6 ms·

As someone who has no choice but to use Windows at work, I'm really sick of all the problems that crop up because so many tools use were written by people who w

As someone who has no choice but to use Windows at work, I'm really sick of all the problems that crop up because so many tools use were written by people who won't use Windows and haven't tested anything on it.

city41 11y ago
I feel your pain, but am not convinced open source maintainers should have to be the ones to resolve the issue. Especially since so many projects are done using spare time and with no compensation.
saosebastiao 11y ago
If I had no choice but to use Windows at work, and using Windows meant I couldn't use a large amount of development tools that I rely on, then the last ones I would blame would be the open source developers that won't use or develop for Windows. Your employer is the problem here.
krisdol 11y ago
Why do you expect developers to pay for software, OSes, and licenses they don't use in order to develop open source software for free? Help them out by contributing, or blame Microsoft who has the resources to make their own OS more compatible Doesnt Microsoft have their own V8 or node.js fork now?
ploxiln 11y ago
Kinda funny isn't it, after a decade where one might be required to use a proprietary VPN or email client that only runs on windows. And those things didn't use standard, published, or even consistent protocols, nor were they open-source. In fact they were hostile to compatible implementations. They had to be reverse-engineered. So now you get just a little, watered-down taste of using the non-preferred platform for something.
tsuraan 11y ago
That's a funny point of view. Windows is made by a multi-billion dollar company, rented by countless wealthy software development shops, but it's volunteer open-source programmers who are supposed to take on the burden of supporting it? Seriously, I can't even comprehend that thought process. I write software for fun, I release it on github, and some people find it useful. If there are other people who don't, they can improve it for their own purposes, or they can find or write something better. I don't think anybody has a right to expect me to support Microsoft's product. That's insane.
- Silhouette 11y ago
  I don't think anybody has a right to expect me to support Microsoft's product. That's insane. True enough, though it's also fair to consider a language/platform/ecosystem inferior for some work if it relies on that kind of individual and often less portable contribution for its effectiveness. A lot of FOSS advocates will promote community support and a broad contributor base as advantages of that style of development, but there is another side to that coin, which is that sometimes you get just what you (didn't) pay for and you're on your own in terms of support or working around any problems.
ag_dubs 11y ago
hi! i totally know this is a common feel for many npmjs users. this is why i've been running an empathy campaign for Windows, Windows Wednesday, where i do all my work (with/for npm) on windows. it's been good for finding bugs, either technical or UX. i'm working on improving the docs to make them friendlier to all platforms (not just OSX, which is the most common platform at npmjs). npmjs cares about the enterprise + windows.
- city41 11y ago
  I think this is the wrong approach. We shouldn't pick up MS's slack, MS should. This just enforces the current situation and keeps enabling MS to ignore the problem.
  - gelasio 11y ago
    So, are you of the opinion that OSS projects should never be built for any commercial, proprietary OS or just Windows (i.e. because it's not Unix)? For instance - OS X window managers suck. Do you think that a project like Spectacle should have never been built because they're just picking up Apple's slack?
    - city41 11y ago
      I don't see how a project like Spectacle, which is OSX specific, relates. If someone wants to make an OS specific project, more power to them. The issue arises on platforms that span OSes, and they just never quite span onto Windows correctly. Microsoft is very happy that Node, Java, Clojure, etc work on Windows. It helps them a lot. But they make little to no effort to help bridge the gap, they usually leave that to everyone else. That's my gripe, right there. And to be fair, this is not a black and white situation. It's complex and Microsoft's role in all of this is complex too. And sometimes this issue does crop up on other OSes, for example Docker on OSX is sometimes a little painful.
      - gelasio 11y ago
        "But they make little to no effort to help bridge the gap, they usually leave that to everyone else." OK, but that's also where you're wrong, right there. In general, but also particularly for this exact issue - Microsoft considered attempting to fix the file path limit for the first release of Windows 10. Maybe you don't understand, but it's going to take a herculean effort to fix this. They want to do it and if you need proof of that I can find posts of them talking about what I just said.
Maarten88 11y ago
Yes, npm is very problematic/buggy on Windows. I wasted many hours because of https://github.com/npm/npm/issues/9696 https://github.com/npm/npm/issues/9696 (meaning any build on visual studio online breaks ~50% of the time simply running 'npm install'). Microsoft should finally fix the MAX_PATH issue in Windows, but npm should just fix their software: it's too important to be that buggy.

city41 11y ago

I feel your pain, but am not convinced open source maintainers should have to be the ones to resolve the issue. Especially since so many projects are done using spare time and with no compensation.

saosebastiao 11y ago

If I had no choice but to use Windows at work, and using Windows meant I couldn't use a large amount of development tools that I rely on, then the last ones I would blame would be the open source developers that won't use or develop for Windows. Your employer is the problem here.

krisdol 11y ago

Why do you expect developers to pay for software, OSes, and licenses they don't use in order to develop open source software for free? Help them out by contributing, or blame Microsoft who has the resources to make their own OS more compatible Doesnt Microsoft have their own V8 or node.js fork now?

ploxiln 11y ago

Kinda funny isn't it, after a decade where one might be required to use a proprietary VPN or email client that only runs on windows. And those things didn't use standard, published, or even consistent protocols, nor were they open-source. In fact they were hostile to compatible implementations. They had to be reverse-engineered. So now you get just a little, watered-down taste of using the non-preferred platform for something.

tsuraan 11y ago

That's a funny point of view. Windows is made by a multi-billion dollar company, rented by countless wealthy software development shops, but it's volunteer open-source programmers who are supposed to take on the burden of supporting it? Seriously, I can't even comprehend that thought process. I write software for fun, I release it on github, and some people find it useful. If there are other people who don't, they can improve it for their own purposes, or they can find or write something better. I don't think anybody has a right to expect me to support Microsoft's product. That's insane.

Silhouette 11y ago
I don't think anybody has a right to expect me to support Microsoft's product. That's insane. True enough, though it's also fair to consider a language/platform/ecosystem inferior for some work if it relies on that kind of individual and often less portable contribution for its effectiveness. A lot of FOSS advocates will promote community support and a broad contributor base as advantages of that style of development, but there is another side to that coin, which is that sometimes you get just what you (didn't) pay for and you're on your own in terms of support or working around any problems.

ag_dubs 11y ago

hi! i totally know this is a common feel for many npmjs users. this is why i've been running an empathy campaign for Windows, Windows Wednesday, where i do all my work (with/for npm) on windows. it's been good for finding bugs, either technical or UX. i'm working on improving the docs to make them friendlier to all platforms (not just OSX, which is the most common platform at npmjs). npmjs cares about the enterprise + windows.

city41 11y ago
I think this is the wrong approach. We shouldn't pick up MS's slack, MS should. This just enforces the current situation and keeps enabling MS to ignore the problem.
- gelasio 11y ago
  So, are you of the opinion that OSS projects should never be built for any commercial, proprietary OS or just Windows (i.e. because it's not Unix)? For instance - OS X window managers suck. Do you think that a project like Spectacle should have never been built because they're just picking up Apple's slack?
  - city41 11y ago
    I don't see how a project like Spectacle, which is OSX specific, relates. If someone wants to make an OS specific project, more power to them. The issue arises on platforms that span OSes, and they just never quite span onto Windows correctly. Microsoft is very happy that Node, Java, Clojure, etc work on Windows. It helps them a lot. But they make little to no effort to help bridge the gap, they usually leave that to everyone else. That's my gripe, right there. And to be fair, this is not a black and white situation. It's complex and Microsoft's role in all of this is complex too. And sometimes this issue does crop up on other OSes, for example Docker on OSX is sometimes a little painful.
    - gelasio 11y ago
      "But they make little to no effort to help bridge the gap, they usually leave that to everyone else." OK, but that's also where you're wrong, right there. In general, but also particularly for this exact issue - Microsoft considered attempting to fix the file path limit for the first release of Windows 10. Maybe you don't understand, but it's going to take a herculean effort to fix this. They want to do it and if you need proof of that I can find posts of them talking about what I just said.

Maarten88 11y ago

Yes, npm is very problematic/buggy on Windows. I wasted many hours because of https://github.com/npm/npm/issues/9696 https://github.com/npm/npm/issues/9696 (meaning any build on visual studio online breaks ~50% of the time simply running 'npm install'). Microsoft should finally fix the MAX_PATH issue in Windows, but npm should just fix their software: it's too important to be that buggy.