Earlier today I posted several lengthy (and well-composed) comments on the following thread in this forum:
https://portableapps.com/node/28953
I posted under the name "suggestiondude", an account I made with a disposable email address.
I was disturbed to see that the admin John T. Haller has now deleted all of my comments and locked the thread from further comments:
As there are no useful suggestions being added at this point other than random people posting multiple comments at a time rehashing old points using disposable email accounts (reminder: disposable email accounts aren't permitted here), I am closing this thread for comments.
Firstly, I appreciate this may be your website, John, and you can run it as you see fit. However if you have any aspirations to make it a place for open and democratic discussion, I suggest you consider my points carefully.
1) I saw no rules preventing the use of disposable email accounts. If you wish, you may impose such rules formally and attempt to block users from creating accounts with certain email domains, but my personal opinion (as a developer and a webmaster) is that these efforts are fruitless.
It is surely an obstruction to those who want to provide quick comment or feedback to block the use of certain email accounts. Surely the goal of an open forum is to make it as easy as possible for its users to comment? No matter if the email is disposable or not, the person is verified as being "a real human" and thus spam is a non-issue (spambots can just as easily use non-disposable email accounts).
All I wanted to do was make some one-off comments and I don't feel that using a permanent email address is necessary to do that.
2) Despite what you may think of my opinions, my comments in the thread were well-thought-out, typed correctly and in a mature manner, and totally free from any kind of abuse, slurs, slang, or other unconstructive literature.
I provided my comments motivated by the frustration which has arisen from using the products you develop and felt that my input was valuable to the improvement of those products. Obviously not. I do not particularly care if you personally think I am re-hashing what has been discussed before - am I not allowed to do so, even to add a "plus one" or add my own voice to the discussion?
3) I raised new points which had not previously been discussed, particularly contrasting the issue with the fact that I, myself, am a software developer, and so was trying to offer a professional insight into the issue as well as posting my own opinions.
4) That thread is full of users voicing their legitimate concerns, and with the developers only reiterating the same response again and again (which, in this case, was "close your apps properly"). If you removed my comments because you thought they were too samey, I suggest you look at removing your own community's comments as well.
The attitudes of the developers/moderators here are disturbing at best, not only to improving the software and platform itself, but to the suggestions and opinion of the users who post about them.
As I have said, I am a developer and forum administrator myself (though I will decline, for obvious reasons, to state which forum) and find it utterly abhorrent to censor input in this manner, from the initial barriers to entry on the forum (i.e. no disposable email addresses) to the removal of comments.
As a long-time user of Portable Apps I will be immediately ceasing use of them and urging others within the development community to do the same. If you want to continue developing without external insight or non-aggressive criticism, then go ahead.
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If you do not like a reply why argue constantly No is forcing you to use Portables App
“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.” Dr. Seuss
Just because the forum guidelines are not pushed in your face on login or signup does not mean they don't exist.
My country doesn't give people a copy of its laws when they are born or when they wake up, but we still aren't allowed to break them.
As soon as you click Create New Account, it says (emphasis mine):
The no disposables rule has been there for years to prevent random people from easily creating multiple accounts and spammers. We specifically block mailinator.com and many of its additional domains (to get around blocks) already, so you likely had to try one of their alternate domains (the one you used is now blocked as well). We've had dozens of issues in the past with people harassing or trolling via disposable mail accounts so it is a rule we are unlikely to change. The 'are you a human?' test is bypassed regularly by spammers these days as we get several hundred accounts a day setup by spammers if our heuristic and ip-based spam filtering is turned off. That's the price you pay for a high traffic website based on standard stuff (Drupal + ReCaptcha).
As to your input, you posted 4 comments saying basically the same thing in rapid succession re-iterating points that have already been discussed in that post without addressing the counterpoints which have already been raised. Additionally, your comments fell on the side of more aggressive/argumentative, which isn't in keeping with our site-wide forum guidelines' "Be Polite" and "Play nice" rules. I realize that the situation is frustrating for you, but restating existing arguments in the manner you did is not helpful to you, me or any other visitors.
These rules are there for a reason. A major reason developers get fed up and leave open source project is abuse from users. That's one of the reasons the Pidgin developers gave up on their forums years back and stopped responding to inquiries, for example. There always seems to be a small percentage of users of free software that get downright nasty when a product doesn't do exactly what they want (note that I'm not saying you got nasty, here). Without properly mitigating that attitude, they can ruin things for developers and other community users. I did, however, want to make sure that the points were clearly addressed in one location, which is why I summed it up in the post I made to lock the thread.
In the end, the forums are not a place for people to vent frustrations at volunteer developers. That's counterproductive and simply unfair. They are a place for reports of bugs and constructive criticism of development choices. So, let me reiterate these points again:
The points you have raised were valid, but it had been asked and addressed multiple times within that thread and added nothing to it. I had already personally posted a request for users to stop reposting the same points within that thread (including me2 and +1 posts) as well multiple times. That coupled with the fact that you were using a disposable account for what seemed like the specific purpose of repetitively posting exactly what was asked not to be posted is the reason your posts were removed and your account suspended. Not censorship or anything nefarious.
If you have anything additional to add or ask, please feel free using your new account tied to a real email address. But, again, please keep in mind the above technical and logistical limitations as well as the forum guidelines and the Play Nice and Be Polite points.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
Didn't see this idea yet...
I would have posted this in the other thread, but it is locked.
could you create a batch file to load the launcher in the first place and watch what processes it starts?
in the very least (if this is possible), you could give the user a prompt reminding them a program is still open.
launch the launcher with a helper process that keeps tabs on what it opens and confirms they are closed...?
aren't all the apps launched with a helper process the way it is now? just tweak that, not the start menu launcher app itself.
The user would still close the apps (I think anyone why expects this to happen auto-MAGICally is trying to re-invent the wheel).
OR
mod the code outright and add a prompt with 'yes or no' when you click 'eject'.
AND OR
mod the default theme to include the warning
By the way;
I'm tech savvy. I had no clue that stand-by basically ejects USB drives. That doesn't sound right to me... Does this still happen if your USB is set to never sleep?? Mine is set to never sleep... maybe include a REG check to see if that option is enabled or not and give a warning appropriately?
I'm not a programmer. I mean no disrespect whatsoever with this post.
Questions are a good way to learn. I don't see any disrespect with your post.
The main problem with your suggestion is that we currently do not have the ability to hook the shutdown process with our current APIs. In other words, we can create a prompt, we just won't know when to show it.
I don't mean shutdown, as in the Start Menu option built into windows, I mean the 'eject' button within the app itself, as well as the close button within the app itself.
app itself= portableapps.com launcher
I realize it isn't a perfect solution, but regardless as to the 'shutdown' 'issue'... there's still the 'eject' issue, right? The eject issue might be much easier to tackle...
And you could include a shutdown option within the portabelapps.com launcher itself... not the finest option, but one that could be implemented much quicker than waiting for a proper shutdown flag within all versions of Windows.
Do you know what I mean? Duct tape. Fixes everything.
The ability for the PA.c Platform to close all apps when you click Eject or Close in the platform is already planned for a future release. It states this above in the topic you replied to:
Please stop re-starting this topic to state things that have already been addressed.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
I am sorry for spelling out what that post states...
I didn't realize that until your post.
Glad it is all spelled out now. No more questions.
Sorry to be a bug.