Oh no.. another round of CSD vs SSD debate

I think it would be best to write a good technical deep dive on the matter covering ecosystem needs, but also technical aspects of it.

Because the latest one is not a good write up in that sense and I can only see wanting to cause further harassment as the reason for boosting it.

So please, just stop it you are doing nobody a favor and everybody will just keep hating each other if we continue like this.

@karolherbst it's not harassment to bring up an ecosystem problem... wot

@dotstdy it's not harassment to bring it up, but things around it can lead and cause harassment.

I _wished_ we'd get a technical solid and great article that covers SSD and CSD and explains in detail what's what.

But if the tldr is: SSD is great because I love it and SSD is bad, because gnome sucks and I won't explain any technical reasons, then it's not great.

@karolherbst but they didn't bring it up in any kind of questionable way, it's a pretty straightforward article with a pretty straightforward request. The fact that many other people have also made the same request in the past doesn't make it harassment.

@dotstdy Oh, it's not about the article, but I've seen people with a wide audience boosting it, even though it's not a great article.

I'm not saying it's bad to voice your opinion. Do it. But people will use it to cause harassment against gnome.

@karolherbst also they did bring up the technical problem - apps don't support CSD universally, and libdecor isn't fixing it in practice. What more do you want really?

@dotstdy They didn't cover the technical problems with SSD and it only says "Gnome says SSD is bad, because $weird reasons" even though there are good technical reasons to dislike SSD, but none of that was covered, so it just looks like "gnome is bad, because they don't do the sane thing haha they suck so much."

@dotstdy Anyway, it's totally fine to hate gnome for it, and dislike gnome for not supporting SSD and ask them to implement it as a bystander and user or app developer and and and.

But this will evolve into harassment and I'd rather that it wouldn't, but it's probably too late for it now anyway.

@karolherbst I think you're overly focusing on some notion that there's a deep technical justification that needs to be considered, that forces gnome into this position. But the reality is that it's not really working, and if you consider pointing that out as harassment idk what to say.

@dotstdy Not the point I was making.

I don't know why you get back to the write up being harassment, because I haven't even claimed that...

@karolherbst It's important to focus on outcomes not justifications, especially when doing communication with users, or you end up in these pointless cycles that nobody enjoys.

@dotstdy sure, and this time it will be part of the pointless cycle and not moving anywhere, because I do see many people will boost it in bad faith, not because they want a proper discussion around it, but because they want to coerce gnome into supporting it no matter what.

@karolherbst "either write a good technical article or stop the harassment" implies that the article in question is harassment. Perhaps that wasn't what you meant to say.

@dotstdy mhh yeah, it was more targeted towards the general community and people giving reach to those kind of write ups in bad faith.

So yeah, it's not a reaction towards the article in question, but more to the vibes of the people around it that use it for their own agenda or something.

I should probably rephrase that then...

@dotstdy Also don't want to imply that the write up in itself is bad. It's an opinion and that's valid, but I'd say it doesn't qualify as a good and deep technical analysis of the technical problems with either tech, which I think should be something we really need to have.

I might have seen some of it here and there but I think that's something we'd truly need to actually have a constructive discussion on a technical level on it.

@dotstdy Maybe the current version is better?

@karolherbst I think one big problem is that gnome is a small number of people, and users are a large number of people. There's constantly new users (well, hopefully), and they're constantly running into the same issues and then writing about it. Trying to turn off the tap of user feedback is a fool's errand, even when it's annoying to constantly relitigate issues.

@dotstdy oh for sure. Like users are frustrated about the situation. I get it.

I'm running into related issues myself, but more from a purely user pov. But I also understand a bit about the topic, that I can envision that a good solution could also be something in the middle of the two camps of people.

And I think people with reach and standing in our communities should rather focus on constructive things and not cause more ore deepen the hostility.

@karolherbst the problem is that the current situation is the compromise position. There's no technical reason. Gnome developers have said that they will not implement, support or maintain a fallback. The only way to get native decorations on gnome is by using gtk. That's why libdecor, an external reimplementation that tries to emulate gnome chrome exists. It's hard to compromise any more than that!

@karolherbst idk it's a recurring problem, but when the upstream has said they won't accept anything else, then searching for better technical solutions in case they change their mind seems not to be a fun thing to do.

@dotstdy Okay, but let's look at it from this perspective:

You claim they don't have any technical reasons. Is it because the reasons aren't worthy called "technical" form your PoV? So you are being dismissive towards their technical reasons.

And now you complain how waiting for them to see the light (to agree with you) sucks?

Can you understand how that looks bad as well?

@karolherbst No it's not that at all. I'm literally just saying that their reasons have led them to make statements that it will never be supported. That statement is the problem, not the technical reasons underpinning it. If there were a technical problem, that would be resolvable. e.g. 'we don't want to do it this way'. but the current situation is 'we won't ever support decorations that aren't rendered by gtk', which leaves zero room for change or compromise.

@karolherbst talking about ssd v.s. csd is itself a distraction for the most part anyway, because what people want (as expressed in the article) is just a way to add native decorations to their apps without using gtk, ideally just through wayland apis. whether or not you render them on the 'server' is actually inconsequential to the 'demands' people are making.

@dotstdy yep, that's correct.

And I get people being unhappy about libdecor. But I'm also sure we could do better there.

But what I do know is, that trying to coerce them into anything won't work either. And I've seen a lot of it in other situations.

Like there are enough people hating on gnome, and then people hate on the devs and the devs will be less motivated to deal with any of it out of spite or because being hated on sucks, or....

@karolherbst i tend to look at it slightly differently, as i see their position being a pretty blatant attempt to coerce the rest of the ecosystem into doing something which they think is better. potato potato, though, in terms of outcomes. i don't think the constantly renewing sea of users will change. i do hope the developers do, though i doubt it will happen.

@dotstdy so you are doing both the same and wonder why it's not going anywhere and hope the other side to change, so it can be constructive in the future?

I mean.. sure, that's one approach, but I do think that e.g. a good libdecor is possible and I think focusing on what needs to happen to succeed there would be more constructive than what people are doing atm.

Sure it might not be the most technical "best" solution, but nobody knows what's the best anyway.

@karolherbst my only point is that there's a status quo formed by neither side changing their position. one side is a constantly changing group of users who are annoyed by a concrete outcome which is straightforwardly poor. and the other side is a couple of gnome developers who don't want to support a thing. you seem to be indicating that the former group can be "more constructive" and break the tie. but the current situation is the result of that compromise!

@karolherbst i'm not sure how a bunch of people who have absolutely zero control over what gnome does or does not implement are the ones who would need to adjust? and even if that were your position, that's exactly what has been tried for the last N years, and it's evidentially still not working. so i don't see any progress happening unless the people in control of the situation change, or change their minds.

@dotstdy a bunch of people have control over whether how they talk about gnome is causing harassment or not and I refuse to accept that it isn't the case.

Obviously causing harassment towards gnome devs isn't working. Like duh.

And that's what has been tried and I'm tired of people pretending it's not happening and that it's unrelated to them implementing or not implementing something.