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Amiga News and Community Announcements => Amiga News and Community Announcements => Amiga Software News => Topic started by: ssolie on December 27, 2008, 04:16:40 PM
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Posting 1:
Due to lack of communication, slow development and broken deadlines I am sorry to inform you that the Sputnik bounty has been canceled.
Posting 2:
With the recent announcement that the Sputnik bounty is canceled I feel that it is of great importance we support those browser projects that is actively developed for AmigaOS4. Amigabounty was not created with the intention to focus on existing projects but when we are talking browsers I would like to point you to two (very) active developers that deserves all the praise they can get.
Chris Young is porting the CSS capable browser NetSurf. Visit Unsatisfactory Software (http://www.unsatisfactorysoftware.co.uk/index.php?pg=netsurf) to read more about NetSurf and download the latest release.
Jörg Strohmayer is porting OWB to AmigaOS4 and it can be downloaded from the OWB website (http://strohmayer.org/owb/).
OWB is also CSS capable and based on the well known Webkit rendering engine used by companies such as Nokia, Google and apple.
Both browsers are looking really promising and I hope every AmigaOS4 user remember to thank those doing something for the platform. I am also sure that a donation is more than welcome, take a look at the respective websites to find the donate buttons, or at least keep them in mind for when you get money from the Sputnik bounty returned.
Posting 3:
How to get your money back.
All money from the closed Sputnik bounty will be returned to the people who so kindly donated. I just have to ask that all people who donated send me an email with their name and Paypal address(email).
Many people stated that they wanted to donate their money to other OS4 developers, if you want me to do that (to avoid further paypal fees) remember to say so (and to which project) in your email. I hope many people choose to support the actively developed OS4 applications.
Please send me the email before 31.01.2009 so I can get the money back to all of you (or to other OS4 projects) ASAP. If I haven't received any email by the end of January 2009 I will donate your money to the developers of the OS4 version of either NetSurf or OWB.
Sorry for the trouble this caused.
My email is tersking(a)gmail.com
Source: http://amigabounty.net
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Lack of communication.. didnt Marcik post here (http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?mode=viewtopic&topic_id=27644&forum=32&start=40&viewmode=flat&order=0) just a little while ago giving a statusreport?
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Perhaps it was a lack of communication from him to the guy organising the bounty that was the problem?
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@hooligan
That was after a lot of pushing to give some extra information about the progress.
I think bounties without deadlines are stupid anyway and I hope this has made that clear.
I think the whole bounty for a webbrowser for OS 4 was created because the Firefox one wasn't and isn't going anywhere and at the time it didn't look like anyone was willing to port a browser.
Then suddenly OWB and Netsurf appear which made the whole bounty for Sputnik mostly obsolete.
Since he already had the AmigaOne for a long while and then the lack of status reports didn't really help.
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Ok. I havent been following much as I dont have Amigas or Pegasos anymore.
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Hopefully Marcik didn't waste too much of his time on this port. Anyways my personal opinion is that all bounties for any browser should be united to make one working browser and tie in more developers towards that.
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No surprise here, unfortunately.
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It's a shame because choice is good. On the other hand I personally don't like Sputnik that much. OWB is one of the main reasons I use os4.1 on my SAM a lot more than I use Morphos on my Efika. Once tabs and downloads are added to OWB I think it will be the defacto os4.1 browser. Netsurf is also good and I'm interested to see how that develops.
Cheers,
Rudi.
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I don't understand it...
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?mode=viewtopic&topic_id=27644&forum=32&start=40&viewmode=flat&order=0#469265 (http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?mode=viewtopic&topic_id=27644&forum=32&start=40&viewmode=flat&order=0#469265)
"Posted on 19-Dec-2008 9:37:57
I was asked to post an status update here, so.
Work on sputnik version for OS4 has started about 2-3 months ago. It's already compiling and many important parts are working (like network code, font rendering). The biggest current obstacle is hacking MUI 4 part. I hoped to resolve them before christmas, and as it's the last big problem release some first beta but i failed. And i have 2 news. A good one: i know now how i can get tie my code into older MUI. A bad one: it'll be a rather big redesign and with my current free time it will take about 1-2 more months to complete."
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paypal fees could be avoided by refunding the monies.
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@ALL
If you donated to the Sputnik bounty please read this.
As I will be away all of January I hope many of you decide what I should do with your donation ASAP.
If I haven't got an email on Tuesday it won't be processed until the beginning of February, as I probably won't have internet access where I'm staying in January.
@Weirdami
IIRC refunds can only be made for free within 30 days, we're a bit past that now :-)
Anyway I will be using my own Sputnik donation to pay the fee to transfer money back. So people will only have to pay the fee to transfer to amigabounty, not to get their money back.
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3124.72 EUR
that's a lot of moolah!
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http://www.amiga-news.de/de/news/comments/231797.html (http://www.amiga-news.de/de/news/comments/231797.html)
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http://www.amiga-news.de/de/news/comments/231797.html (http://www.amiga-news.de/de/news/comments/231797.html)
How did the poster of that post know that the guy doing the bounty had read the email he sent on that date? Some sort of AOL type deal?
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@weirdami
Have a look here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-mail_tracking).
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I know that simply because Marcin told me he read it then. Marcin wrote that to me in the last email I got from him.
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Two months for a beta? Two months is lightspeed in Amiga Time. If the user masses can't put up with that, that's their problem.
Now everyone's going to have to wait a month to get their cash back anyway, so why would it have been so intolerable to wait two and see if something tangible appears? Could have saved (or at least postponed) a lot of aggravation.
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Wow, this was extremely ugly. Kicking the legs away after several months of dedicated work, time that could have been spent better working on the MorphOS version. Well, now we know that one should *never* commit to an OS4 bounty, especially not for big and complicated projects with an uncertain time frame.
This is beyond low.
:-(
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@Takemehomegrandma
Kicking legs away after broken deadlines. I know nothing of dedicated work, Marcin should have told me.
I know Marcin said it compiled but didn't run yet but he was never able to show me anything at all. Regarding the complexity.. It is a port from an Amiga like system and as such shouldn't be to hard apart from the MUI4 dependencies, so I really don't know how much work was done so far.
Time frame was not uncertain. Deadlines was agreed upon and there was even a written contract for the hardware which also included a deadline that's been broken.
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@TMHG
Your response makes me wonder if you even read the summary provided here, http://www.amiga-news.de/de/news/comments/231797.html - I think it states quite clearly why it was decided to be withdrawn, and I see nothing wrong in why it was done either.
I don't think it was ugly, or that it should cast any kind of shadow on any future bounty for that matter. I think this all comes down to poor communication from Marcin's side, and for the amount of money I don't think it's unreasonable to expect some kind of working communication. It's OK to not be around, and delays are too. But when it happens, it needs to be communicated..
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@reflect
I was going to say the same thing!
I know that if someone had 3000 euro that i wanted to be mine, i would reply to each and every email! :-)
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there was even a written contract for the hardware which also included a deadline that's been broken.
he was supposed to create some hardware or did he get some free hardware that now needs to be returned?
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Your first problem was that you even enforce deadlines for a project like this in the first place. You can put a deadline on simple and more trivial things like SDL ports, but developing a native web browser!? Maybe it was foolish of Marcin to accept those terms at all in the first place, but it was done under heavy preassure and a lot of nagging as far as I remember. You would have gained so much by letting the deadline slip, but I think most people that follows the online discussions knows and understands the reason why you didn't. Anyway, I see a lot of people cheering at this decision (which only shows how short sighted and ignorant some people really are), but you have let down a great number of people/contributors hoping for a *native* OS4 browser, you have kicked the legs on a developer of a great OS4 project and rendered all his work worthless, and you have clearly showed that OS4 bounties *can* be completely worthless. Anyway, not my loss, not in any way. *You* are the long term losers of this, and you seems to be totally happy with an SDL browser anyway. BTW, what is the deadline for the Amiga Mozilla bounty?
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he was supposed to create some hardware or did he get some free hardware that now needs to be returned?
I sure hopes he sends back the hardware fast as hell, and I'm sure he will. OS4 hardware is utterly worthless to him now...
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hey, it's blue trolling rearing it's ugly head again. :roll:
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hey, it's blue trolling rearing it's ugly head again.
What's your problem? It hurts when I'm right?
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@mihcael
I know that if someone had 3000 euro that i wanted to be mine, i would reply to each and every email!
3000 euros for a job where you have to port source code to alien platform you know nothing about and does not have all functionality. And that you have to go with your studies and have time for your girlfriend... the money does not give you quality time.
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Troels,
as an organizer and manager of the Sputnik bounty project you don't need to advocate or defend your decision here or anywhere else. The right to make the decision was fully yours as it was you who put the energy and reputation into the project. You don't need to explain the details of your decision to anybody. Do NOT let anyone tell you something different or make you feel guilty!
In my opinion your decision was right and logical result of several deadline breaches and lack of communication from the bounty hunter. Cancellation of the bounty was a rational decision and every good manager would do the same (if not sooner).
Good luck with future bounties.
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as an organizer and manager of the Sputnik bounty project you don't need to advocate or defend your decision here or anywhere else. The right to make the decision (without any need to explain the details) was fully yours as it was you who put the energy and reputation into the project
I can't help but think that the people who actually put their money into the project should have been asked what they wanted done, and this doesn't seem to have happened.
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@mongo
They still have time to decide till the end of the January 2009.
I agree that those who don't do that in time should be contacted individually or simply refunded without asking.
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@mongo
You are quite wrong there. A lot of people asked about getting their money back or being able to transfer it to Netsurf or OWB. So in the end it were the people that put the money in the bounty that had a part in the cancellation.
Did you actually read everything posted related to this?
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@takemehomegrandma
Why should his work be worthless?
He could just also continue his work. If he is able to port it to OS 4 and make it stable and support it he will easily get that amount of money in donations.
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You are quite wrong there. A lot of people asked about getting their money back or being able to transfer it to Netsurf or OWB. So in the end it were the people that put the money in the bounty that had a part in the cancellation.
How many is "a lot"? For that matter, how many people donated?
Without providing any numbers, "a lot" doesn't mean anything.
Did you actually read everything posted related to this?
Yes.
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Maybe the people who still want to support the project can send their returned money directly to the developer, or set up another bounty.
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Maybe the people who still want to support the project can send their returned money directly to the developer, or set up another bounty.
utopia
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Quote:
hey, it's blue trolling rearing it's ugly head again.
What's your problem? It hurts when I'm right?
IMHO you are wrong. A guy doing a bounty above $3000 and getting a new computer should understand that he should be able to say more then 'wait another 2 moths for firsts results' after 13 months of work. Especially if he wants to keep the results closed source.
greets,
Staf.
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@takemehomegrandma
Your first problem was that you even enforce deadlines for a project like this in the first place. You can put a deadline on simple and more trivial things like SDL ports, but developing a native web browser!? Maybe it was foolish of Marcin to accept those terms at all in the first place, but it was done under heavy preassure and a lot of nagging as far as I remember. You would have gained so much by letting the deadline slip, but I think most people that follows the online discussions knows and understands the reason why you didn't.
Actually, there is no problem at all. Everyone has to work with deadlines, and this bounty was no different. Nor should it have been. The bounty deadline has already slipped significantly; it should have been done a year ago. Marcin decided to focus on other stuff which he has every right to do. However, he knew that missing the deadline could result in the bounty being cancelled.
Anyway, I see a lot of people cheering at this decision (which only shows how short sighted and ignorant some people really are), but you have let down a great number of people/contributors hoping for a *native* OS4 browser, you have kicked the legs on a developer of a great OS4 project and rendered all his work worthless, and you have clearly showed that OS4 bounties *can* be completely worthless. Anyway, not my loss, not in any way. *You* are the long term losers of this, and you seems to be totally happy with an SDL browser anyway.
You've been told often enough that OWB (and now netsurf) are native browsers, not just "quickie SDL ports" because they don't use SDL at all, but you insist on characterizing them as such. That is ignorance.
BTW, what is the deadline for the Amiga Mozilla bounty?
Perhaps it should have had a deadline. However, that bounty wasn't directed at any specific developer so the situation is different. IIRC, AROS bounties also have a deadline when a developer accepts the task.
Hans
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@mongo
Anyway, not my loss, not in any way. *You* are the long term losers of this, and you seems to be totally happy with an SDL browser anyway.
Troels has already said that a number of contributors asked for their money back, some even publicly. As a contributor myself, I have no problem with the cancellation. In fact, the most vocal people against the cancellation didn't contribute themselves.
It is a bit of a disappointing end to the bounty, but it isn't surprising considering how things went.
Hans