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> But, I'm kinda baffled why anyone would volunteer to provide free labor to one of the largest and most profitable companies in the world. Somewhat related, i

> But, I'm kinda baffled why anyone would volunteer to provide free labor to one of the largest and most profitable companies in the world. Somewhat related, it has become Apple user/developer etiquette not to mention bugs without filing a bug report on Apple's closed issue tracker beforehand: https://blackpixel.com/writing/2012/02/radar-or-gtfo.html https://blackpixel.com/writing/2012/02/radar-or-gtfo.html I can't believe how many hours I've wasted on detailed bug reports only for them to be closed as a duplicate, or "works as expected". If you are frustrated with Apple, there is only one thing that works: 1) be influential, 2) complain publicly. If you want macOS to be documented, don't do it yourself. Find people at prominent media outlets and start the meme that Apple's documentation sucks, and that it matters for <reasons>. Add all sorts of pressure and with any luck, Apple will address this issue to turn the narrative around in its favour. Since I don't have any of that power, I try to find open source projects that affect me and donate time or money to them instead.

zoul 9y ago
The big difference is that while bugs can only be fixed from the inside, the documentation can be greatly improved even without Apple’s buy-in.
- ethbro 9y ago
  Not efficiently. And others volunteering their time to reverse engineer documentation on an ever moving target sounds like an exercise in folly. Especially when the first party could hire technical writers for a fraction of the cost of developers and make this problem disappear.
  - zoul 9y ago
    They could solve the problem, but they are not doing it. Trying to force their hand by public shaming may work, but I don’t think it will. Volunteering the effort seems like a pragmatic approach. I would love to have a place where I could send a PR to fix a documentation shortcoming. Adding requests to Radar is futile.
    - Drdrdrq 9y ago
      That's not pragmatic, that's just... wrong, on so many levels. Either 1) shame them, 2) move to OSS, or 3) suffer, but please don't donate your precious time to solve the problems of a rich company who doesn't care about its users. Doing so would only diminish the effect of first option (shaming) and is just not fair to anyone. Or, write a complete reference book and sell it for profit.
      - zoul 9y ago
        You could say the same thing about many free software projects created for the ecosystem. Many of them could have been created by Apple and shipped as a part of the system. I have donated my precious time to solve problems that should have been solved by Apple before. I’m not extatic about it, but my itch got scratched and hopefully I may have helped other people, too, so I consider it a pragmatic improvement. I can see your point, though, so let’s simply disagree, it’s good for the world to have different people try different approaches.
        geocar 9y ago
        Yes, and it's a good reason to pause before making new free software for a nonfree system. Sometimes it is good because it helps people use more free software- but not always. Sometimes it just helps people use the non-free software.
        slaymaker1907 9y ago
        I think the difference is that those weren't created solely for Apple's benefit.
        matthewbauer 9y ago
        Which projects do you have in mind? Only one that comes to mind for me is Homebrew.
deleted 9y ago
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masonic 9y ago
1) be influential, 2) complain publicly 3) don't buy their products.

zoul 9y ago

The big difference is that while bugs can only be fixed from the inside, the documentation can be greatly improved even without Apple’s buy-in.

ethbro 9y ago
Not efficiently. And others volunteering their time to reverse engineer documentation on an ever moving target sounds like an exercise in folly. Especially when the first party could hire technical writers for a fraction of the cost of developers and make this problem disappear.
- zoul 9y ago
  They could solve the problem, but they are not doing it. Trying to force their hand by public shaming may work, but I don’t think it will. Volunteering the effort seems like a pragmatic approach. I would love to have a place where I could send a PR to fix a documentation shortcoming. Adding requests to Radar is futile.
  - Drdrdrq 9y ago
    That's not pragmatic, that's just... wrong, on so many levels. Either 1) shame them, 2) move to OSS, or 3) suffer, but please don't donate your precious time to solve the problems of a rich company who doesn't care about its users. Doing so would only diminish the effect of first option (shaming) and is just not fair to anyone. Or, write a complete reference book and sell it for profit.
    - zoul 9y ago
      You could say the same thing about many free software projects created for the ecosystem. Many of them could have been created by Apple and shipped as a part of the system. I have donated my precious time to solve problems that should have been solved by Apple before. I’m not extatic about it, but my itch got scratched and hopefully I may have helped other people, too, so I consider it a pragmatic improvement. I can see your point, though, so let’s simply disagree, it’s good for the world to have different people try different approaches.
      - geocar 9y ago
        Yes, and it's a good reason to pause before making new free software for a nonfree system. Sometimes it is good because it helps people use more free software- but not always. Sometimes it just helps people use the non-free software.
      - slaymaker1907 9y ago
        I think the difference is that those weren't created solely for Apple's benefit.
      - matthewbauer 9y ago
        Which projects do you have in mind? Only one that comes to mind for me is Homebrew.

deleted 9y ago

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masonic 9y ago

1) be influential, 2) complain publicly 3) don't buy their products.