Re: [Gimp-user] HATE the new save vs. export behavior

[Jay Smith <jay JaySmith com>]

On 08/07/2012 06:53 PM, Alexandre Prokoudine wrote:
> On Wed, Aug 8, 2012 at 2:28 AM, Jay Smith wrote:
>
> > As many husbands have taken decades to learn (or else they are no longer
> > married), sometimes "writing all the reasoning down" won't make the wife
> > feel better.  Right now, the developers are responding to an emotional
> > situation by saying something like "but we did what was logical, we even
> > wrote it down first".  In the recorded history of human relations, I doubt
> > that response has worked on a regular, consistent basis.
>
> Jay,
>
> Let's not try fooling each other. The only thing the former community
> is really going to accept is "Sorry, we screwed up, and you were right
> all the time. We are going to revert, sorry again".
>
> The former community will probably also accept "OK, we are going to
> make this optional", except no two people so far agreed on how exactly
> this should be done, and noone so far seems to have understood how
> badly it would affect usability and code maintenance.
>
> People just want the old stuff back at any cost. Not gonna happen.
>
> > Users become very attached to the software they use.
>
> You make it sound like there are generations of people who passed the
> habit of Ctrl+S for saving to PNG from father to son, whereas personal
> digital image editing is barely 30 years old :)
>
> > When software evolves in a direction different from that user/workflow, the
> > user experiences *very personal* feelings of *loss*.
> >
> > The strong feelings expressed in all these "yet another long threads" are
> > users expressing their feelings of _loss_.
> >
> > And it is not just their _feelings_.  Some of them will decide that they
> > will have to migrate to other software which does include them it its
> > "target user group".  That migration comes at a very real cost of time,
> > effort, learning, and perhaps money.
>
> Excuse me, but what is wrong with that picture? Human civilization
> always needs time to adapt to new things. It was ever so.
>
> Would you tell Wright brothers that they shouldn't have had come up
> with their Flyer, because, ye gods, a hundred years later people still
> got to spend some time to learn how to get the bloody thing take off?
> :)
>
> > If the developers have made a mistake, it was possibly overlooking these
> > "feelings issues" and not expecting such a strong reaction.  That is not to
> > say that the developers did not have to do what they did.  However, they
> > should not have been surprised by the reaction.
>
> We knew it was going to be crying and moaning all over the place. We
> had early warnings of that, too. And actually we made few adjustments
> to the new model to clarify things, e.g.
>
> http://git.gnome.org/browse/gimp/commit/?h=gimp-2-8&id=f4ce57aa9709e492666c16259e81625a3e4a7796
>
> http://git.gnome.org/browse/gimp/commit/?h=gimp-2-8&id=c3e904fab1b29224b7dd55bb5b4af49f34c3b335
>
> Alexandre Prokoudine

Alexandre,

You made a very specific statement:

   "I don't really understand why we need yet another
    long thread to go through all these things yet again."

I attempted to explain my opinion of the situation, specifically in 
regard to what you claimed you did not understand.

In return, I got back a dismissive reply that IMHO completely ignored 
the intent of what I was trying to say.  Your response has seriously 
tested my respect for you -- I tried very hard to show my respect for you.

I was not trying to say that users _should or should not_ do/think/feel 
this or that for whatever reason.

I was giving my opinion of the dynamics behind **WHY** they DO 
think/feel this or that.

Either you read my words too quickly without taking time to understand 
what I was getting at or you completely misunderstood what I was saying. 
 Your response does not jive with the intent of what I was writing.

In fact, you just got out a "bigger hammer" to try and pound the problem 
down.

From this I am starting to get the idea that you don't actually _want_ 
to understand the problem; you just want the problem to go away.  If 
that is the case, and as long as that is the case, the problem will not 
go away.

The users are writing from their feelings.  Until you respond to those 
feelings, you will get nowhere.

In summary, IF nearly every one of the developers responses included 
some version of the following statement, nearly half of your "long 
threads" would vanish and life would be good:


 "We understand _____ presents a difficult situation for some
  users and we regret the impact that this has had on you.
  Unfortunately, we had to make difficult choices in the subject
  of _______ and the result is that the program will no longer
  fit the workflow of some users.  We feel that the changes we
  have made will be to the benefit of the majority of the user
  community and we are dedicated to continuing the improvement
  of Gimp for the target user community.  We appreciate your
  loyalty to Gimp and hope that you will find a way to adjust
  your workflows so that Gimp's new behavior will work well
  for you.  Thank you for expressing your concern.  Please know
  that we have heard you, even if the changes we have had to make
  are not favorable for you, and that we will continue to work
  on improving the program to be the best that it can be for
  the target user community."

You may think that you have said this thousands of times, but I have not 
seen it.  Bits and pieces of it had been said, but until you respond to 
the FEELINGS people are having, every time, you won't get any change in 
their behavior.  Responding to the people with a repetition of the facts 
without expressing any empathy for what they are going through will get 
you nowhere.

I've got nothing more to contribute to this subject.  Please don't feel 
the need to reply, especially not if it is like the last reply.

Jay