have a new package 
fixing that problem in the repo, to be installed by the package manager, 
typically in under 12 hours.  I have a config problem with a board from 
one of the vendors making and selling the board?  The vendor is there 
and I've had fixes for _my_ missunderstandings that worked perectly in 
15 minutes.

I'd love to see a sig line or hidden header line, with a URL that is that 
projects bug tracker, one that is fully accessible using the lists user 
identity and the same password it takes to log into the server and 
adjust your list preferences.  But that would make it too easy for us to 
disturb some of the prima donna's we seem to have nurtured in the last 
15 years, and we can't possibly be allowed to bother them, can we?

Thanks for bringing up the subject Ben. 
> --
>  \      “[Entrenched media corporations will] maintain the status quo,
> | `\       or die trying. Either is better than actually WORKING for a
> | _o__)                  living.” —ringsnake.livejournal.com,
> 2007-11-12 | Ben Finney

Cheers, Gene Heskett
-- 
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
Genes Web page <http://geneslinuxbox.net:6309/gene>