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I agree in this case. If it's a git repo, not a problem. But, it's not the first time I've seen this issue raised, and the common response is "heck yeah, I want

by cheald 15y ago

I agree in this case. If it's a git repo, not a problem. But, it's not the first time I've seen this issue raised, and the common response is "heck yeah, I want to do that!" It's not inconceivable to imagine that someone packages this into a mass-usable extension eventually. One Google search led me here: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/mlnhcepfaddcopbeggpobodmmodilgmc https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/mlnhcepfaddcopbegg... People, in general, don't understand what the permissions they're granting (and ergo, revoking) do, and what why they are needed (or what fails to work when they are revoked). It's a broken solution to a broken problem - permissions aren't granular enough, but permissions that are too granular get the TL;DR treatment from users. Developers have abused the permissions structure (usually under the "just in case" rather than "active abuse" justification), and users don't understand it, and the middle ground is that it's a giant mess that can't be unraveled without breaking a lot of things in the process. I'd love to see some process by which an app could pass a string that says "This is why we need this permission, here's what happens if we don't have it", and then let the user select or deselect it, having been fully informed of the consequences. Additionally, exposing that UI to the user will encourage developers to write robust code that deals with that permission not being present.

bigiain 15y ago
"It's a broken solution to a broken problem" Sure. That doesn't mean we need to accept Facebook's status quo - which resolves the inevitable brokenness in the direction of: "Oh well, your privacy and that of your friends is the price you have to pay to let poorly written apps to work." We should at least have the option to choose: "I'll have a little more control over my privacy and a bit more respect for my friends, and if that means the new social-media-viral-casual-gaming-sensation-de-jour fails to work for me 'cause it thought it could spam my friends and didn't properly check for success (or intentionally crashed on failure), then that's fine too, maybe I'll do something else with that time."
- cheald 15y ago
  I agree that we should have the right to choose. I also have enough experience doing support for customers to know that most people are boneheaded about this stuff, and will immediately jump to blaming the developer for their buggy software, causing support headaches and user discontent. For the HN audience - hackers, who know this technology, and understand the risks, and can correlate their revoking permissions with the effects down the road - this extension is great. I'm probably gonna install it later today. For the general user audience, this is like handing someone a loaded shotgun and telling them they can use it to scratch itches on their feet.

by cheald 15y ago

bigiain 15y ago

"It's a broken solution to a broken problem" Sure. That doesn't mean we need to accept Facebook's status quo - which resolves the inevitable brokenness in the direction of: "Oh well, your privacy and that of your friends is the price you have to pay to let poorly written apps to work." We should at least have the option to choose: "I'll have a little more control over my privacy and a bit more respect for my friends, and if that means the new social-media-viral-casual-gaming-sensation-de-jour fails to work for me 'cause it thought it could spam my friends and didn't properly check for success (or intentionally crashed on failure), then that's fine too, maybe I'll do something else with that time."

cheald 15y ago
I agree that we should have the right to choose. I also have enough experience doing support for customers to know that most people are boneheaded about this stuff, and will immediately jump to blaming the developer for their buggy software, causing support headaches and user discontent. For the HN audience - hackers, who know this technology, and understand the risks, and can correlate their revoking permissions with the effects down the road - this extension is great. I'm probably gonna install it later today. For the general user audience, this is like handing someone a loaded shotgun and telling them they can use it to scratch itches on their feet.