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CKAN Discussion Continutation


phoenix_ca

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@Kobymaru

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That sounds rather unfair. I just checked out the GitHub page for CKAN, and it turns out that that the overwhelming majority of contributions come from like 3-5 people, and not from a microsoft-end-user-program-sized software division, like I thought.

So I have my doubts that all that those people are doing is sitting behind their evil screens and squinting their evil eyes and letting out evil, maniac laughs. Even "basically".

I also have my doubts that implying that they intentionally disrespect you by not immediately implementing suggested changes will change the climate such that they are more inclined to implement those changes.

Basically this.

 

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Please don't take mod managers as a personal insult, because they're not. I'm grateful for what you did, and so is every single one of your users. The evil "people like me" don't actually want to hurt you, they see it as improving your work (the distribution and accesibility side of it). I know you don't see it that way, but in a sense, all of this CKAN business is similar to spreading the good word on your mod. Kinda like a post with a link on reddit, just with code on GitHub.

I think this point is getting entirely missed in the discussion.

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I stand by @ferram4's point that, while CKAN can make life for users easier, it can possibly make mod authors lives much more frustrating, while not allowing them to opt out or otherwise remove the issue

@phoenix_ca sharing a link on Reddit doesn't cause bug reports for modders. Bug reports that aren't their responsibility or problem, but they often have to spend time chasing after.

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And on the notion of "Well my time is valuable", fine. You guys realize other people's time is valuable too, right? Just take myself as an example. I work split shifts 5-6 days a week (so twelve hour days not counting time spent sitting around at work, transit, or anything else), on top of taking programming and math classes so I can apply to a tech school. If you're going to play the "my time is valuable" card, you have to extend that to users too and understand that some, perhaps a lot, of them also don't particularly like wasting their own time because they only have so much of it to go around. CKAN is at the very least, as solution to that issue and it's what shaves enough time off the entire process of mod installs that I can actually get around to playing KSP instead of testing it and then having a new update come around and have to start the process all over again.

@CobaltWolf I'm not the one who brought-up the reddit link comparison. But in legal terms it's effectively similar. That's why I asked for possible solutions that would mitigate the problems mod authors are having. Ferram handed us all a pretty decent list. Though I agree with @cantab that demanding the system be entirely opt-in, especially when the CKAN team has said quite strongly they aren't interested in doing that, is having the perfect be the enemy of the good. If we could settle on improvements that would at least mitigate the main issues, that would at least be a start.

 

It'd be nice if we could scare-up some more of the CKAN team to talk about this though.

Edited by phoenix_ca
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@phoenix_ca

let me preface this by saying that I have never had any problems with CKAN and have never opposed to my mods being featured there.

 

however, I want to believe that if the day will come that I will want my mods out of there, they will remove my mods without complains

when you force modders to have their mods there against their will you lose the right to say stuff like:

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[WE] don't actually want to hurt you, [WE] see it as improving your work (the distribution and accesibility side of it)

 

of course none of my mods are remotely as demanded as FAR, so the chances of me getting CKAN issues is pretty low, and even then, the chance of them giving a *** if my mod stays or goes are pretty darn low as well :D

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31 minutes ago, phoenix_ca said:

And on the notion of "Well my time is valuable", fine. You guys realize other people's time is valuable too, right? Just take myself as an example. I work split shifts 5-6 days a week (so twelve hour days not counting time spent sitting around at work, transit, or anything else), on top of taking programming and math classes so I can apply to a tech school. If you're going to play the "my time is valuable" card, you have to extend that to users too and understand that some, perhaps a lot, of them also don't particularly like wasting their own time because they only have so much of it to go around. CKAN is at the very least, as solution to that issue and it's what shaves enough time off the entire process of mod installs that I can actually get around to playing KSP instead of testing it and then having a new update come around and have to start the process all over again.

Wow.

Then don't use my mods.  Seriously.  I have pretty much zero time for people who act that entitled towards the labors of other people.  Sorry, but my time as a content creator is significantly more valuable in relation to mods that I create and maintain than your time as a guy who wants to use some free stuff I provide.  Especially since you - and I mean you personallly - wasted my time in the middle of an update night by tossing one of my mods up on CKAN.

We all keep saying the same thing here... but nobody seems interested in listening.  I will try again.  

Make inclusion of a mod opt in only.
Let modders remove whatever they want from CKAN whenever they want.  No questions asked.
Unless we either say 'sure, go ahead and list it' or do it ourselves.  Do not list it.

That's it.  Without that being sorted, this thread is going to go nowhere.

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1 hour ago, phoenix_ca said:

@Kobymaru

Basically this.

 

I think this point is getting entirely missed in the discussion.

I think those points were immediately dismissed because as it is said before mod authors are volunteers who mod for their own sake. Exposure, distribution, popularity and other things CKAN prides itself on are in reality secondary concerns to most of them, and your man power shortage is not a good excuse to disrespect mod authors

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1 hour ago, phoenix_ca said:

Though I agree with @cantab that demanding the system be entirely opt-in, especially when the CKAN team has said quite strongly they aren't interested in doing that, is having the perfect be the enemy of the good.

Except that's not what I meant. What I meant was that if a New Better Mod Manager comes up and doesn't immediately and totally replace CKAN, I don't agree with ferram's claim that that would make the NBMM useless.

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also, if modders keep being annoyed by CKAN the solution is pretty simple:

Question: How do I stop CKAN from linking to my mod?

Answer: Upload the mods to sites like Curse or Dropbox which CKAN cannot use

 

Possible solution for CKAN: Redistribute all the mods that allow redistribution

Unavoidable consequence of that: Modders start to use more restrictive licenses.

 

Overall result: CKAN ultimately fails and in the process maybe we lose modders that just don't want to bother and decide to stop modding altogether

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13 minutes ago, Sigma88 said:

also, if modders keep being annoyed by CKAN the solution is pretty simple:

Question: How do I stop CKAN from linking to my mod?

Answer: Upload the mods to sites like Curse or Dropbox which CKAN cannot use

 

Possible solution for CKAN: Redistribute all the mods that allow redistribution

Unavoidable consequence of that: Modders start to use more restrictive licenses.

 

Overall result: CKAN ultimately fails and in the process maybe we lose modders that just don't want to bother and decide to stop modding altogether

Yes this ^

Really if CKAN will not change it's ways then for the health Of the modding and ksp community discussion of mod managers that participate in unneighborly practices like listing without permission, automating installation without quality assurance, and ignoring requests to be delisted should be banned. This will prompt CKAN  to change or be forced to leave the nexus of ksp modding.

This is really no different from the new forum rule that bans update requests which was also implemented for the comfort of modders and as a result the health of the community.

Edited by passinglurker
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I've been pretty active in the CKAN team for the last six months or so, and I really do understand the problems that the minority of mod authors being vocal here have with CKAN. The CKAN project is a team effort, and a team that are often time-poor.

A major part of the underlying philosphy behind CKAN is the open source movement, and I think this is where Ferram4, Roverdude and others are having conflicts. When you release something as open source, you are relinquishing control of it. That's fundamentally what it means to put something under an open source license. You have freely ceded any control over distribution, other than the specific limitations in the license you choose. To me it is frankly staggering to release something under an open source license and then complain that other people are taking away your ability to control the distribution. You gave that up when you released it as open source. You are opting in to alternate distribution methods when you release a mod as open source. We respect that decision.

Now, Roverdude has relicensed all of his art assets as All Rights Reserved, and has clearly stated that he does not wish any of his mods to be listed on CKAN unless he submits them himself. I find that a sad decision, but we will respect it. I will personally make every effort to ensure that none of his mods will be added to CKAN unless he has published the metadata himself. 

The relicensing of the art assets is a simple thing for Roverdude to do legally. Personally, I wish there was a similar solution for Ferram4, because I'd be happy to never have to deal with him again, but I gather that FAR has many co-contributors and is basically impossible to relicense at this point. If it were simply my decision, I'd de-list FAR from CKAN and direct any complaints to the FAR thread, but I am bound by the project policies.

Ferram4's suggestions for auto-checking metadata and improving our processes to cause less problems for mod authors have not been ignored. We have tickets open and discussions and work ongoing to remedy the issues. Unfortunately, between the flood of new mods being submitted to CKAN and Squad pushing out new versions of CKAN, we are often just too busy scrambling to keep things working to make any major architectural improvements. The other factor is that some of the most active contributors to CKAN are only working on metadata, with little coding ability. 

I really like the idea of a CKAN mod that dumps all information about CKAN installed mods into the KSP log. I wish I had the faintest idea where to start in writing one.

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Let's stop being so dramatic. Don't expect people to understand your feelings. People can be dumb and mean.

If CKAN switches to an Opt-in system as described, then someone else can just make another tool that installs redistributable mods. 

 

"but, but I want..."

Nope, no buts. Per Add-on posting rule #1:
 

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"[add-ons] must be accompanied by a license that regulates what other users can do with the copyrighted material."



TL;DR
Everyone please just use a license that reflects your will.

Edited by JedTech
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Since it is being rehashed here I will post this again

As we have this fun CKAN discussion I think it is important to remember our places in this ecosystem. 

I have yet to find a modder who created a mod "for the community". Everyone I've known made a mod "for themselves" and then was nice enough to "share it with the community". Re-read if necessary because this is an important but subtle difference. 

Along those lines most modder likely don't actually care how many people use their mods. Sure there may be a bit of a rush when you see how popular something you created is. At the end of the day however is it not the primary motivation. 

With all of that said it becomes clear why modder a have the attitude about CKAN that they do. The ONLY reason for a modder to embrace CKAN is if it makes their life easier. Currently it does not. 

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22 minutes ago, politas said:

You gave that up when you released it as open source. You are opting in to alternate distribution methods when you release a mod as open source. We respect that decision.

17 minutes ago, JedTech said:

Everyone please just use a license that reflects your will.

this is exactly what I was talking about

the solution is, make the mod's license restrictive.

the result is, as a community we get less open source mods.

 

the nice thing about open source mods is that if a guy like @ferram4 suddently decides to stop working on his mods, then someone else can take over from there.

the current behaviour will just result in modders taking measures against CKAN, which will result in less mods being open source

Edited by Sigma88
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Just now, Sigma88 said:

as a community we get less open source mods.

Nope you can use or create a license that can help you restrict redistribution per your will, while still allowing for open source.

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9 minutes ago, goldenpsp said:

Since it is being rehashed here I will post this again

As we have this fun CKAN discussion I think it is important to remember our places in this ecosystem. 

I have yet to find a modder who created a mod "for the community". Everyone I've known made a mod "for themselves" and then was nice enough to "share it with the community". Re-read if necessary because this is an important but subtle difference. 

Along those lines most modder likely don't actually care how many people use their mods. Sure there may be a bit of a rush when you see how popular something you created is. At the end of the day however is it not the primary motivation. 

With all of that said it becomes clear why modder a have the attitude about CKAN that they do. The ONLY reason for a modder to embrace CKAN is if it makes their life easier. Currently it does not. 

Well, the response I hear from most modders is that it does. CKAN's mission is to help users get a fully working installation of KSP with as many of the mods they want that will work together. We want to get it right. I personally spend a significant portion of my week (that I used to spend just playing KSP) correcting CKAN metadata to make it work right.

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@Kobymaru:

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That sounds rather unfair. I just checked out the GitHub page for CKAN, and it turns out that that the overwhelming majority of contributions come from like 3-5 people, and not from a microsoft-end-user-program-sized software division, like I thought.

So I have my doubts that all that those people are doing is sitting behind their evil screens and squinting their evil eyes and letting out evil, maniac laughs. Even "basically".

I also have my doubts that implying that they intentionally disrespect you by not immediately implementing suggested changes will change the climate such that they are more inclined to implement those changes.

And yet, is any of it untrue?  If CKAN contributors decide not to do anything about issues reported, what recourse does a mod author really have?  What direct, measurable consequences will there be for CKAN under those circumstances?  The only options right now are to abandon the mod or go to war and try to sabotage CKAN.  We want an opt-in only method for CKAN so that we don't have to go that far.

As for being evil, I don't believe that.  I just believe that they don't particularly care.  Considering that the issue that turned me completely against CKAN happened over a year ago now, it's pretty obvious they don't put priority towards fixing their issues.

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What is this shield-system that you are talking about?

Uh... the fact that they can thumb their noses at modders without consequence?  The same thing I have been complaining about here?

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So if I'm a responsible adult who modifies and uses tools to keep his KSP install in order and share the knowledge on my way of doing it, I'm a jackass?

When you modify those tools to get around steps that modders take to reduce their support workload and then share that with other people so as to sabotage those attempts, you are not a responsible adult; you are a jackass making modding harder for us.

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Wow, that's rather extreme. It makes me sad that you would go to such extremes. It also makes me sad that apparently you were pushed by ignorant users and ignorant CKAN'ers.

I'm not even blaming you. I'm just sad.

And yet, what other options do I have?  I keep asking for less drastic measures, and CKAN contributors and supporters keep telling me that isn't acceptable.

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Please don't take mod managers as a personal insult, because they're not. I'm grateful for what you did, and so is every single one of your users. The evil "people like me" don't actually want to hurt you, they see it as improving your work (the distribution and accesibility side of it). I know you don't see it that way, but in a sense, all of this CKAN business is similar to spreading the good word on your mod. Kinda like a post with a link on reddit, just with code on GitHub.

I don't take their existence as an insult; I do take the insinuation that the "good word on my mod" or that reaching any kind of wider audience should be a mitigating factor as one though.  I don't care about having more users, I care about having a manageable and useful support and feedback system.  CKAN does not provide that.

23 minutes ago, politas said:

To me it is frankly staggering to release something under an open source license and then complain that other people are taking away your ability to control the distribution. You gave that up when you released it as open source. You are opting in to alternate distribution methods when you release a mod as open source. We respect that decision.

That would be far easier to defend if CKAN did not introduce install errors galore.  The demands are not based in legality, but in a demand for some courtesy for once and an acknowledgement that you do create issues and that you would rather have greater goodwill with modders than to risk creating additional issues.  In the same way that modders can deliberately ignore unintended and fixable conflicts between mods, but we don't and try to fix them because we would rather things work well and that everyone get along rather than simply pointing to a license and thumbing our noses at each other over it.

23 minutes ago, politas said:

If it were simply my decision, I'd de-list FAR from CKAN and direct any complaints to the FAR thread, but I am bound by the project policies.

And you know what?  If CKAN were opt-in and weren't so prone to creating install errors, I wouldn't want it removed.  So there's a very easy way to make that request go away that's in your benefit.

Besides that, you might be bound by the project policies, but that doesn't mean to throw up your hands and not bother changing them.  Removing that one policy would fix so many animosity issues in one fell swoop.

23 minutes ago, politas said:

Ferram4's suggestions for auto-checking metadata and improving our processes to cause less problems for mod authors have not been ignored. We have tickets open and discussions and work ongoing to remedy the issues. Unfortunately, between the flood of new mods being submitted to CKAN and Squad pushing out new versions of CKAN, we are often just too busy scrambling to keep things working to make any major architectural improvements. The other factor is that some of the most active contributors to CKAN are only working on metadata, with little coding ability. 

And yet, the issues this is intended to fix happened a year ago.  A year ago.  And no progress was done on it.  I suggested something like this to you specifically in the CKAN thread approximately 8 months ago.  And there has been no progress.  For all you claim to be working on things, nothing has been done in a long, long time.

18 minutes ago, JedTech said:

Let's stop being so dramatic. Don't expect people to understand your feelings. People can be dumb and mean.

If CKAN switches to an Opt-in system as described, then someone else can just make another tool that installs redistributable mods. 

And yet they will not be stickied at the top of the Addon Release forum, they will not have had institutional support from a few modders, they will have to fight their way to getting visibility and a userbase.  And if the user responses to the CompatibilityChecker breaker and win64-forks for FAR were any indication, many users really don't agree with introducing extra workload for modders even after they've explicitly asked for it to change.

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5 minutes ago, JedTech said:

Nope you can use or create a license that can help you restrict redistribution per your will, while still allowing for open source.

except that (and this is already happening right now)

CKAN does not redistribute mods, CKAN uses the links provided by modders.

So even licenses that do not allow "redistribution" can end up on CKAN

(most of my mods are All Rights Reserved, and still, they are on CKAN)

 

I have never had any issues with CKAN, on the contrary, I have always tried to help them if they had issues with my mods.

but if they care about the community as they say, I don't understand why they get so obsessed with doing stuff against content creators will.

It's crystal clear that an hostile environment will lead to less/more restricted content, why in hell would anyone want that?

Edited by Sigma88
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3 minutes ago, Sigma88 said:

most of my mods are All Rights Reserved, and still, they are on CKAN

Well that's not good. If it bugs you, we should talk to somebody about correcting that.

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2 minutes ago, ferram4 said:

That would be far easier to defend if CKAN did not introduce install errors galore.  The demands are not based in legality, but in a demand for some courtesy for once and an acknowledgement that you do create issues and that you would rather have greater goodwill with modders than to risk creating additional issues.  In the same way that modders can deliberately ignore unintended and fixable conflicts between mods, but we don't and try to fix them because we would rather things work well and that everyone get along rather than simply pointing to a license and thumbing our noses at each other over it.

And you know what?  If CKAN were opt-in and weren't so prone to creating install errors, I wouldn't want it removed.  So there's a very easy way to make that request go away that's in your benefit.

Besides that, you might be bound by the project policies, but that doesn't mean to throw up your hands and not bother changing them.  Removing that one policy would fix so many animosity issues in one fell swoop.

And yet, the issues this is intended to fix happened a year ago.  A year ago.  And no progress was done on it.  I suggested something like this to you specifically in the CKAN thread approximately 8 months ago.  And there has been no progress.  For all you claim to be working on things, nothing has been done in a long, long time.

How many times do we have to publicly say that yes, CKAN occasionally causes some problems in order for you to consider we have acknowledged it?

If you came to us explaining what was wrong with the installation, we'd be able to fix it quickly. When all you say is "take my mod off, it's causing me problems" and refuse to see our side of things or engage in actual real discussion, then you're not going to get the result you want.

Is CKAN still installing FAR incorrectly? My understanding is that the issue with installation has been fixed.

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2 minutes ago, JedTech said:

Well that's not good. If it bugs you, we should talk to somebody about correcting that.

my attitude towards CKAN has alway been:

"I don't care and I don't want to manage it, but if anyone wants to take the time to put my mods there, feel free to do so."

and this attitude will continue as long as I don't get any problems from CKAN users.

I just hope that if that day will come, I will not have to go through hell to get them out.

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3 hours ago, phoenix_ca said:

I think this point is getting entirely missed in the discussion.

Actually, I dont think it IS... Modders have stated they DO NOT have an issue with modmanagers... KSP ModAdmin, and KSP AVC havent gotten grief like CKAN, AND they ARE supported (especially AVC) by MANY modders... I think the issue is most certainly CKANs implementation and usage that most devs take umbrage to...

And while we differ on opinion, THANK YOU for starting this thread, @phoenix_ca :)

I ask everyone (myself included, as I seem to sometimes get heated and offend people :) ), to please lets keep at least ONE CKAN thread civil... :)

Edited by Stone Blue
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2 hours ago, RoverDude said:

Then don't use my mods.  Seriously.  I have pretty much zero time for people who act that entitled towards the labors of other people.  Sorry, but my time as a content creator is significantly more valuable in relation to mods that I create and maintain than your time as a guy who wants to use some free stuff I provide.

I figured this would be the response when I said that. My point was that people are going to use the tools that save them time and effort when installing mods. This is not something easily changed, even if we just killed CKAN entirely. Someone else will make a new tool that does the same thing. Saying "Well, just don't use mods" is equivalent to me just saying to you "Well, if you don't like the time modding takes, just stop modding." It shows absolutely no respect for the concerns of others.

 

Do you see how this gets us absolutely nowhere? Just more animosity to go around, and no realistic solutions.

Part of the reason I'm so opposed to forcing strict opt-in only for everything is because there are no analogues for it in other modding communities (that I know of, and that actually work and don't get supplanted by a more open manager in short order). XCOM 2 and Cities: Skylines are centered on the Steam Workshop. Bethesda's games and a few others are de facto centered on Nexus. KSP has none of that centrality. There is no one-stop-shop where you can see most if not all mods easily. There's SpaceDock, GitHub, Curse, and probably the worst of the lot, just plain links to a download file on a forum thread, which effectively leaves the mod dead and buried unless its page keeps getting bumped in the forums.

 

2 hours ago, RoverDude said:

Especially since you - and I mean you personallly - wasted my time in the middle of an update night by tossing one of my mods up on CKAN.

I've already publically apologized for this: 

Quote

Yeah. I looked back at the history and that was actually my bad. It was my first contribution and I didn't know you were managing your own mods. It got merged; later I realized you manage your own files by looking at all the other USI ones and once I knew what was going on I edited the wiki to point-out to anyone else new wanting to contribute that some authors manage their own stuff and it's better to leave them to it (there was no such information when I looked at that guide and thus, that didn't occur to me; at the time I didn't know CKAN even had that ability, to pull from some other metadata file somewhere and the one in the repo being effectively just a pointer to it).

Anyway, that was mostly a documentation issue and has since been fixed. Hopefully no one else new who wants to add your mods to CKAN will do what I did because they'll read the guide and be clued-in. Or at least I can promise to bring-it-up as long as I'm keeping my eyes on that repo.

(I had the best intentions! The Malemute Rover is a great mod. :D )

In my own defense, which I omitted in the apology above, the addition was approved and merged by someone on the CKAN team. If you would spare a moment to stop brow-beating me over this:

This situation showed a clear issue with CKAN workflow when it comes to contributions that can be changed for the better. I've already done my small part in trying to prevent another such error in future, by updating the guide to adding new metadata to warn about just this case and suggest that contributors instead leave that to the particular mod authors. I even used you as an example: https://github.com/KSP-CKAN/CKAN/wiki/Adding-a-mod-to-the-CKAN#before-you-start

On top of that, you've got @politas here saying it won't happen again, and I'm looking-out for it too. We're all human and have to learn from our mistakes. Sorry, but things are going to go wrong, even when we have the best intentions.

1 hour ago, cantab said:

Except that's not what I meant. What I meant was that if a New Better Mod Manager comes up and doesn't immediately and totally replace CKAN, I don't agree with ferram's claim that that would make the NBMM useless.

Fair enough, I misunderstood.

 

47 minutes ago, politas said:

I really like the idea of a CKAN mod that dumps all information about CKAN installed mods into the KSP log. I wish I had the faintest idea where to start in writing one.

I too really like this one. This is an example of where mod authors, who are already familiar with the inner workings of KSP and already have experience with plugins for it, could really help the CKAN team help them.

Just because this is getting far too acrimonious, this little YouTube clip bit is totally relevant to what I just said: 

 

4 minutes ago, Stone Blue said:

And while we differ on opinion, THANK YOU for starting this thread, @phoenix_ca :)

No problem. :) I'm a left-leaning libertarian. If I didn't promote more discussion and try to help people as much as I can come to some sort of reasonable accomodation, I'd be a pretty huge hypocrite. :P 

Edited by phoenix_ca
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