Community opinion polling central thread

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chrisb
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Re: Community opinion polling central thread

Post by chrisb »

pathfinder wrote: Thu Jun 01, 2023 9:10 pm I'm not saying that FreeCAD needs to cater to these new use cases specifically, but if it wants to broaden its user base, it may need to account for new and shifting demands that potential users have. If their demands are not met, they'll go elsewhere and not even contribute to the debate. You'll never know what these groups actually look for.
So what? I see these arguments every once in a while like a holy grale trying to convince the few developers to do everything that some other system has. What is the benefit of broaden the user base and what is the problem if users go elsewhere?
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pathfinder
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Re: Community opinion polling central thread

Post by pathfinder »

chrisb wrote: Fri Jun 02, 2023 12:32 am
So what? I see these arguments every once in a while like a holy grale trying to convince the few developers to do everything that some other system has. What is the benefit of broaden the user base and what is the problem if users go elsewhere?
Well, I must admit that I'm talking for my own benefit here, because I am part of the group of potential users who would love to use FC more, but has a hard time because it is not optimized for what I want to do. Nurbs modelling is probably the biggest one. And the thing is, if I want to stay in open source software, there is no other place for me to go. That's not FCs or the devs problem, but that is my subjective perspective.

I mean, you have a point: with a growing user base, the few devs would have to spread themselves very thin. And in open source development, the devs generally work on what they want, which usually means they work towards solutions for their own use cases. I guess my assumption is that with a growing user base, eventually new devs may come in, but I realize now that this is mainly just that - an assumption - rather than a foregone conclusion.
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Re: Community opinion polling central thread

Post by chrisb »

pathfinder wrote: Fri Jun 02, 2023 5:29 am I guess my assumption is that with a growing user base, eventually new devs may come in,
I had hoped that too, but I I don't really see it happening. So you may consider what Bernd, the originator of FEM workbench did: He was no programmer, but learned it during developing this great workbench.
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Re: Community opinion polling central thread

Post by pathfinder »

That's a fair point.

Although, speaking from my personal perspective here, that feels like standing in front of a mountain with nothing but a spoon.
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Re: Community opinion polling central thread

Post by chrisb »

pathfinder wrote: Fri Jun 02, 2023 7:22 am Although, speaking from my personal perspective here, that feels like standing in front of a mountain with nothing but a spoon.
Consider it a mountain of chocolate or whatever you like and start :) !
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sliptonic
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Re: Community opinion polling central thread

Post by sliptonic »

chrisb wrote: Fri Jun 02, 2023 6:47 am
pathfinder wrote: Fri Jun 02, 2023 5:29 am I guess my assumption is that with a growing user base, eventually new devs may come in,
I had hoped that too, but I I don't really see it happening. So you may consider what Bernd, the originator of FEM workbench did: He was no programmer, but learned it during developing this great workbench.
Pretty much my experience with Path as well. I wasn't (still not) a very strong programmer. Yorik encouraged me and told me to do it anyway. He told me that since it's open source I was free to do it wrong and someone will come along and make it better! It was good advice.

It is, however, not the only way to make a huge difference. The real hard work that developers do isn't coding. It's figuring out what needs to be done. Start a new issue like "Problem: User can't do XXXX with Nurbs" Treat the issue like a research paper and not a wish list. Do the competitive analysis. Really dig into what it would take to make FreeCAD Nurbs modeling good. If it takes you five minutes to write the issue, you're doing it wrong. You need to take the research burden off the developer so they can focus on the solution. If the issue is good, it will naturally draw attention. A good issue (one where the only thing left to figure out is the code) is catnip for developers. Find other related issues in the tracker and link to them. Build them into a Github project so the issues are seen in a bigger context. This is hard thankless work but it needs to be done. Once the conversation starts, stay involved. Help make decisions and clarify the complexity.
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Re: Community opinion polling central thread

Post by pathfinder »

sliptonic wrote: Fri Jun 02, 2023 11:48 am
It is, however, not the only way to make a huge difference. The real hard work that developers do isn't coding. It's figuring out what needs to be done.
That looks more up my alley. Gotta see when I find time to actually look into it, but I will eventually.
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Re: Community opinion polling central thread

Post by adrianinsaval »

chrisb wrote: Fri Jun 02, 2023 12:32 am So what? I see these arguments every once in a while like a holy grale trying to convince the few developers to do everything that some other system has. What is the benefit of broaden the user base and what is the problem if users go elsewhere?
There are many many benefits, more feedback (which can be very useful after filtering the junk), more donations, more collaborators, industry acceptance (which entails job opportunities for FreeCAD experts and availability of services that accept FreeCAD files), the latter also entails more donations or direct hire of devs to work on FreeCAD as companies start using FreeCAD.

IMO you are being shortsighted if you don't see the benefit of growing the user base, this is of course not something that you will immediately see but that does happen. Before the FPA existed many also used this type of arguments against the creation of an org saying that it was myth that it would increase donations, well I think those people have been proven wrong! And it's just a matter of time before the anti userbase growth are proven wrong too IMO.

And of course there's the other side of it, if something is made more intuitive such that new users would be able to use it without much problem then experienced users will likely benefit from a smoother workflow or at the very least would also be able to quickly adapt to an intuitive workflow. Of course there is balance to be struck but it is correct to hold first time user experience in high regard.
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Re: Community opinion polling central thread

Post by chrisb »

Poll about enabling automatic horizontal/vertical tool in Sketcher: viewtopic.php?t=83055
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