Stop Begging

• Kris Dee Apr 5, 2023, 6:16 AM (20 months ago)

  ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

  THANK you for this extension. I have several installs with LO, and these popups are extremely annoying (I am not a toddler who needs to be reminded every X-time...)
  Hope this extension works.
  And, extension author, ignore the critics...

• peter j0svai Jul 1, 2022, 12:30 PM (2 years ago)

  ★ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

  this is a mean sabotage
  
  For the Libreoffice community, including users and developers, sending out donation messages is as basic, fundamental functionality like feeding or breathing for an organism -- which this community is.
  
  This title is a mean act, disrespect, and shouldn't be tolerated.
  
  In real life I'd tell him -- why do I have the feeling that it's a male -- to get the f* out of here. But that's also not acceptable for the community. Thank God, however, the same can be brought home in a decent manner, too.
  
  
  If someone doesn't like to see these donation messages, which are a must, functionally the same thing as paying in Microsoft's world, he should avoid this application, and that's it.
  
  Creating an addon which blocks communication from Libreoffice HQ to Libreoffice users is a mean and cheap sabotage.
  
  Defacing the Libreoffice (and Open Source community) IMAGE by calling asking for donation repeatedly "begging" through injecting a snippet into the system through the contribution's channel is... vandalism.
  
  
  Are open source communities begging?
  
  Whoever says yes to this, is missing the whole point of what we are talking about here...

  • Justin Luth May 20, 2023, 1:51 PM (18 months ago)

    For the record, donations actually do almost nothing for the LibreOffice project. What does a lot for the project is volunteer involvement (although even that is dwarfed by corporate development). I have volunteered at least 4 years of full-time bug-fixing to making LO a highly interoperable office suite. When LibreOffice became intrusive, I was ready to switch my open-source contributions to something else. One reason I stayed was because I could at least make this extension. The actual sabotage here is taking an open-source program and turning it into donation-ware, despite the developers' objections.
    
    And it definitely is begging. It appropriately "asks" for donations when you download the install or visit the about page. But randomly and intentionally interfering with the user who is just going about his work is inappropriate begging.

  • Kris Dee Apr 5, 2023, 6:19 AM (20 months ago)

    An extension like this should not be tolerated? Who are you - Microsoft?
    Have you forgotten the term "open source"?
    Why can free-software people tolerate so little criticism (I think of GIMP here)?

  • Yal gb Oct 30, 2022, 2:43 PM (2 years ago)

    Hi, as donator to LO this is probably one of the first extension I add to a fresh installation of LO. I don't want to be reminded what are the new features and/or that donating is essential to LO (and all the other Libre apps) when I fire my word processor and, to my knowledge, there is no other way than this extension to get rid of this popup.

• Kevin Ernst May 22, 2022, 6:37 AM (2 years ago)

  ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

  As a monthly donor, I appreciate that this exists, not because I'm chafed by the fact that LibreOffice developers would *dare* to ask for donations, but because I don't have the option to say "I Already Donated" or some other easily accessible UI to permanently disable these banners.
  
  So, the donation/get involved banners are both necessary to the enduring health of the project, *and* annoying.
  
  I also think the name of the extension could be changed to exactly what Heiko suggested below, for the exact reason stated. But that doesn't merit a zero-star review, *or* others making snide remarks at the mere suggestion it be changed. Words do matter.

  • Kevin Ernst May 22, 2022, 6:42 AM (2 years ago)

    But (the reason I left a star off, and forgot to say why)…
    
    It would be better had the extension not forced the "Tip of the Day" setting off, too.
    
    "Tip of the Day" messages have nothing whatsoever to do with asking for donations/engagement. The tips could be a desired feature, *separate* from the desire to stop the other banners from appearing.
    
    There is already a checkbox in the settings to enable/disable "Tip of the Day" under "LibreOffice" → General.

    • Justin Luth May 20, 2023, 1:57 PM (18 months ago)

      It doesn't "force" Tip of the Day off. It only defaults it off. TOTD should be opt-in, not opt-out. You can opt-in using the checkbox you mentioned, or via the help menu.

• charles benjamin Jan 8, 2022, 8:05 PM (3 years ago)

  ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

  Excellent solution to a problem that should have never happened.

• Mike Kaganski Jun 28, 2021, 6:48 AM (3 years ago)

  ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

  Is changing Writer fonts an intended effect of the extension?
  
  Since this extension sets LastTime*Shown to MAXINT32, it doesn't need the oor:finalized, which is why it was crashing in 6.1.0-6.1.2. The finalized flag only needs when one sets these values to 0.

  • Justin Luth Feb 4, 2022, 6:42 PM (3 years ago)

    It doesn't actually change writer fonts (since the file isn't mentioned in the manifest). However, you are right that writer.xcu doesn't belong in there. So I made version 6.3.1 without that file. No need for existing users to re-download it though.

    • Mike Kaganski Jul 14, 2022, 12:46 PM (2 years ago)

      Oh, visited the page today, and realized that I didn't set a "rating" - which translated to zero-star. I apologize, it was not a conscious thing, just something UX-related on the site (answering makes the rating far to the top). If I did that today, knowing that, I'd put 4 stars (I would prefer the name changed, too ;))

• Heiko Jun 16, 2020, 1:40 PM (4 years ago)

  ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

  The title of this extension is a bit provocative. Please rename to "Block the donation/involvement infobar", or the like. Thank you!

  • charles benjamin Jan 8, 2022, 8:10 PM (3 years ago)

    No, it is not in the least bit "provocative." Why would you even assume that? You liberals need to stop taking offense at everything.

  • Frank Jul 6, 2020, 4:20 PM (4 years ago)

    IMHO the title is perfectly appropriate, inasmuch as such an extension shouldn't have become necessary in the first place.

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