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I have few projects on 1k+ stars; the ones that are more beginner-friendly are normally where I get most unrelated requests. I used to help people where possibl

I have few projects on 1k+ stars; the ones that are more beginner-friendly are normally where I get most unrelated requests. I used to help people where possible, but now I just don't have the time (or TBH, motivation). So I closed the issues on those two projects that got most low-quality issues. People started to open PR to tell me I was wrong and I should open the issues. This cemented my decision, oh the entitlement of some people.

noitsnot 6y ago
I think that's understandable. You closed issues for bugs you didn't resolve.
- sgillen 6y ago
  Maybe you know the OP, but in my experience a lot of issues are not bug reports but very low quality, uninformed or unreasonable requests or questions. Like questions made about basic functionality that is answered in the documentation/faq, or requests for features that are completely outside the scope of the project. Another popular category is requests for basic education e.g. “how does DQN work?”. That’s fine if it’s one person but when it’s 100 it gets overwhelming.
  - stickfigure 6y ago
    Sure. On the other hand, sometimes people put a lot of time and effort into isolating an issue and writing up the best description they can manage. Closing the issue is a one-click FU to the people who are doing their best to help. Some users are overly entitled, but some maintainers are self-absorbed douchebags. I've seen both sides.
    - cellularmitosis 6y ago
      I will never understand this point of view. The author has already given you possibly hundreds of hours of free labor simply by publishing the project. But now, because they won’t give you a few more, they’re a douchebag? Even if they close all issues with no comment, they have given you a such _massive_ head start vs having to write the entire project yourself from scratch. How can you be anything but grateful?
      - sgillen 6y ago
        It's just that if you put lot of effort into isolating a bug for someone for free, it can feels bad to have it rejected without explanation. Also if it's a real issue that you won't fix you should at least leave the issue open so other people know. IMO you can definitely be extremely grateful for someone's contribution and also think they are sort of rude, not incompatible views/feeling.
        growse 6y ago
        > It's just that if you put lot of effort into isolating a bug for someone for free, it can feels bad to have it rejected without explanation. Where does that bad feeling come from? Does it come from the fact that you feel like you're owed a response? Do you get the same feeling when you email strangers and they don't respond? > Also if it's a real issue that you won't fix you should at least leave the issue open so other people know. > IMO you can definitely be extremely grateful for someone's contribution and also think they are sort of rude, not incompatible views/feeling. You're not entitled to gratitude. Assuming that people should & will run their own projects according to your values around courtesy is a little self-centred. If you need the bug fixing and the maintainer isn't doing it fast enough, just fork it. This is the point of open source.
        sgillen 6y ago
        > Where does that bad feeling come from? Does it come from the fact that you feel like you're owed a response? Do you get the same feeling when you email strangers and they don't respond? It's just the time spent for me, I mean if for some reason I put like an hour of my time composing an email to a stranger and they didn't respond I would unhappy. It would be my fault but I would still be unhappy. I agree that no one is entitled to have everyone act nice to them. I just think it's nice to tell someone why you're closing their issue. > If you need the bug fixing and the maintainer isn't doing it fast enough, just fork it. This is the point of open source. 100%
        growse 6y ago
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - franciscop 6y ago
    Exactly this. Bug reports were very welcome! While I stated that the API would not expand any longer in some projects, I also considered coherent feature requests a positive, and normally suggested and guided those as a plugin that lives within their codebase. The problem was when people came like "I am using this library, can you debug my code?" and pasted a 500-liner, or like "this doesn't work on my XYZ system, fix it", or when they were just rude or demanding. I've met some wonderful people BTW, and would also not trade that for anything.
  - dclusin 6y ago
    I've done this after scouring the documentation and being unable to find an answer. When there isn't a newsgroup or email list setup it's often really the only way to get in touch with a developer or maintainer. Suboptimal for sure, but if a library seems like it may solve your problem, it's worth a shot.
- franciscop 6y ago
  Sorry I mean I closed the issues section
- rrix2 6y ago
  OP does not owe you their labor.
  - noitsnot 6y ago
    That's a pretty aggressive comment. Let's try to be civil.
    - detaro 6y ago
      What's aggressive/uncivil about that?
freedomben 6y ago
Did you tell them why you were closing the issues as #WONTFIX? I maintain a few projects in the "hundreds of stars" range, and I also send PRs to numerous projects with regularity (I make a point to fix typos and such in documentation when I find them). Of course some people are low effort issuers, but some people put time and effort into opening an issue on a project. When the maintainer closes it without even taking 60 seconds to type a quick message why, it shows me that the maintainer is the entitled dick, not the user. It certainly goes both ways. I hope you don't just close issues without an explanation. If people disagree and complain, that's one thing, but at least attempt to articulate your reasons.
- Jesus_piece 6y ago
  I think that's the point. Maintainers have no obligation to do anything for anyone
  - gingerlime 6y ago
    No, there is no obligation. But there’s a thing called courtesy. And as humans there are certain social norms. If someone spams me, I will ignore or retaliate by reporting as spam. If someone sends a low effort question, I might politely tell them to rtfm. If someone makes an effort to articulate a problem, even if I disagree, I’ll try to give them a reasoned response. And if I genuinely have no interest in any interaction I’ll make sure to disable issues/comments or otherwise communicate this intent.
    - dgellow 6y ago
      So you agree that there is no obligation, then assert a set of social obligations that should be respected. Do you see the contradiction here?
      - harisund 6y ago
        You are simply being pedantic. He said there's no "absolute" obligation, but there are some by virtue of us living in a society.
pkaye 6y ago
> People started to open PR to tell me I was wrong and I should open the issues. Did those pull requests have code changes?
- riquito 6y ago
  I don't know Francisco but I'm sure he deserves better than this https://github.com/franciscop/picnic/pull/203/files https://github.com/franciscop/picnic/pull/203/files +If you spot a bug or any other issue you may go to hell because this software is officially Bug Free(TM). +
  - JimDabell 6y ago
    If you see somebody behaving like that, report them to GitHub so they don't do it to anybody else. The link is on their user profile page.
    - franciscop 6y ago
      I did, no response so far.
- franciscop 6y ago
  No

noitsnot 6y ago

I think that's understandable. You closed issues for bugs you didn't resolve.

sgillen 6y ago
Maybe you know the OP, but in my experience a lot of issues are not bug reports but very low quality, uninformed or unreasonable requests or questions. Like questions made about basic functionality that is answered in the documentation/faq, or requests for features that are completely outside the scope of the project. Another popular category is requests for basic education e.g. “how does DQN work?”. That’s fine if it’s one person but when it’s 100 it gets overwhelming.
- stickfigure 6y ago
  Sure. On the other hand, sometimes people put a lot of time and effort into isolating an issue and writing up the best description they can manage. Closing the issue is a one-click FU to the people who are doing their best to help. Some users are overly entitled, but some maintainers are self-absorbed douchebags. I've seen both sides.
  - cellularmitosis 6y ago
    I will never understand this point of view. The author has already given you possibly hundreds of hours of free labor simply by publishing the project. But now, because they won’t give you a few more, they’re a douchebag? Even if they close all issues with no comment, they have given you a such _massive_ head start vs having to write the entire project yourself from scratch. How can you be anything but grateful?
    - sgillen 6y ago
      It's just that if you put lot of effort into isolating a bug for someone for free, it can feels bad to have it rejected without explanation. Also if it's a real issue that you won't fix you should at least leave the issue open so other people know. IMO you can definitely be extremely grateful for someone's contribution and also think they are sort of rude, not incompatible views/feeling.
      - growse 6y ago
        > It's just that if you put lot of effort into isolating a bug for someone for free, it can feels bad to have it rejected without explanation. Where does that bad feeling come from? Does it come from the fact that you feel like you're owed a response? Do you get the same feeling when you email strangers and they don't respond? > Also if it's a real issue that you won't fix you should at least leave the issue open so other people know. > IMO you can definitely be extremely grateful for someone's contribution and also think they are sort of rude, not incompatible views/feeling. You're not entitled to gratitude. Assuming that people should & will run their own projects according to your values around courtesy is a little self-centred. If you need the bug fixing and the maintainer isn't doing it fast enough, just fork it. This is the point of open source.
        sgillen 6y ago
        > Where does that bad feeling come from? Does it come from the fact that you feel like you're owed a response? Do you get the same feeling when you email strangers and they don't respond? It's just the time spent for me, I mean if for some reason I put like an hour of my time composing an email to a stranger and they didn't respond I would unhappy. It would be my fault but I would still be unhappy. I agree that no one is entitled to have everyone act nice to them. I just think it's nice to tell someone why you're closing their issue. > If you need the bug fixing and the maintainer isn't doing it fast enough, just fork it. This is the point of open source. 100%
        growse 6y ago
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- franciscop 6y ago
  Exactly this. Bug reports were very welcome! While I stated that the API would not expand any longer in some projects, I also considered coherent feature requests a positive, and normally suggested and guided those as a plugin that lives within their codebase. The problem was when people came like "I am using this library, can you debug my code?" and pasted a 500-liner, or like "this doesn't work on my XYZ system, fix it", or when they were just rude or demanding. I've met some wonderful people BTW, and would also not trade that for anything.
- dclusin 6y ago
  I've done this after scouring the documentation and being unable to find an answer. When there isn't a newsgroup or email list setup it's often really the only way to get in touch with a developer or maintainer. Suboptimal for sure, but if a library seems like it may solve your problem, it's worth a shot.
franciscop 6y ago
Sorry I mean I closed the issues section
rrix2 6y ago
OP does not owe you their labor.
- noitsnot 6y ago
  That's a pretty aggressive comment. Let's try to be civil.
  - detaro 6y ago
    What's aggressive/uncivil about that?

freedomben 6y ago

Did you tell them why you were closing the issues as #WONTFIX? I maintain a few projects in the "hundreds of stars" range, and I also send PRs to numerous projects with regularity (I make a point to fix typos and such in documentation when I find them). Of course some people are low effort issuers, but some people put time and effort into opening an issue on a project. When the maintainer closes it without even taking 60 seconds to type a quick message why, it shows me that the maintainer is the entitled dick, not the user. It certainly goes both ways. I hope you don't just close issues without an explanation. If people disagree and complain, that's one thing, but at least attempt to articulate your reasons.

Jesus_piece 6y ago
I think that's the point. Maintainers have no obligation to do anything for anyone
- gingerlime 6y ago
  No, there is no obligation. But there’s a thing called courtesy. And as humans there are certain social norms. If someone spams me, I will ignore or retaliate by reporting as spam. If someone sends a low effort question, I might politely tell them to rtfm. If someone makes an effort to articulate a problem, even if I disagree, I’ll try to give them a reasoned response. And if I genuinely have no interest in any interaction I’ll make sure to disable issues/comments or otherwise communicate this intent.
  - dgellow 6y ago
    So you agree that there is no obligation, then assert a set of social obligations that should be respected. Do you see the contradiction here?
    - harisund 6y ago
      You are simply being pedantic. He said there's no "absolute" obligation, but there are some by virtue of us living in a society.

pkaye 6y ago

> People started to open PR to tell me I was wrong and I should open the issues. Did those pull requests have code changes?

riquito 6y ago
I don't know Francisco but I'm sure he deserves better than this https://github.com/franciscop/picnic/pull/203/files https://github.com/franciscop/picnic/pull/203/files +If you spot a bug or any other issue you may go to hell because this software is officially Bug Free(TM). +
- JimDabell 6y ago
  If you see somebody behaving like that, report them to GitHub so they don't do it to anybody else. The link is on their user profile page.
  - franciscop 6y ago
    I did, no response so far.
franciscop 6y ago
No