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I kind of agree with the Reddit post. Like how hard is it to just provide a simple download button? Obviously if it's an open source project and still in development there's not a lot of utility in doing that, but there are situations where there will be a plug-in for a program and it's been distributed via github.
And it's got a terrible UI, I can never remember where the download zip button is, because it's not obvious.
Because making proper executables working on all machines is just extra maintenance work. They probably just wanted to code something and share it to the world without that extra headache.
Unless you're running it very low level code no it's not.
If it's anything that is in c++ or java You're basically making me copy paste your code into a compiler and then pressing compile the end result will be identical to the one you would have given me.
It’s not if you want to compile for Windows, Linux and Mac at the same time, with x86, x64 and ARM support. Cross compiling can often be a big annoyance to set up.
And this is a Python project. Making stand alone executables for Python projects is rare.
GitHub public repositories get free build runners for all of those except ARM and aren't that hard to set up (for compiled languages of course).
Github is not a software distribution platform, it was never meant to be one. It's a developer platform for code distribution and collaboration. And UI is designed around that.
A lot of projects use it as a distribution platform, but they're wrong - it's always better to have a web page with simple download button for casual "ordinary" people.
But, this case is special: this mostly harmless tool is designed and almost exclusively used to stalk / doxx / hack people =|. So, it's not in developers interest to make it widely available and easy to install.
You're full of contradictions. "It's not a distribution platform it's another kind of distribution platform." Nevermind the fact that it has a "releases" feature designed to provide a somewhat easy way to distribute software however the dev wants to use it.
Then "it's a mostly harmless script designed to commit crimes." Do you know what harmless means?
Sorry, I meant to write that Github is not a software distribution, but a code distribution platform.
And 'mostly harmless' as in it's not inherently malicious - you can use it for harmless stuff. It's merely a tool.
Also I don't really follow how it makes sense that the UI should be bad if they only meant for it to be used with code. Developers are humans too, and the GitHub UI is not great. I use it all the time and still get confused by some of the dumb UI decisions they have made.
Not having a download button being front and center has never been one of them.
Well software is code.
And you did say 'designed' re: the Sherlock script
You are arguing with elitism, it will never go anywhere and they will never feel ashamed.
Honestly, 99% of the reason the world is still locked in closed source software ecosystems is that fucking elitist rectal-cranial inversionist devs that want to make it as hard as possible for a non-dev to use their tools.
'You aren't entitled to an easy install' is the mantra they whisper in their hearts as they push code.
What? It's python code, not in a binary, and you're complaining about things being closed source?
Also if you want it compiled and provided to you, feel free to pay someone to provide that service.
The only barrier here is not wanting to pay AND not wanting to learn or read instructions.
Life is going to be pretty tricky with that mentality.
^This attitude is exactly what crippled open source, good job playing into Apple and Microshit's hands.
The more effort a user has to put in to use a tool, especially when other, easier and functional tools exist, the less likely that user is going to adopt that tool as part of their daily use.
The only barrier here is not wanting to pay AND not wanting to learn or read instructions.
This is a false dichotomy, there are plenty of free and good open source tools that don't need 20 hours of manual plundering to install.
The Gimp is a great example of this, super easy to install right out the box for even non-technical people, is open source, doesn't cost a cent.
The simple truth is devs that share your attitude are too lazy to complete their projects so they get it to 80% and expect the end user to finish the rest.
Do you think that is winning you any adherents? But please, keep proving my claims of linux elitism so blatantly, it makes my job so much easier.
You don't know what you're talking about, simple as.
This is a python tool. It will never be compiled for you. Ever. It's literally not compiled. Get over it.
This post was perfectly made to trigger all the morons who don't know the first thing about coding... getting upset you're looking at source code... in a repository...
If you're upset at seeing source code, GET THE FUCK OUT OF THE REPO!!
Listen son, I was coding and compiling C++ for MUDs back in the early 90s and some of my python code is still being used back at my university and I graduated before smartphones.
Your assumption of incompetence is just another symptom of the elitist rot that small minded devs constantly wear.
I was coding and compiling C++ for MUDs back in the early 90s and some of my python code is still being used back at my university and I graduated before smartphones.
Oh I get it now, you're just an old fart with outdated knowledge who can't be bothered to keep up with "all this dag nabbit fancy tech, back in MY day" blah blah blah, go back to yelling at the cloud
That's not how getting older works. At all. Especially in tech.
You know one of the funniest things about people insulting me over my age? If everything goes well for you, you'll be here one day too. And it's going to be a lot sooner than you think.
And then you can have Gen Beta insult you for being an old fogie tied to the tablet ecosystem when brain interfaces are the norm.
I hope you remember this moment when it happens to you, but you likely won't.
You're right, tech moves fast and requires continuous learning, but you can still learn as you get older. However, it's quite clear from your comments in this entire thread, that you have not.
You do not want to learn new things and lash out when people point this out or provide you software that might require you to learn something to deploy it expecting every project out there to be point and click and ready to go.
Have you even contributed to an open source project? At all? Do you know what goes into maintaining these projects? "30 years in IT" doesn't mean shit, that could easily be 30 years in hell desk or 30 years in IT "middle management"
The more effort a user has to put in to use a tool, especially when other, easier and functional tools exist, the less likely that user is going to adopt that tool as part of their daily use.
The catch here is that oftentimes, for the use cases that people get elitist about, there are no other, easier, or functional tools, which is part of why it's so frustrating to encounter elitist mindsets around this stuff. I don't even really particularly care about not having .exes or what have you, or having to compile a python script, right, I mostly just kind of find it frustrating when documentation for these kinds of projects is extremely lacking and unclear as to what you're supposed to do. Shit takes 3 minutes on the dev's side, to curb like 20 or so more questions clogging up issue reporting and, realistically, what should be the avenues of contact you're gonna want to be using for bug reports. It's literally worse for the dev not to at the very least make the documentation a little better than it usually is. Sometimes that scales up to even be, it would be better for the dev to actually make an exe because that would be more idiot proof, and they would also get less shitty complaints.
Basically the argument I'm making is that many devs kind of encounter a deadlock where they get really frustrated at giving out something for free, then encountering complaints about inaccessibility, and then they start fighting ghosts when people ask them questions in lacking documentation. Most of these cases, if they'd put in slightly more effort from the start, they would've solved themselves a more massive headache in the long run. Lots of these, you don't even really have to put in a ton of extra effort, such is the upside of open source, you can just solve the documentation afterwards when someone comes in with a question the first time and then you take that feedback and actually append it to your documentation instead of just getting frustrated that everyone else is too stupid.
I'm glad to finally see someone in this thread talking rationally about this. Thank you.
many devs kind of encounter a deadlock where they get really frustrated at giving out something for free,
I get that, the world is expensive, but being profit motivated does not align with the open source ethos. I have no problems with devs choosing to go closed source and charging for their products, but 90% of open source projects never get to the point of being solid enough to be a paid product regarding ease of install and use.
I think it's less that they want to be paid, and more that they just are doing something that they think is kind of like, an altruistic act (and it is, probably, as long as they're not maybe encouraging stagnation or inhabiting the space so that another dev won't take a crack at it). So it's frustrating to be doing this altruistic, somewhat thankless act, and then get bitched at for it, even if you're getting bitched at because of your own stupidity, or lack of forethought, or insular presumption that everyone else knows how to do what you do. I empathize with them, and I see their problem, but I also understand why people are bitching, instead of just being like "the people who are bitching suck and are wrong" how people tend to do, which just leads to a positive feedback loop where everyone is constantly pissed off.
Look I did helpdesk for a decade, I know for a fact what it feels like to be bitched at by people that you try to help. What I'm saying is that open source projects need big teams and people who know how to organize them, and there should be a foundation with the sole purpose of rounding up donations to fund those teams working on worthwhile projects.
And if some exist now point me in their direction and I will gladly donate.
If It takes me less than 10 mins to install their software.
I don't disagree with any of that, and I don't find it at all to be, generally, disagreeable, I don't think many would really disagree with that. I would maybe have some thoughts on the efficacy of different types of organizations, like, do we run this as a no-profit, or as a co-op that kind of absorbs multiple different open source projects into itself? I could see it working for sure, to the point where something like that has to exist I would think, but implementation details would make or break the motherfucker for sure. Also interesting would be how you figure out which projects to fund, compared to which you don't really give a shit about.
I was saying more, that I think the people who are disagreeing with you, are disagreeing from the perspective that everyone who makes demands of devs are entitled, especially when the devs are free. I don't really agree with that position necessarily, I was just trying to spell out that I think that's their position, more than that they necessarily disagree that open source should be, basically along your idea, better than it is. Better organized, more centralized, more easily funded, I don't think they're disagreeing with that, I just think they're more doing that kind of basic redditor shit where they want to argue who's at fault more, instead of recognizing the external circumstances which brought about the problem.
This is not a standard tool. This is an offensive security (aka hacking tool).
The hacking community does not want people like the one in the post.
All of this still applies to any open source project
There is one core difference. In regular open source projects, lack of layman accessibility is considered a bug.
For offensive security tools such as in OP's post, it simply isn't a consideration because the audience for these tools are not laymen, therefore they aren't designed with laymen in mind.
In fact there's something of an incentive to keep laymen out because people just hitting random buttons without serious consideration of what they are doing can land people in jail.
They're designed with the offensive security community in mind, of which even the most rookie members think nothing of firing up terminal and entering some nifty commands.
I'm talking more open source in general and scraping tools aren't 'hacking'.
Sherlock is an Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) tool. It is specifically made to gather information on a target, which is always step 1 of an attack.
We can agree to disagree on whether it constitutes an attack tool, however it is clearly made with red teamers in mind.
So I guess ping is a hacking tool now too huh?
There isn't a fuckdamn single drop of intellectual honesty in any of these comments.
So I guess ping is a hacking tool now too huh?
Does ping have the potential to lead you almost directly to a potential attack path? Because Sherlock can.
There isn’t a fuckdamn single drop of intellectual honesty in any of these comments.
Well what the fuck would I know? I've only been a pentester/red teamer for 8 fucking years.
Hey, wanna know what's by far the most useful tool in a red teamer/attacker's arsenal?
A fucking notepad!
Because the process isn't about tapping a few fucking buttons and you've hacked into the mainframe. You gather information. You make links. You poke and prod at stuff. You try to keep a low profile while you also try to figure out where your objective is. Then, and only then, you make a final plan and go for the objective.
The Gimp is a great example of this, super easy to install right out the box for even non-technical people, is open source, doesn't cost a cent.
No, it's not, GIMP has funding, resources and a fucking company behind it lmao and on top of that it's intended to be an end-user tool
Not all open source projects are the same, many are just things people work on in their free time and are kind enough to share, many aren't intended (like this one) for end users at all. They're meant for people who know what they're doing (which it's quite evident you don't)
If you want to know who is actually harming the open source community look in a mirror, it's people like you who whine and bitch about "Meah InstAllers MeH uSEr ExpErIenCe" that makes devs not want to contribute
No, it’s not, GIMP has funding,
That contradicts zero statements I have made, it is still super easy to install, doesn't cost the user a cent, and is open source.
Maybe the world would be a better place of more open source projects had funding.
that makes devs not want to contribute
If money is so important to them then maybe they should choose not to be open source devs?
If you cannot adhere to the philosophy then don't complain when people call you out on it.
it’s people like you
It's people like me that have chosen not to go the open source route due to the difficulty, that is our choice and is the worldwide average choice as hardly anyone ever bothers to deal with all the byzantine bullshit that arrogant elitists like yourself are just giddy over expressing.
Open Source has failed its original goals due to elitist devs putting up artificial hurdles to general adoption, you don't get to complain about adoption if you actively narrow your market segment to people who have the time and experience to fix your broken shit before they use it.
Lmao, just because something is open source doesn't mean the devs are expecting a return. You talk about market segments, adoption rates and funding like that's the only goal someone has for sharing their project
You expect someone who put something on GitHub, for free, for everyone, worked on with their spare time because they had a passion for it to have it 100% ready to ship to production complete with an installer and a GUI? Nah, you're the elitist asshole, you should order more than one mirror.
That contradicts zero statements I have made, it is still super easy to install, doesn't cost the user a cent, and is open source
Yes it does, they have the funding and resources to pay someone to handle the easy installer and user experience, they have teams of people to handle the issues.
If money is so important to them then maybe they should choose not to be open source devs?
If you cannot adhere to the philosophy then don't complain when people call you out on it.
LMFAO it's not about the money, it's time and effort, for one or 2 people maintaining a project they shared and work on in their free time that's in short supply.
If you have your panties in such a twist over "User Experience" it's open source, make your own damn contributions. Contribute an installer then, contribute some infrastructure for a website to have your fancy download button. You talk of open source philosophy, but then instead of contributing to making a project's user experience better, you just bitch about it instead.
You talk about market segments, adoption rates and funding like that’s the only goal someone has for sharing their project
No I didn't but the fact you assumed that is telling. You aren't arguing with me, you are arguing with a mental construct of me with the worst possible arguments. This is bad faith debate and I'm not going to tolerate it much longer.
Nah, you’re the elitist asshole, you should order more than one mirror.
Firstly, fuck you, and secondly this is the exact reason open source has lost the software wars. Most of humanity has chosen closed source due to convenience and availability. If open source can't compete with this, it isn't the fault of the consumer.
Your attitude is rancid and is the main reason open source will never be more than a novelty for most people.
You are like Todd Howard complaining how people are 'playing starfield wrong' and insisting that it is a super great game when the vast majority of players disagree. No amount of Todd insulting his userbase is going to make Starfield a good game.
Yes it does, they have the funding and resources to pay someone to handle the easy installer and user experience, they have teams of people to handle the issues.
No it doesn't, my stipulations were 'free to the user, easy to install, and open source'. I'm not going to repeat myself a third time.
You are intellectually dishonest and I'm frankly done and blocking you after this reply.
LMFAO it’s not about the money, it’s time and effort, for one or 2 people maintaining a project they shared and work on in their free time that’s in short supply.
Ok then maybe we need to make a world where good devs can program all they want for open source projects without having to keep a main job to pay for their needs.
I'd gladly donate to a foundation who's purpose is to provide the means for living to teams of dedicated and non-elitist devs.
If you have your panties in such a twist
Eat every inch of my ass and beg for seconds, grease stain.
It’s not about elitism. It’s because most developers don’t want to spend that time on the extra maintenance and QA to ensure it’s working flawlessly for the end user.
Most FOSS are just things people initially wanted for themselves, so they developed it in their spare time. Then they thought it might be neat to share the code in case someone else might find use in it, so they uploaded their work to GitHub.
If you want an exe you can always contribute to the project, or at least make a fork.
Many open source devs don't care about the quantity of users as much as the quality. Good users, who can spot and report bugs, are worth their weight in gold. Users who can't do this may be great humans in their own fields, but aren't really that useful for the project.
This is a false dichotomy, there are plenty of free and good open source tools that don't need 20 hours of manual plundering to install.
Right, and they do it because they have more funding, time and/or manpower. Not all teams have these.
Then it isn't open source, available to all.
'I only want smart users who don't complain' is the most arrogant attitude a dev can have.
Right, and they do it because they have more funding, time and/or manpower. Not all teams have these.
Ok then maybe more open source projects should get funding.
Open source means you are allowed to see the source code, and to modify and/or share it. No warranty or support is implied, and some software explicitly disclaim any such responsibility.
'I only want smart users who don't complain' is the most arrogant attitude a dev can have.
I don't think any dev wants users who don't complain. But when their time is limited, they want users who will submit useful complaints.
Also, maybe the situation will become clearer if you ask yourself why open source devs share their code for free. They aren't (usually) getting paid to do it. They are giving you code they probably wrote for their own personal use, in the hope that you might find and report issues with it, and thus help them make their own copy better. So if you aren't good enough to do that, well, they might help you out of the goodness of their heart, but you really aren't entitled to their help.
Ok then maybe more open source projects should get funding.
I mean, yes?