What’s confusing about this is that every gh command is just a wrapper around their API.
GitHub CLI now collects pseudoanonymous telemetry
311–320 of 368 posts
Re: GitHub CLI now collects pseudoanonymous telemetry
#312Earlier quoted context omitted.
> you don't know exactly how it's being used, which features actually need your attention, especially if you're spread thin. Why not conduct a survey? > vague bug reports instead of automated session recording and if you need to maintain that, you'll have gray hairs appearing by the age of 30. If it's a customer, why not reach directly to him? > with the system working okay at a load X, but falling over at X+1 and yo…
> Why not conduct a survey? Large amounts of time before getting feedback, low percentage of people responding, not an accurate sample of all users (you will get signal from the loudest ones) and inaccurate data (biases in perception) instead of measurable reality. Not useless, but not a full replacement for telemetry. > If it's a customer, why not reach directly to him? Layers of indirection (and also the slowness o…
> Large amounts of time before getting feedback […]inaccurate data (biases in perception) instead of measurable reality.
I think perception is more valuable because that is the only way of measuring frustration with the UX of the software. Something may be used a lot, but is painful to everyone.
> You might not control the processes and approvals needed to do that in a non-startup environment
In such environment, it’s often true that features are governed by third parties as well. You collect telemetry, but have no say in what user will get and experience.
> Culture of not collecting client side data also often comes together with a culture of not collecting server side data properly either
I strongly doubt that. We have way more tools for collecting data on servers than on doing telemetry.
——
As a user, I essentially want my software to stay the same as long as possible. If I really need a new feature or am struggling with a bug, that’s when I contact the developers. If the developers are dogfooding their own software, new feature can be quite a delight especially when their profile is similar to yours.
But telemetry driven development is how you get features no one asked for.
Re: GitHub CLI now collects pseudoanonymous telemetry
#313Earlier quoted context omitted.
God forbid you talk to your users
Talking is a must. But just like quantum particles, users behave and talk very differently. Just look at gamers - most of them say they _hate_ AI in games, yet they are actively behaving differently, buying games made with AI, using AI, etc.
It’s okay if I spy on you without your consent, it’s for your own good. Or my own good. Something like that, is that your point? The ends justify the means? How about respect as a feature, that one you don’t need telemetry to determine.
Re: GitHub CLI now collects pseudoanonymous telemetry
#314Earlier quoted context omitted.
people that say things like this are exhausting. exhausting . You make it so very easy to classify you straight into the "looney" bin. People said that WSL was EEE for Linux. when that didn't happen, people said that WSL gaining GPU support was EEE. When that didn't happen, people said that WSLg was EEE for Linux. People said that Powershell was EEE for Windows. None of these happened. none of them even appear to hav…
I think the down-votes on this comment are too bad. It's legitimately funny to write a muli-paragraph rant in high dudgeon calling other people "exhausting".
If reading exhausts you, don’t read it.
The comment’s size is apparent before reading a single word, so you can avoid it if it is too large. “EEE” comments are short and exhausting and there is no warning visible.
Re: GitHub CLI now collects pseudoanonymous telemetry
#315Why we collect telemetry ...our team needs visibility into how features are being used in practice. We use this data to prioritize our work and evaluate whether features are meeting real user needs. I'm curious why corporate development teams always feel the need to spy on their users? Is it not sufficient to employ good engineering and design practices? Git has served us well for 20+ years without detailed analytics…
I used to believe that it was not necessary until I started building my own startup. If you dont have analytics you are flying blind. You don't know what your users actually care about and how to optimize a successful user journey. The difference between what people tell you when asked directly and how they actually use your software is actually shocking.
Be very careful with that.
Analytics driven development easily leads to bad outcomes. 1. Important, but less frequently used feature gets moved to a hidden spot leading to even less usage leading to eventual removal. 2. Poorly functioning features not getting the improvement they need because few use them due to how poorly they function.
I have seen these patterns a lot in software where decisions are based on analytics, and I usually stop using that sofware when I find a replacement.
Re: GitHub CLI now collects pseudoanonymous telemetry
#316Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're only flying blind if you make decisions not looking and thinking. Analytics isn't the only way to figure out "what your users actually care about", you can also try the old school way, commonly referred to as "Talking with people", then after taking notes, you think about it, maybe discuss with others. Don't take what people say at face value, but think about it together with your knowledge and experience, and…
Sure, you can spend the weeks to months of expensive and time consuming work it takes to get a fuzzy, half accurate and biased picture of what your users workflows look like through user interviews and surveys. Or you can look at the analytics, which tell you everything you need to know immediately, always up to date, with perfect precision. Sometimes HN drives me crazy. From this thread you’d think telemetry is scre…
> Or you can look at the analytics, which tell you everything you need to know immediately, always up to date, with perfect precision.
Analytics do not tell you everything you need to know immediately. The analytics may say that no one is using a given feature, but they don't necessarily tell you why. Maybe they don't use it because they're not aware of it, marketing is presenting it wrong, or sales isn't selling against it. Maybe they've tried to use it and it doesn't work for them and they never tried it again. Maybe the call to action to bring them to it doesn't work or directs them wrong. Maybe it gets used by 1% of the users who happen to be power users. You might look at that 1% and conclude that it's not getting enough use to warrant supporting it or keeping it around.
Re: GitHub CLI now collects pseudoanonymous telemetry
#317Earlier quoted context omitted.
This. If I'm forced to use a feature I hate because it's the only way to do something, the "ground truth" reflects that I like that feature. It doesn't tell the whole story.
Most metrics teams are reasonably competent and are aware of that. Excepting "growth hackers" I haven't been in a single metrics discussion where we didn't talk about what we're actually measuring, if it reflects what we want to measure, and how to counterbalance metrics sufficiently so we don't build yet another growthhacking disaster. Doesn't mean that metrics are perfect - they are in fact aggravatingly imprecise…
And yet, the observable evidence of changes in software that collect metrics directly contradict this.
Re: GitHub CLI now collects pseudoanonymous telemetry
#318Earlier quoted context omitted.
Asking users isn't a substitute for usage data. Usage data is the ground truth. Soliciting user feedback is invasive, and it's only possible for some questions. The HN response to this is "too bad" but it's a thought-terminating response.
The ground truth that I never click on Stargate on Netflix is completely at odds with the actual truth that I love Stargate and want more of it and things like it. What the ground truth usage data is completely ignorant of is that Netflix's copy is a crappy blurry transfer, and so I got dvds instead.
Sure, but Netflix is not interested in whether you love Stargate or not. Telemetry says that you never click it, so it's ok to remove it from their catalogue (which is correct).
Now, they could've done a better job by increasing the quality, but that's a further (and costly) optimisation.
Re: GitHub CLI now collects pseudoanonymous telemetry
#319Earlier quoted context omitted.
It isn't only corporate development teams — open source development teams want to spy on their users, too. For instance, Homebrew: "Anonymous analytics allow us to prioritise fixes and features based on how, where and when people use Homebrew." [1] [1] https://docs.brew.sh/Analytics
Is it spying if: 1. It's anonymous 2. They're telling you they're doing it 3. You can opt out of it
Yes!
Re: GitHub CLI now collects pseudoanonymous telemetry
#320Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thinking out loud: what are the best practices to vet a tools' telemetry details? The devil is in the details. A quick summary of my Claude-assisted research at the Gist below. Top of mind is some kind of trusted intermediary service with a vested interest in striking a definable middle ground that is good enough for both sides (users and product-builders) Gist: WIP 31 minutes in still cookin'
Hey, please don't blindly paste/post from LLMs, please.
I appreciate the "please", but this comes across as presumptive. First, you don't know the effort level I put in. Second, you haven't seen the end result. Third, why do you think I would "blindly paste" from an LLM? If you take a look at my profile or other comments, I hope that is clear.
I appreciate feedback in general, and I am glad when people care about making HN a nice place for discussion and community. Sometimes a well-meaning person goes a little too far, and I think it happened above. That's my charitable interpretation. It is also possible that in this age of AI, people are understandably pissed and sending that frustration out into the world. When that happens, just remember the people reading it matter too.
About me: I would not share something unless I think it has value to at least one other person on HN. I've done a lot of work about data and privacy in general (having worked at a differential privacy startup in the past), but I'm much newer to the idea of digging into ways of making telemetry gathering more transparent. I haven't found great resources on the Web about this yet, which is why I started doing the research. And I'm going to share it for others to read, criticize, build on top of, etc.