Free addons accessibility

[Ozzy47]

IMO, developers should be required to submit their free addons on XF for download. Users should not be forced to go off site to obtain free products.

This would also help vet addons as more users have easy access to them, rather than going to site XYZ, registering, liking, making XX post and all of this on a site in a language they do on speak.

The more people with access to the addons, the more eyes on the code.

 

[Ozzy47]

And for the developers, this would help you as well. The more people that run your free addons, means a much larger customer pool for your premium addons.

 

[Kirby]

IMHO, its' a two-edged sword.
From an Admin/User perspective I fully agree that external websites are a PITA and I'd highly appreciate if all Add-ons were directly available from RM.

But as a developer on the other hand I do not like restrictions. If I want to release smth, I like to release where and how I want it to be released.

Diversity is a good thing and I appreciate any release, even if the Add-on is unmainted, bugged or whatever.
I always feel a bit sad when Add-ons are removed by XF housekeeping, luckily sometimes those are stil available from other sources (GitHub, etc.)
If they were only available from RM they would be gone for good in those cases (which, for end users, in most cases is a good thing though).

 

[Dadparvar]

I always feel a bit sad when Add-ons are removed by XF housekeeping

They don't remove illogically. I have add-ons in RM here, that I haven't updated them for a long time. No updates, no post on their discussion thread, and some even no interaction whatsoever. But I'm almost always (if not always) around and if someone asks something, I'll reply. That means I haven't forbidden those add-ons and I have eyes on them, even if I'm quiet. (so my add-ons are all there, none deleted, and none even marked as unmaintained by staff)
But yeah I had a free add-on long time ago (is removed by myself) that had a direct DB query and Mike I remember posted in its discussion thread and asked me to fix it, and I immediately removed the add-on so that no more person downloads it. and yeah they were completely right about the critical issue in that add-on)

also, I saw cases which staff undeleted the auto-deleted forbidden resources (recent one: ArrowChat)

So, so far, everything looks pretty much logical and acceptable.

 

[DragonByte Tech]

Bias disclaimer: I'm someone who hosts their free add-ons on their own site rather than hosting them in the RM.


In my opinion, this would hurt developers who sell premium add-ons on their site, for a number of reasons.

1. Discoverability of premium add-ons to go along with free add-ons is always going to be better on the developer's own site, since it takes fewer clicks to see "what else do they offer on this site that I might need".

2. Less opportunities to market new products. Being signed up on a developer's site means (email preferences notwithstanding) you receive emails about sales and/or new products.

3. Fewer statistics available for the developer. By being able to track downloads more accurately, developers can gauge which add-ons are popular and which platforms are popular (for those that ask users to list their forum platform as well).


It would also be an inconvenience:

4. Uploading a resource both to our own websites AND to the resource manager is an added time-sink, vs if the add-on is hosted entirely @ our own websites (the download URL doesn't need updating with every release). Since the XFRM API Keys are not forthcoming, this would make it take even longer to do add-on releases, especially in bulk.


It would also not fit certain business models:

5. Regardless of how you feel about branding, the fact is that my free add-ons do contain branding. By making them work nearly identical to paid add-ons, where the user must add them to cart and checkout - albeit not with payment information obviously - before it's available in their license area, we are able to offer the ability to purchase branding removal that works without any additional action (such as manually editing files to remove branding).
It would be impossible to offer an elegant Branding Free solution for free products if everyone downloads the exact same copy of the product.


Furthermore, I want to address this separately:

The more people that run your free admins, means a much larger customer pool for your premium addons.

Yes, but with downsides. It is of course true that the more people become aware of a developer, the larger the chance they sell some premium add-ons too, but what's not being taken into consideration is the cost of support. Very few, if any developer here changes separately for support (e.g. all add-ons are downloadable for free but if you want any support you have to pay) as far as I know.

If you have a thousand people using your free mod, that's potentially a thousand people who have questions about how to use the mod, about compatibility with other mods (and there's a very large amount of possible combinations of mods that could produce an issue), etc. Even if 0% of support tickets were bug reports, it's still possible that a not insignificant amount of time would be taken up by support tickets.

Now scale that up to 5 or maybe 10 free mods. Suddenly, the amount of time spent providing support for free add-ons becomes a bigger and bigger part of your total amount of work hours.

Not providing adequate support for free add-ons is not an option, because if someone's only experience with support is "no reply until a lot of nagging" then they have no reason to believe that support for that developer's premium add-ons is going to be any better.

For this reason, I believe that the added barrier to entry is in some cases a boon to the developer, rather than a detriment.


Lastly, with regards to this:

rather than going to site XYZ, registering, likening, making XX post and all of this on a site in a language they do on speak.

I don't know of a single developer who requires "like the first post" and "you need at least X posts to download".

I do know that piracy sites require this, though...

Honestly, if someone is willing to register to a piracy site and like the first post and post 5 posts just to download a free mod they could have gotten in 1/10ths of that time from my site, then I have absolutely no sympathy for this user if they were to complain "this resource should be in the XFRM not on the developer's site!"

 

[Ozzy47]

In my opinion, this would hurt developers who sell premium add-ons on their site, for a number of reasons.

Care to explain how this hurt you while releasing addons in vB?

 

[Ozzy47]

don't know of a single developer who requires "like the first post" and "you need at least X posts to download".

Oddly enough, one of the developers that liked your post. ,

• For the download like the resource and Reply the discussion

You can see the addon here, https://xenforo.com/community/resources/cc-t-copy-code.6570/

 

[DragonByte Tech]

Care to explain how this hurt you while releasing addons in vB?

Not having an option to do otherwise is not valid counter-argument. As far as I am aware, there was a requirement to attach the add-on itself, and paid listings were only allowed if a free Lite version was attached, without any "time-bomb" code in it.

Totally different environment, so we may want to limit ourselves to comparing apples with apples for the purposes of this discussion

Since the option exists here at the time of writing, all of the benefits mentioned in my post are currently conferred to developers who choose to do this.

Oddly enough, one of the developers that liked your post.

I would posit that this is the exception, rather than the rule. If the majority of developers chose to do this, I would certainly be more sympathetic towards the viewpoints in the OP.

 

[Ozzy47]

Tiptoe through the tulips.

 

[CRUEL-MODZ]

Hello,
actually, I'm just asking for an answer and a like on the resource on my forum, it's not huge, I understand that you may not like it, but I don't share other people's addons, I only share mine ! it's just a reward, to develop it's not an extraordinary addon, we're very far from it, it's just a little JS, but, I share more, because I share it under another name @XenSoluce, and I join it is about: @DragonByte Tech !

 

[jul]

Sure it is easier for the end user for free add-ons to be available on the Xenforo resources.

But in the end it's a free add-on... Free...

If all a developer is asking a few minutes of your time to register and check out their website with probably other add-ons then why complain.
Instead of them selling the add-on for money they sell it for a registered account and a few minutes of your time.

They spend alot of time developing something so you can use it for free. All they ask in return are a few minutes... C'mon.

Remember, you aren't forced to do anything you don't want. Meaning, don't want to register then don't...

Would it be better for they sell it for like $0.01?

Please don't limit developers.

 

[frm]

I think one word can end this debate: WordPress, launching 7 years prior to XF, but 3 after vB.

I don't know what came first in terms of 3rd party addons as I hopped on vB4 (2010, a year before XF) when they were offered on 3rd party sites as well.

Which came first in the realm of addons being on 3rd party sites? It's hard to tell with WordPress as you have 1 click CRAP install plugins and themes.

I must have 20+ logins for paid WordPress plugins and themes (and new framework with themes) that truly made it a beast, both performance wise and SEO wise, without slowing it down like A LOT of, I'd say, unregulated 1 click install stuff.

It's the world we live in.

Create an account and download XF add ons or styles.

Follow the threads of the ones you download on here so you're aware of updates and either wait it out for conflict reports or deploy on your own test environment prior to going live.

It's really not a huge issue.

 

[bzcomputers]

I'd rather pay a few dollars for what is currently a "free" add-on just to have it downloadable here and all discussion on the add-on occur here (@ Xenforo.com) in one place.

I'm currently only using around 10 add-ons and right now that has required at least 6 different accounts on 6 different forums. Then if I post an issue/bug/question about the app here at xenforo.com numerous developers also want it posted on their own website in order to get assistance. Why is this necessary? ...the answer is it isn't. A discussion can be EASILY monitored/watched here on Xenforo.com. Requiring a user to also post somewhere else is either just trying to boost posts on one's own forum or being too lazy not to click the "watch" discussion button here. Hey, we all want posts on our sites, but trying to scrounge for a few by requiring other admins to duplicate bug reports is ridiculous - and this definitely happens.

The most help an admin is going to get on any add-on for XenForo is going to get is RIGHT HERE on XenForo.com. I would say most issues/questions posted by admins are answered and commented on by other random admins and not the original add-on developer to begin with. Yes, some developers are quite active and very helpful but that is not always the case. Just the quantity of experienced admins transversing this site daily makes it much more useful to post and discuss all add-ons here.

Is there a perfect solution?
Should I just say "It's free, stop complaining!"

Obviously not ...(see complaint above)

 

[Max Taxable]

I'd rather pay a few dollars for what is currently a "free" add-on just to have it downloadable here and all discussion on the add-on occur here (@ Xenforo.com) in one place.

I'm currently only using around 10 add-ons and right now that has required at least 6 different accounts on 6 different forums. Then if I post an issue/bug/question about the app here at xenforo.com numerous developers also want it posted on their own website in order to get assistance. Why is this necessary? ...the answer is it isn't. A discussion can be EASILY monitored/watched here on Xenforo.com. Requiring a user to also post somewhere else is either just trying to boost posts on one's own forum or being too lazy not to click the "watch" discussion button here. Hey, we all want posts on our sites, but trying to scrounge for a few by requiring other admins to duplicate bug reports is ridiculous - and this definitely happens.

The most help an admin is going to get on any add-on for XenForo is going to get is RIGHT HERE on XenForo.com. I would say most issues/questions posted by admins are answered and commented on by other random admins and not the original add-on developer to begin with. Yes, some developers are quite active and very helpful but that is not always the case. Just the quantity of experienced admins transversing this site daily makes it much more useful to post and discuss all add-ons here.

Is there a perfect solution?
Should I just say "It's free, stop complaining!"

Obviously not ...(see complaint above)

I've avoided "free" addons many times if they're not downloadable here at xf dot com. I resist registering at any 3rd party site as a requirement to get the "free" addon. To get the "free" addon I must register, give an email address and a password. I reject that. More people should.

But more to the point of the OP... This idea of not only joining the 3rd party addon site to get the "free" addon - but also be required to "like" the addon thread there and also give a review of it on the 3rd party site BEFORE being allowed to download the addon is beyond the pale. It smacks of astroturfing. I'm not doing it and neither should anyone else.

We've already seen one dev get busted for requiring a 5 star review in order to then give updates.... This type of astroturfing is less than ethical and should be resisted at all times.

 

[AnzahTools]

@bzcomputers I can only take us as an example:
So I only moved our add-ons to my own website because I can work there better with feedback.
I can use the posts directly as a todo list to see if there are still open jobs and can record work steps.

@jul has it already said a registration needs only a few seconds and passwords do not have to be remembered in the 21 century because there are password databases.

I can already understand the desire for centralization, but it requires a much more complex system than the resource manager.

 

[DragonByte Tech]

Then if I post an issue/bug/question about the app here at xenforo.com numerous developers also want it posted on their own website in order to get assistance. Why is this necessary? ...the answer is it isn't. A discussion can be EASILY monitored/watched here on Xenforo.com. Requiring a user to also post somewhere else is either just trying to boost posts on one's own forum or being too lazy not to click the "watch" discussion button here.

I'm sorry, but this is not true AT ALL. Resource threads here can EASILY get flooded to the point where stuff is missed, and yes that does include us clicking the "Watch" button.

While I agree with you that an effort should be made to provide support in the threads here @ this site, unless you are a developer yourself that has to deal with half a dozen or more threads, I find it baffling that you can make such bold claims about what is easy and what isn't.

Let me give you a scenario:
I wake up first thing in the morning. Being the greasy nerd that I am, I reach for my phone and refresh XenForo.com. I see I have a reply to one of my add-on threads.

Uh oh, someone is reporting they received a server error, and it looks like a legitimate bug too.

That alert about someone replying to my thread is never coming back as unread, so I now have no choice but to keep the thread open on my phone and use iCloud Tabs to open it up on my laptop when I pull it up and start work proper.

Contrast that with a ticket @ my site, where I have a block like this:


Same scenario; I wake up and refresh my site, see a new thread, server error, legitimate bug.

This thread that I just read will stay in that block until I flag the ticket as "Answered", and if I need to look at it on my actual computer vs just being able to answer a "how do I" question on my phone, it will still be there to remind me.

I can hear you thinking "THE EASY SOLUTION IS JUST TO NOT CHECK IT ON YOUR PHONE THEN", which is the same as saying "even if there's a chance you can help this person sooner, you should force them to wait for a few hours until you start work".
Alternatively, what if I'm away from the computer, but have a few minutes to check support tickets (on public transport or just sitting at a bench outside the shop or whatever)?
Or if I've already shut down the computer for the night, and I'm just doing a once-over right before bed?

In short, by making these false statements about how easy it is to deal with support queries @ this site - in spite of having seemingly no experience doing so - you're effectively saying that you want support to be slower.

If you had a simple "how do I" question, would you prefer having to wait for several hours for an answer because the developer knows they are hecking themselves over by checking their phone? I'm sure every developer would appreciate it if 100% of their customers came together and said "please be slower in helping me just in case someone posts a complex issue".

I somehow doubt that's going to happen, though

Hey, we all want posts on our sites, but trying to scrounge for a few by requiring other admins to duplicate bug reports is ridiculous - and this definitely happens.

This is an utterly ridiculous statement. Developers who run commercial sites care less than zero about the number of posts on their site. It's frankly insulting that you claim developers may ask certain users to open a ticket @ their site in order to boost post count.

Ask any major developer what they wish XF would implement for resources @ this site, and they'll tell you "a support ticket system". But that's just us being lazy or "wanting to scrounge up a few posts for our sites".

Please.

While I sympathise with the hassle of having multiple accounts across multiple sites, I'm sure you could think of a supporting argument that doesn't involve insulting developers.

 

[AnzahTools]

While I sympathise with the hassle of having multiple accounts across multiple sites

This could be improved with a Single Sign On solution but also this can/will bring many problems with it again.

 

[Robust]

While I agree with you that an effort should be made to provide support in the threads here @ this site, unless you are a developer yourself that has to deal with half a dozen or more threads, I find it baffling that you can make such bold claims about what is easy and what isn't.

I don't provide support here at all. I can't manage so many support channels efficiently. I've found the best quality support with the best response time was provided when people actually used my system. It doesn't require login, simply filling out a form or sending an email which just feeds into Zendesk.

The resource threads on here are not adequate for providing quick and quality support. They're not even designed for it. Bug reports, suggestions, help, all crammed into one thread, and half of that only helps unlicensed users with it being public. If log files or data are required it has to be taken into private messages anyway. Conversations also a bit inefficient.

 

[bzcomputers]

I'm sorry, but this is not true AT ALL. Resource threads here can EASILY get flooded to the point where stuff is missed, and yes that does include us clicking the "Watch" button.

While I agree with you that an effort should be made to provide support in the threads here @ this site, unless you are a developer yourself that has to deal with half a dozen or more threads, I find it baffling that you can make such bold claims about what is easy and what isn't.

Let me give you a scenario:
I wake up first thing in the morning. Being the greasy nerd that I am, I reach for my phone and refresh XenForo.com. I see I have a reply to one of my add-on threads.

Uh oh, someone is reporting they received a server error, and it looks like a legitimate bug too.

That alert about someone replying to my thread is never coming back as unread, so I now have no choice but to keep the thread open on my phone and use iCloud Tabs to open it up on my laptop when I pull it up and start work proper.

Contrast that with a ticket @ my site, where I have a block like this:
View attachment 207168

Same scenario; I wake up and refresh my site, see a new thread, server error, legitimate bug.

This thread that I just read will stay in that block until I flag the ticket as "Answered", and if I need to look at it on my actual computer vs just being able to answer a "how do I" question on my phone, it will still be there to remind me.

I can hear you thinking "THE EASY SOLUTION IS JUST TO NOT CHECK IT ON YOUR PHONE THEN", which is the same as saying "even if there's a chance you can help this person sooner, you should force them to wait for a few hours until you start work".
Alternatively, what if I'm away from the computer, but have a few minutes to check support tickets (on public transport or just sitting at a bench outside the shop or whatever)?
Or if I've already shut down the computer for the night, and I'm just doing a once-over right before bed?

In short, by making these false statements about how easy it is to deal with support queries @ this site - in spite of having seemingly no experience doing so - you're effectively saying that you want support to be slower.

If you had a simple "how do I" question, would you prefer having to wait for several hours for an answer because the developer knows they are hecking themselves over by checking their phone? I'm sure every developer would appreciate it if 100% of their customers came together and said "please be slower in helping me just in case someone posts a complex issue".

I somehow doubt that's going to happen, though


This is an utterly ridiculous statement. Developers who run commercial sites care less than zero about the number of posts on their site. It's frankly insulting that you claim developers may ask certain users to open a ticket @ their site in order to boost post count.

Ask any major developer what they wish XF would implement for resources @ this site, and they'll tell you "a support ticket system". But that's just us being lazy or "wanting to scrounge up a few posts for our sites".

Please.

While I sympathise with the hassle of having multiple accounts across multiple sites, I'm sure you could think of a supporting argument that doesn't involve insulting developers.

Let me first say, I do appreciate you taking the time and writing this out. I did read it through carefully (twice).

I just want to first say that my post above you were quoting was specifically in reference to to the topic at hand of free add-ons and non-commercial developers.

Second, I can understand commercial developers, or even non-commercial developers, with multiple add-ons finding the current single discussion thread per add-on difficult to keep up with because at times they do get flooded with chatter when what developers really need to get to are the reported issues, possible bugs and any genuine suggestions for additional features.

This is why I said "Is there a perfect solution?" to bringing it all back here to one place. Making it easier for the user and the developer.

Why can't each add-on have a "general discussion thread", a separate "bug reports thread / or ticketing system", and a separate "suggestions thread". If it works for the XenForo software itself quite well, seems like taking a working solution and applying to add-ons also would be beneficial to everyone.

 

[Chris D]

Just to make clear where we are at with this; we have no plans to restrict the options available for the resource types which are offered. Especially that some people may have a use case where they want to "up-sell" a free version to a branding free version or premium support or whatever.

From the point of view of viewing code, if you are keen to review the code of a free add-on not hosted here, you are still free to, and if that is something that you wish to do then I do not feel that having to register for free on another site should be a barrier for that.

On the subject of code reviews, we still have things afoot:

Plans are afoot and we'll have more to report in the future.