11–20 of 357 posts
This may be an obvious point but how can you say you failed when due to the fact that it's open source, anybody could check out the code and start supporting it?
And perhaps a little bit of false guilt, because they were overwhelmed by the sheer amount of work. Perhaps they didn't estimate how time consuming it is to do this and feel guilty about that.
This may be an obvious point but how can you say you failed when due to the fact that it's open source, anybody could check out the code and start supporting it?
I have an OS project too, people want 1000 things, you can say "ok, make a PR and it will be integrated", many make a good PR, but that's it. Normally they do not make any support, they made feature they need, and they are gone when it is implemented. (not all, but most people)
And when issues come up, because of the new feature, you can try to contact the creator, sometimes they help, sometimes not. But to contact them is work too.
I am so happy that i found a "community manager" (after years and many try it), who does all the non-programming stuff and keep the project alive, cause my time is spare too.
> ...People want a lot of things from you and your project, big companies are using the project and need a lot of things as well from it in order to keep their projects healthy, but in most of the cases this is a talk in just one way. There are more people interest in have things from you, than help! And this crashed me If they are all users of your open source software and are begging for features for free, ignore t…
This is bearable for a certain amount of time but after that one really has to look after themselves, regardless of financial interests or a crash is inevitable.
Of course it's terrible to become burnt out and it feels awful not having enough time to work on an open source project that you love. But, is it just me or has it become rarer for open source project maintainers to feel free to let projects go? I don't mean to let them die, I mean, to find like-minded individuals to which you can defer some or all of the work? I realize that as the original author one feels a sense…
I've had a few people offer help over the course of the years, but unfortunately they don't always have all the skills needed, so they can only help with a part of the project. When they do have the necessary skills, they don't have the time.
As I don't have the time to keep working on both projects for free, I'll probably abandon the lesser used one. I'd love to find a successor for the second project, but to be honest I don't have any idea how to go about finding that person.
(I don't want to post specifics of the projects because I'm trying not to link this account with my real world identity)
That's the dark side of open source. Companies think these projects grow on trees and they use them without paying anything. We need law changes to ensure that open source can be sustainable and companies pay the fair share of revenue they make by using it.
How do you estimate a share? What's the share of libc in Google business? What's the share of openssl? What's the share of ncurses?
Nobody says that one company has to support every project and google supports many open source projects.
Of course it's terrible to become burnt out and it feels awful not having enough time to work on an open source project that you love. But, is it just me or has it become rarer for open source project maintainers to feel free to let projects go? I don't mean to let them die, I mean, to find like-minded individuals to which you can defer some or all of the work? I realize that as the original author one feels a sense…
I think part of the worry of handing projects over stems from a couple of fairly high-profile events when projects were handed over to theoretically trust-worthy people who went rogue and used them as a platform for malware or spear phishing. Suddenly, even just relinquishing control can be a bad thing for the community.
I'm currently on a 6 month hiatus from OSS, no one has notified me of any fires so I think everything is just fine without me which is how it should be.
Of course it's terrible to become burnt out and it feels awful not having enough time to work on an open source project that you love. But, is it just me or has it become rarer for open source project maintainers to feel free to let projects go? I don't mean to let them die, I mean, to find like-minded individuals to which you can defer some or all of the work? I realize that as the original author one feels a sense…
I think it has always been rare. I generally avoid projects which are under a person's own github account because to me it is a massive red flag that they will kill the project by failing to maintain it and failing to hand it over at some point in time.
When you build a project the most important part is to eliminate dependency on yourself. If you are approving all commits, or doing most changes, you need to fix it, because it is a problem.
I don't really understand pedronauck's response. If he does not have time, he should tell people he does not have time and they should make PRs, is that not the point of open source projects?
There is nothing wrong with demanding that people help themselves, people are not entitled to your time, and unless you are not processing PRs then you are not the problem.
Of course it's terrible to become burnt out and it feels awful not having enough time to work on an open source project that you love. But, is it just me or has it become rarer for open source project maintainers to feel free to let projects go? I don't mean to let them die, I mean, to find like-minded individuals to which you can defer some or all of the work? I realize that as the original author one feels a sense…
I maintain two slightly popular open source apps, and my experience is that there are a lot of people interested in using your product, but very few people interested in contributing to it. I've had a few people offer help over the course of the years, but unfortunately they don't always have all the skills needed, so they can only help with a part of the project. When they do have the necessary skills, they don't ha…
Of course it's terrible to become burnt out and it feels awful not having enough time to work on an open source project that you love. But, is it just me or has it become rarer for open source project maintainers to feel free to let projects go? I don't mean to let them die, I mean, to find like-minded individuals to which you can defer some or all of the work? I realize that as the original author one feels a sense…
I maintain two slightly popular open source apps, and my experience is that there are a lot of people interested in using your product, but very few people interested in contributing to it. I've had a few people offer help over the course of the years, but unfortunately they don't always have all the skills needed, so they can only help with a part of the project. When they do have the necessary skills, they don't ha…
So whats wrong with allowing them to help with those parts?