Abuse of power and censorship in the WineHQ Forums and WineAppDb database

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wine6444
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Abuse of power and censorship in the WineHQ Forums and WineAppDb database

Post by wine6444 »

Entries for Wine App Db have been denied for no justifiable reason.
And after creating a new account here in the forum I just noticed that my replies to forum threads are not appearing. Do they require admin approval to show up?

Is there a way so that these places can become more open to the public?
I feel like there are mechanisms in place that favor too much the tendency of some people abusing their sense of power, rejecting posts, rejecting app entries, rejecting forum replies.

I have more than one entry for Wine App Db denied and I'm not staying silent about it anymore.
What are the steps required for people to contest app maintainer decisions?
The worst thing about this is that the other app maintainer had approved my post already, and he thanked me for how informative and helpful it was, since it contained extensive step-by-step installation procedure. The other app maintainer went there and REVOKED the other person's decision, just like that, without any kind of verification, without any kind of barriers. Is that kind of behavior encouraged here? In case you want to see it, the app in question is The Sims 1: Complete Collection, I just posted a comment there too describing what happened. If that comment is already gone, it's probably being deleted out of spite, supressing information, censorship, etc. Attitudes that are unfit for this community.

Screenshots, in case the comments there are deleted out of spite.
https://imgur.com/a/CG9o5U0

Linux should be all about SHARING. Sharing data, sharing information. Building an entire environment out of volunteer collaborations. And all of a sudden some people think they have the right to hamper that spirit of voluntarism and get in the way, preventing others from collaborating.

What is the procedure to report abusive app maintainers and seek repairing measures?
Can one app maintainer override the decision of another one, unchecked like that?
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dimesio
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Re: Abuse of power and censorship in the WineHQ Forums and WineAppDb database

Post by dimesio »

wine6444 wrote: Wed May 26, 2021 1:07 pm And after creating a new account here in the forum I just noticed that my replies to forum threads are not appearing. Do they require admin approval to show up?
The first three posts of new forum users must be approved by a moderator. It is the only effective way we have found to keep out spam.
The other app maintainer went there and REVOKED the other person's decision, just like that, without any kind of verification, without any kind of barriers. Is that kind of behavior encouraged here? In case you want to see it, the app in question is The Sims 1: Complete Collection, I just posted a comment there too describing what happened. If that comment is already gone, it's probably being deleted out of spite, supressing information, censorship, etc.
Having looked at the comments in the AppDB describing what happened, I agree with the second maintainer that the test report never should have been accepted in the first place. His reasons were stated clearly and they conform to guidelines laid out in https://wiki.winehq.org/AppDB_Test_Results_Guidelines, which I suggest you read carefully before submitting any more test reports.
If that comment is already gone, it's probably being deleted out of spite, supressing information, censorship, etc.
Not only is the comment still there, it has received more than one reply explaining in detail why the test report was rejected and what you need to do to fix it.
What is the procedure to report abusive app maintainers and seek repairing measures?
This is the place to report AppDB problems that are not bugs in the code (use Bugzilla for the latter). That's why the "Contact Us" link leads here. I am an AppDB admin.
Can one app maintainer override the decision of another one, unchecked like that?
Yes.
[email protected]
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Re: Abuse of power and censorship in the WineHQ Forums and WineAppDb database

Post by [email protected] »

Whether the details of the OP's complaint are on target or not, the general reason for unhappiness is supported by my experience.

I've been generating publicly available software for nearly half a century -- BEFORE open source was a concept. And I've been trying to report that Fotosketcher software can be run under Wine in various Ubuntu/Linux Mint flavours. I've been using it for the last 2 years. You can see results in freely available novel "Love and Iron" on obooko.com, where I used it to generate chapter introduction graphics.

Now in preparing a talk in our Linux-Ottawa series New2Linux that I run, I thought I'd do a talk on how to use Windows software under Linux. I do use Wine for a couple of packages, namely Fotosketcher and Irfanview, but otherwise I've found VirtualBox is my friend, since "stuff works".

My problem with the AppDB: I posted a report that Fotosketcher was working fine, but the drop-down does NOT include Wine 5.0.3, to I chose 5.0.4. Post rejected. But 5.0.3 is what Mint/Ubuntu latest repo has. That's the one new Linux users will install. But to be a good open-source citizen, I spent the effort (non-trivial and NOT for newbies) to install wine-development (which says 5.5 as the response to "wine --version". I then went and edited my submission, only to have the website tell me I couldn't change the version AND ERASE MY NOTES and ask me to start over. That isn't friendly or smart.

Thus no report on Fotosketcher, which is a program Wine runs. But there are lots of reports on programs that don't work well. So I'll be telling newbies to use Wine only if they have an experienced user holding their hand who knows a package works. Otherwise there'll be frustration and grumpiness.

WineHQ could be much, much more welcoming to folk trying to do the right thing and report what works and what doesn't. How about an "interim submissions" section where things don't have all the details. Has anyone looked at how may submissions are abandoned? When I worked for a while on a contract for Limited Brands, the elephant in the room was the proportion of customers who got fed up with waiting for a cashier and dumped merchandise on the nearest shelf. Statistics on abandonment (e.g., people who hang up when put on hold) often are ignored e.g., we answered 99% of all questions asked (but 99.5% of callers gave up before asking).

Prof. J C Nash
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dimesio
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Re: Abuse of power and censorship in the WineHQ Forums and WineAppDb database

Post by dimesio »

[email protected] wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 10:13 am
My problem with the AppDB: I posted a report that Fotosketcher was working fine, but the drop-down does NOT include Wine 5.0.3, to I chose 5.0.4. Post rejected. But 5.0.3 is what Mint/Ubuntu latest repo has.
FYI, the WineHQ Ubuntu packages should work on Mint, and that is what we recommend people use.
WineHQ could be much, much more welcoming to folk trying to do the right thing and report what works and what doesn't. How about an "interim submissions" section where things don't have all the details
.
There are lots of things that could be done to improve the AppDB, but IMO the current codebase is not really worth the trouble. The AppDB code is ancient; it really needs to be rewritten from the ground up, which is a major task (and beyond my limited skills). More to the point, Wine is a volunteer project, and volunteers work on what they want, when they want. Are you volunteering?
When I worked for a while on a contract for Limited Brands, the elephant in the room was the proportion of customers who got fed up with waiting for a cashier and dumped merchandise on the nearest shelf
Wine is not a business and its users are not customers.
zapper
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Re: Abuse of power and censorship in the WineHQ Forums and WineAppDb database

Post by zapper »

dimesio wrote: Sun Jun 06, 2021 7:03 am
[email protected] wrote: Sat Jun 05, 2021 10:13 am
My problem with the AppDB: I posted a report that Fotosketcher was working fine, but the drop-down does NOT include Wine 5.0.3, to I chose 5.0.4. Post rejected. But 5.0.3 is what Mint/Ubuntu latest repo has.
FYI, the WineHQ Ubuntu packages should work on Mint, and that is what we recommend people use.
WineHQ could be much, much more welcoming to folk trying to do the right thing and report what works and what doesn't. How about an "interim submissions" section where things don't have all the details
.
There are lots of things that could be done to improve the AppDB, but IMO the current codebase is not really worth the trouble. The AppDB code is ancient; it really needs to be rewritten from the ground up, which is a major task (and beyond my limited skills). More to the point, Wine is a volunteer project, and volunteers work on what they want, when they want. Are you volunteering?
When I worked for a while on a contract for Limited Brands, the elephant in the room was the proportion of customers who got fed up with waiting for a cashier and dumped merchandise on the nearest shelf
Wine is not a business and its users are not customers.
None of that matters, if people want to report their findings, you shouldn't censor them unless you have a pretty damn good reason.

The above situation that op mentions, is not a reason to censor... that's the bottom line.

I experienced the same thing, and it makes me not want to submit in the future.

In fact, I already gave up due to such bs... Its just too much of a headache to submit something and then have your damn AppDB be like, resubmit or we will delete it...

Please get off your high horse and realize you are making people actively not want to help the project...

Just sayin...

that's stupid. come on man...
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Re: Abuse of power and censorship in the WineHQ Forums and WineAppDb database

Post by TigerWild »

I have to agree with Zapper. In a community where everyone is expected to come together to make a thing better, creating a hostile working environment is non-conducive. I expect better.
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