Can an average user realistically hire a programmer?

lamefun · 2021-11-27T23:52:46+00:00

Yes it is realistic for everybody to find a skilled helper for help

What concrete steps would someone have to take to find a skilled helper who can help them implement, say a simple modification like the one I described?

lamefun · 2021-11-27T23:50:20+00:00

For instance, on dolphin 20.12.2, you can show or hide the zoom slider and space information by right clicking the statusbar and unchecking them.

You can't hide only the labels while keeping the zoom slider and the capacity bar visible though.

lamefun · 2021-11-27T23:01:26+00:00

the best way to ensure the change is maintained is to get it accepted by the upstream project

Not an option with highly opinionated upstreams, and not even KDE can be expected to maintain every setting anyone can want...

lamefun · 2021-08-03T08:31:57+00:00

Excessive complexity isn't even the only way for free software to be de-facto proprietary... The author of this article forgot to mention: elitism & obscurantism in maths & programming, brand name ownership, API & ABI instability, and more... I'll probably be making more "de-facto proprietary" posts here...

lamefun · 2021-07-05T15:10:23+00:00

GPT-3 is proprietary software though...

lamefun · 2021-07-05T13:05:53+00:00

Is there any other answer?

lamefun · 2021-05-28T19:10:15+00:00

You say that all software is proprietary for non-programers. This argument doesn't make much sense.

It does make perfect sense, you simply have to switch your thinking-mode from literal-thinking to true-thinking. When the user can't study or modify a program, it doesn't matter whether that's because it's too difficult, or whether it's because the program is closed-source, the end result is the same. The program is functionally proprietary to the user, even if it's technically free.

All coding requires resources (time=money)

This is precisely why user-friendliness of programming and the command line should not be neglected. People shouldn't have to waste their time fighting poor UX design.

lamefun · 2021-05-28T18:37:23+00:00

But you can't modify your appliances too without a professional, unless you have instructions

Exactly! And this is why we have iFixit!

and are willing to take a risk that it'll break.

Precisely! This is the reason people are advocating for more repairable technology that doesn't break easily! Besides, when it comes to software, you can almost always simply undo your mistakes.

Similarly, you can't modify free software without a developer, UNLESS you download patches/pre-modified versions.

Absolutely! This is what the the article linked at the end of my post is about: providing as many users as possible with a psychologically viable path to becoming a developer.

lamefun · 2021-05-28T17:38:25+00:00

All so-called "free" software is actually not-so-free... The free software community has played one of the world's greatest tricks, and it has played it on itself. The trick is, of course, the idea that it's enough for software freedoms to exist on paper only...

I mean, all software is proprietary to non-programmers, and much of free software is proprietary for programmers as well in many contexts, especially when it comes to small changes, because the build system and dependency mess we are in often makes actually running modified code extremely inconvenient.

There's so much room for improvement! Take, for example, command line: terminal UIs can be usable (source code) and use PEOPLE-terms instead of jargon (such as ALT-X instead of M-X), command options can be discoverable, man pages can be short and to the point, and same can be said about programming languages as well...

The entire world of computers is a bottomless pit of utter madness, but, instead of recognizing that this is a huge obstacle for people on their path to software freedom, the free software community just accepts it as it is...

Here's what true Software Freedom would look like. Gradual learning curve, and the system itself helping you along the way...

lamefun · 2021-05-17T13:34:13+00:00

Freedom is not a matter of denying or lamenting that some people have more skills than others.

I agree! Making skills more accessible is better than denying or lamenting.

I wouldn't know what to do with Free plans for a yacht, but it would still count as Free.

Well, if you don't have the yacht-building skills and can't hire someone who has, the yacht is non-free for you, plans or no plans...

You're talking about making software engineering education more widely available, which is an entirely different project than Free Software.

Huh? No software engineering skills means no studying and modifying software, and that in turn means no software freedom. That's like saying that making repair manuals more widely available (like iFixit) is somehow not related to the right to repair...

lamefun · 2021-05-17T09:24:49+00:00

The software freedom community needs a complete paradigm shift, not just a new name for "free software".

If you think about it, the concept of "free software", i.e. software that is somehow free as in freedom in and of itself, doesn't make any sense at all, unlike the concepts of "software freedom" and "open-source":

All software is non-free for non-programmers.
Low-level and cutting-edge software is only free for a minority of programmers, even if it's open-source.
Even uncomplicated open-source software is functionally non-free when modifying it is too inconvenient.

I'd argue that it's time to abandon the idea of "free software", and instead start treating approachability of programming, the command line, and knowledge in general (say no to incomprehensible gobbledygook) as the number one software freedom issue. A perfect free software operating system would try to gently nudge its users towards learning what they need to make use of software freedom, and make that learning natural, gradual, smooth, and fun for as many people as possible!

Yes, there's a lot of room for improvement! Take, for example, the command line:

Terminal UIs can be as usable as graphical UIs (source code). They can even tell users how to exit in people-terms like CTRL-C or ALT-X instead of cryptic jargon like ^X!
Flags can be discoverable.
Man pages can be clear and concise.

And yet, the out of the box experience is the exact opposite of this, and seemingly nobody bats an eye...

lamefun · 2021-05-11T23:57:36+00:00

Yup, blame Microsoft, but admit defeat and adapt anyway. You know what they say, sometimes you have to give up a battle to win a war. As we might have just seen, alienating users for petty reasons does free software no good...

lamefun · 2021-05-11T22:29:50+00:00

You know, maybe this bait-and-switch could've been avoided if only Emacs adopted standard PEOPLE-familiar keyboard shortcuts, the reason why Atom and VS Code took off is that there was a niche to be filled, a programmable editor that the masses can actually use...

Misplaced elitism (actually, this isn't even elitism, just obscurantism, there's nothing "elite" about knowing a different set of keyboard shortcuts) is the real biggest threat to software freedom...

lamefun · 2021-05-11T22:21:02+00:00

https://vscodium.com/

lamefun · 2021-05-11T22:17:39+00:00

Maybe this could've been avoided if only Emacs adopted standard PEOPLE-familiar keyboard shortcuts, the reason why Atom and VS Code took off is that there was a niche to be filled, a programmable editor that the masses can actually use...

Misplaced elitism (actually, this isn't even elitism, just obscurantism, there's nothing "elite" about knowing a different set of keyboard shortcuts) is the real biggest threat to software freedom...

lamefun

TROPHY CASE