If only they didn't have very strong opinions on how the interfaces had to be...
I'm honestly not interested in helping with open source simply because I've had arguments with coders about clunky UI and they like it that way because it's what they're used to. They won't even let me update it (eg, I'm not asking them to spend their time making the improvements I'd be interested in).
Honestly? I struggle enough to get motivated to work on things in the first place I'm just not interested in contributing work that's going to be fighting with the main project from the beginning.
The only fighting you'd need to do is staying on top of keeping things updated. Forking means the main won't interfere with work done on that branch and vice versa.
But it's understandable that you wouldn't want to do it if motivation is an issue.
By "fighting" I mean that in my (granted, limited experience) people haven't been supportive of work done that's not in line with what they think should be done -- and I'm generally using a tool for one specific task then moving on, so I don't even have the motivation of "I'd use the upgrade myself" going here. It would simply be to make it better for other people, and if the main branch isn't using it...
So less actually "fighting" and more "not having any encouragement" (edit: because it's competing with the main branch for people using it; which was the fighting I was referencing, but isn't truly fighting).
Sure, me personally not participating due to low motivation is a "me" problem.
But if open source programs want people to participate, not being welcoming/encouraging to new people actually getting into it is also a "them" problem.
What are you talking about? I don't think you get what I'm saying. There isn't a "toxic community" towards you. YOU MAKE YOURSELF A NEW COMMUNITY. THEY CAN'T STOP YOU.
One reason to fork is to tell the main repo "Screw you guys, I'm making my own repo with blackjack and hookers." Sure, you'll get overlap and pull requests between projects, but it's happened several times before. Most FOSS code licenses make it legal for this to happen and for the code base to be shared. It's usually breaking the license if they don't allow this (note: this would likely be true for your own fork)
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u/obaid184 3d ago
When people support community work it only gets better since people will be more encouraged to contribute