Re: [LUG] Use Jitsi for video conferencing was Re: Skype

[Michael Everitt <michael@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On 26/03/20 12:03, Neil wrote:
> I have had another look at FF and am still not keen on it. One of my main
> moans, and I am not alone, is that I like the tab bar to be the bottom
> one. This used to be an easy choice until FF developers, in their wisdom,
> decided to remove it.
>
> Is it important to have the tab bar at the bottom? No, of course not.
>
> Is it important that that choice should be available to me? Absolutely.
>
And this is one of the annoyances I am increasingly finding about the FOSS
community at large these days, possibly being somewhat close-in to the
ecosystem. Linux used to be all about choice, but slowly that choice is
being eroded away in the name of consistency and maintainability .. which
is fine until you end up with something like Windows or Ubuntu, where you
really don't have 'Choice' in the real definition .. you have, like Apple
and Microsoft and Google .. Take it or Leave it.

Now, for me, I like to have something to make a decision over, and if that
reduces down to Something vs Nothing, that's not really a Choice, now is
it? And it's here I do rather agree with Neil's ethos. If he wants to use
Palemoon, that's genuinely His Choice, and he shouldn't be berated for
having it, or doing it. But when you have the scenario, as it used to be
with Internet Explorer 4-7, or nothing (as far as functionality went) then
the options are pretty bleak. I, for one, back in the day, raved about IE4
and its 'new' and innovative features (what me, Linux heathen!) but now its
pretty much a case of "I must have Latest Firefox and Latest Chromium" to
be able to successfully Browse the Web, and frankly, I don't find that
acceptable. We haven't even got started on Facebook's sloppy React coding
yet (I'll save that for another ranty post).
> For me FF has become too bloated, and the developers are far too
> arrogant. If they look at any questions/comments on line about FF they
> must realise how many people they are annoying about this. Yet they just
> ignore it all, no doubt deciding that they know best.
>
> One thing I like most about Linux is that it is so configurable. So when
> a simple choice like this is removed, without any by your leave, I get
> angry.
>
> And, why do you not like Waterfox? To me it seems to be FF as it should
> be. Or am I wrong again?
>
> Neil
>
So yeah, actually on this one, I'm totally with you, Neil - FOSS developers
are getting selfish and arrogant, and forgetting their roots. It started
with SystemD and Poettring, and it's spreading everywhere else with the
Rust and Go ecosystems, driven hard by the Big Boys in the game, and their
millions of dollars in backing. This isn't really good for the ecosystem
all, and it's killing those people who retain the original Unix philosophy
of "Do One Thing Well" and those with a modicum of 'doing it properly' and
'testing thoroughly' which ought to have become a lot /easier/ with CI & CD
tooling available.

Instead, everyone's taking the shortcuts and the easy route, and we end up
with the mess that is OSS at the present time. I hope the tide will change,
but with the current sea of 'CADT' (look it up) I am not very hopeful.

*raises a glass to Neil* this one's on me, bud.

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