13
Arvind

My sympathies to you. It has to be one of the most frustrating things when your computer is out of action through no fault of your own. Thank you for updating us and pointing out that the software has critical bugs and what your experiences were.

Curtis

Sometimes I think I have heard it all from developers only for someone to sympathise with not a victim of software problems causing major problems but instead the programmers involved, and then juxtapose the idea of uninstalling software correctly with "customer expectations being unreasonable". Customers should absolutely expect that applications do not mess up their system and should constantly expect safe software - this is not unreasonable.

A much bigger problem to software developers than hackers are software developers themselves, when they act and think like they're better than others or condescend others. Software development is a skill, no more or less insightful than skills in music, parenting, design or marketing.

Before people complain, I'm a software developer myself so have had plenty of opportunity to work with many and see that these attitudes are unhelpful and serve only to alienate developers - thankfully most modern interview processes for major corporations and agencies are as much if not more interested in weeding these mindsets out as they are hiring someone proficient.

David Bolton

Bugs happen no matter what you do or how much you test. I'm glad you took the feedback here and you removed the open at start up feature and that you recognised that there was indeed a bug here with the uninstall as Arvind explained. Keeping in mind you were disbelieving of the issue in the first place, then concede there was an issue, it seems like poor form to now imply rhetorically that actually this is all a ruse by some competitor. Let's give Arvind the benefit of the doubt without implication that they have an ulterior motive especially as you concede there was an issue after all.

Software development is tricky, bugs happen, but let's assume everyone means well.
"The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing" - Socrates

https://heavenlysphere.com/

14
Many thanks to both you, Curtis, and to Paul.

Of course, from the start I did indeed think that Arvind was "on the level"; however, his accusation that Omnicycles was "malware" was insulting, so I thus had to set things straight. I myself am not the programmer; my good friend of 30 years, Juan Manuel Puertas, has always done the programming, and I can truly say that he is the most honest person i have ever met in my life. Juanma would NEVER even consider putting any sort of malware into a program. Naturally, Arvind could not know this.

Yes, Arvind did discover a flaw in the program: namely, that the program we were using to create the setup file didn't properly allow for it to then be uninstalled easily.

In addition, he noted that Omnicycles was set to automatically start up when starting the PC. The truth is, since I use it everyday anyway, I never saw that as a flaw, but of course, I could see that others would, which is why I quickly found a solution.

The fact that within just a few days, I had found another setup program, and corrected both of these flaws should have shown him that my intentions were honest. After all, how often do you see that a software developer makes such corrections only a couple of days after their being reported? (especially when the program is free!).

Paul: You seem to assume that Arvind was correct in saying that Omnicycles "messed up his system". To that, I can only say:

1) About the "automatic startup" weakness: Arvind could have easily corrected that himself by removing Omnicycles from Windows Startup, but he apparently doesn't have the computer skills to do so; nor did he have the little bit of patience a Google search on the issue would have taken; nor did he have the simple idea of writing to me and ASKING how to change this; I would have been most glad to help him. Instead, he simply said "This is malware in my book.", thus accusing me of having bad intentions.

2) True, the fact that that version could not be installed automatically was a flaw, HOWEVER; it could well be installed manually, merely by removing the relevant Omnicycles folder. Arvind's malware accusation implied that the program had installed some hidden .exe on his system, which defied any attempts to locate and erase it, and this is NOT true. Erasing the folder would have erased the program, for it has no hidden "malware" files!

I can well sympathize with anyone who ends up spending hours to rectify a problem on their PC. However, Arvind could have easily spared himself those hours by simply asking me about the problem. Though the program is now free, I have NEVER refused to help someone with a problem.

In my last post, I ask Arvind to ask his programmer EXACTLY what Omnicycles did to "F... up his system"; I am still waiting for an answer. If indeed the program does do something horrible, I sure would like to know about it, all the more so since it would certainly not be intentional.

Now Paul: I can understand you sympathizing with Arvind, yet as I read over his posts, and mine as well, I cannot escape the impression that mine have been more complete, more respectful, more honest, and perhaps most importantly, I have shown a much greater willingness to collaborate to solve any problem that might exist. Statements such as the final one Arvind made, that sarcastic: "Thanks Omnicycles... you suck!" would seem to say something not unessential about the type of person Arvind is. Yes, I, too, have experienced great frustrations with programs over the years, yet I have NEVER EVER spewed forth such insults, either verbally or in writing, and would certainly never do so when dealing with someone who has shown a great desire to help, as have I. Yes, Paul, I, like you, do tend to believe that people mean well. It's just that being accused of creating malware, and then having obscenities hurled at me does not incline me to believe in the good intentions of my accuser!

Curtis, you said things quite well. In our case, we decided to give away Omnicycles for free, since we weren't selling it too often anyway, and we feel that the new features we are including in the program (some of which cannot be found in any other) are of great importance to astrology, and should therefore be made available to astrologers everywhere. In other words: Juan Manuel and I are idealists!

All of that being said: I sure hope that from now on in this thread, we'll see some posts from people who are actually using Omnicycles! I would love to hear their opinions, suggestions for further additions, etc.

Once again, my thanks to Curtis and Paul, and I wish you all a fine day! (Yes, you too, Arvind, wherever you may be!)
Co-creator of Omnicycles Software (now free!), designed to offer new ways of studying the chart. Download at: http://www.omnicycles.com/omnicycles.com.zip

15
Paul wrote:Sometimes I think I have heard it all from developers only for someone to sympathise with not a victim of software problems causing major problems but instead the programmers involved, and then juxtapose the idea of uninstalling software correctly with "customer expectations being unreasonable". Customers should absolutely expect that applications do not mess up their system and should constantly expect safe software - this is not unreasonable.
Paul,

You have turned what I have said is a general tendency to the specific situation that Arvind was talking about which I did not intend at all. Do not misrepresent me by interpreting what I said to mean that I don't agree with Arvind on this particular issue because I just don't know about all the details of this particular case. It would indeed be reasonable for uninstall to be complete, but my comment really has nothing to do with that and focused upon the developer side with (GENERALLY - hint not this particular case) unreasonable expectations. The phenomenon is real that I described above. Break out a new app and everyone gets excited. Develop it to perfection and it gets criticized and downplayed. This has happened countless times to others (not just me). But it did seem rather over the top what Arvind did, hence my sympathy for David Bolton.
Curtis Manwaring
Zoidiasoft Technologies, LLC

16
And, no Paul, not everyone can do software well. If you're doing all encompassing work from scratch to finish that is difficult. Working in a corporate setting is very different and tasks are broken up to something more manageable. You get to work 8 hours and sleep at night. But during the Terran Atlas development cycle because of the situation with Astrolabe, I was pulling 16 hour days for nearly 3 months straight.

It's not about saying I'm "better than everyone else", just want some slack in the attitudes I get when people just don't realize the hell I go through to pull this stuff off.
Curtis Manwaring
Zoidiasoft Technologies, LLC

17
The other thing I wanted to point out through all of this Arvind was being abusive against the rules stated on this forum, but what did you do as moderator Paul? David Bolton was very professional through all of this and only questioned intentions after several abusive attacks at the end, but who do you go after? That's very telling IMO. I probably wouldn't have been as patient. I'm not disputing Arvind's claim of the problem that he had, but the way he brought it forward in such an abusive fashion is what I object to. I don't think that's putting myself in a superior position. But the attitude is typical of many users of astrology software.

I'm not ever going to work for corporate power again. I won't be lectured by someone who wasn't even alive when I was first introduced to programming. The whole point of my doing this was to break free of that slave environment. If you're happy doing it, that is fine. But I don't live by your rules and it doesn't sound to me like you've ever been under the kind of fire to where your survival in business was put at stake. I've sweated under the hot Nevada sun with only a solar panel connected to my truck (with laptop and cell phone) out in the desert to stay alive in business (essentially homeless) when this whole fisasco with Astrolabe began. It got to the point that when I was camping up on Mt. Charleston, that I would put my truck in neutral down Kyle Canyon Rd until I got to Rte 95 (to save gas) when I had to get back into town. I was eating barrel cactus seeds, prickly pear cactus, and even bark scorpions to survive. Don't believe me? Ask Chris Brennan (he witnessed this last part under different circumstances). Until your life is on the line I don't think you can possibly understand what it's like to be in my position. So if it sounds like I think Arvind's gripes are petty, try to put it into perspective.
Last edited by zoidsoft on Wed Mar 29, 2017 9:11 am, edited 1 time in total.
Curtis Manwaring
Zoidiasoft Technologies, LLC

18
David
Juanma would NEVER even consider putting any sort of malware into a program. Naturally, Arvind could not know this.
I believe you. But we may need to broaden how we see malware to how a consumer sees malware. A program which cannot install correctly could easily fall into that category especially when it irritates by opening by default. It remains to be seen whether whatever problems Arvind had prevented him from stopping the automatic start as well, it was unclear. Either way a program which is designed to be unavoidable by default and which doesn't uninstall correctly can be seen as malware by a general public who don't restrict this definition to an intentional effort to trick, scam, advertise or corrupt like other definitions of malware may imply.
The fact that within just a few days, I had found another setup program, and corrected both of these flaws should have shown him that my intentions were honest.
Again we should broaden from implications that all malware is intentionally malicious rather than disruptive and difficult to remove or avoid.

He also was probably quite right to inform people of his issues which I feel we should accept are real and for which a faulty uninstall is at least partially responsible.
Paul: You seem to assume that Arvind was correct in saying that Omnicycles "messed up his system".
I don't actually. I do believe Arvind however that he installed the software in good faith and either only meant to experiment with it and always remove it, or was irritated by the automatic start up and tried to remove it entirely and subsequently realised there was a problem with uninstall. I also believe that either the install, the uninstall or the attempts made to uninstall has affected his computer in some way. It may have highlighted an existing problem, not played well with something on his machine or it may be that in attempting to uninstall this he damaged or uninstalled something else.

But I do believe him, without needing to insinuate he has malicious intent himself, that his problems as he knows them started with installing omnicycles.

As for your numbered points:
1: it's not clear to me if he also had trouble doing this or even if this was his major issue and was reported more to explain why, when he subsequently couldn't uninstall, he felt it was malware (defining it here as an irritant difficult or impossible to remove or avoid)

2: we shouldn't expect people to know how malware actually works or even limit it to one common approach, it can be used generally as I described it. A university professor once made a case to us as a class that internet explorer being impossible to remove as well as having known security issues could well be imagined as malware-lite - this was within the context of discussing an EU ruling regarding IE being automatically included with Windows and ethics within software development. The point I'm making here is that we should broaden our understanding of malware from a malicious attempt to advertise or steal information to software which is irritating or a nuisance to the user which is difficult or impossible to avoid or remove for a person with basic or average computer expertise.
Now Paul: I can understand you sympathizing with Arvind, yet as I read over his posts, and mine as well, I cannot escape the impression that mine have been more complete, more respectful, more honest, and perhaps most importantly, I have shown a much greater willingness to collaborate to solve any problem that might exist.
I appreciate your being courteous and I don't disagree you have been respectful and willing to help solve the problem. I don't think I implied otherwise though and, as I'm sure you understand, you're not the one who had computer problems after installing software. Personally I understand such irritation and I don't see anywhere where you personally have been abused. Notice he never said "David Bolton sucks" but that his experience with omnicycles leads him to feel that the software sucks - let's not forget there was indeed an issue with it. I don't think it's insulting to anyone to offer that critique, it's his opinion and whilst not as articulate or polite as most of your messages is not abusive or insulting.

I also don't think Arvind "hurled obscenities" at you. He quoted what a tech person told him about not you but the software and he even self edited himself. I can't imagine you are so sensitive as to find wtf or f**k obscene let alone hurled at you.

You were not attacked here even if software you are affiliated with and love was criticised. That can feel personal of course, but it usually isn't.

Either way after admitting there was a problem it's generally not a good idea to take a sour grapes route of insinuating they're maliciously out to take down competitors anyway.

I wish you a good day too.
"The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing" - Socrates

https://heavenlysphere.com/

19
I also don't think Arvind "hurled obscenities" at you. He quoted what a tech person told him about not you but the software and he even self edited himself. I can't imagine you are so sensitive as to find wtf or f**k obscene let alone hurled at you.

You were not attacked here even if software you are affiliated with and love was criticised. That can feel personal of course, but it usually isn't.
Regardless of who it comes from if "f**k" isn't obscene on Skyscript, then I guess anything goes.
Curtis Manwaring
Zoidiasoft Technologies, LLC

20
Curtis

I don't know any developers who don't pull all nighters from time to time both on private projects as well as in corporate settings. In any event I don't think I implied that you personally are not hard working nor software developers in general not hard working.

The reality here is someone had a legitimate problem with software and it comes across, whether you mean to or not, as condescending when you juxtapose the facts of this situation which both sides agree on with statements about how unreasonable people can be. If it's not related to this specific case it may be necessary to clarify that. People naturally assume there's context to what people say.

We've disagreed in the past about software development but as I said in my own post software development is a skill. Like all skills practice is necessary to hone those skills and some natural altitude likely sorts the wheat from the chaff. Like all skills, not everyone can do it well. I'm not disagreeing with that, I'm disagreeing with the connotation that this is somehow special or unique to development. I would find it much easier to sit with you and work for 16 hours on the Terran atlas than be handed a piano and asked to play a piece by Bach or Chopin or handed water pencils and paper and asked to do a sketch. There's lots of things not everyone can do. But in this instance what was asked for is not unreasonable. To paraphrase an old boss, if you enjoy solving difficult problems, are patient and have a knack for ordered logical thinking, go be a developer. If you want appreciation or praise go be a surgeon.
Arvind was being abusive against the rules stated on this forum, but what did you do as moderator Paul?
Which rule and how was it breached? I don't see Arvind insulting or abusing anyone. Whilst I also would prefer the problem was communicated better I understand why Arvind gives his critique of the product as he did based on his experience with it. He even emphasises that this just his experience and so wants people to know so as to be cautious.
In addition, whilst I can moderate any forum my focus and remit is really the horary board. I seldom ever remove posts or need to put on the moderator hat at all and usually only will lock a thread if it gets too heated or abusive.
I won't be lectured by someone who wasn't even alive when I was first introduced to programming.
See it as you want and take it as you want.

I sympathise with your personal situation and I understand never wanting to work for corporate interest ever again. I really do. My point was more that software developers give them selves a bad reputation as much as something like hacking does but at least this is changing where larger businesses can afford to invest in a more rigorous hiring process that promotes emotional intelligence and good teamwork and personality as much as altitude or skill.
"The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing" - Socrates

https://heavenlysphere.com/

21
Paul wrote:I don't know any developers who don't pull all nighters from time to time both on private projects as well as in corporate settings.
Not too many have done it for 3 months straight with no days off because they were so afraid of not having enough money to stay alive and eat. I was already homeless.
Curtis Manwaring
Zoidiasoft Technologies, LLC

22
Thanks for your insights, Paul. Perhaps I did overreact a bit - accusing me of having malicious intentions (i.e., of having created malware) may have caused me to question Arvind's objectives.

Your example of Internet Explorer was interesting indeed: I wonder if Microsoft changed their policy as soon as someone complained about it?

But hey, now that a new version of Omnicycles was put up at my site many days ago (one that uninstalls with ease, and that does not start up automatically) , perhaps this thread could move more towards the experiences of other users with it. And of course: if other weaknesses are found, I'm all ears!
Co-creator of Omnicycles Software (now free!), designed to offer new ways of studying the chart. Download at: http://www.omnicycles.com/omnicycles.com.zip

23
Thank you for being so reasonable David. Personally I don't think anyone involved here has any malicious intent at all. Hopefully this is a conclusion everyone will move toward.

Circling back to Curtis' point, creating software can be difficult and bug free code simply doesn't exist - human error assures it. Well done for responding so quickly and rectifying the problem.

As for the IE issue - this was raised within a larger study within a module focusing on issues like ethics, law and professional standards within information systems as a field. Asking questions like whether software development ought to be "reserved" in some way like how to practice law you must pass the bar or how the term "architect" requires you to be part of a regulated architects guild and making the point that software errors in a world of computer driven missiles, computer managed cars with autopilot and cruise control as well as all modern medical equipment and so on really does have the potential to endanger lives or cause large financial problems. I can't go into it all here but one of our case studies was the massive IT waste and mis-management of the NHS IT schemes here in the U.K. and also legal and ethical issues with Microsoft and IE. The backdrop was a case made focusing on anti competitive practices and the inclusion of windows media player branching out to IE in a subsequent case and how it's ingrained in the OS.
The outcome was a legal battle resulting in Microsoft being forced to show a prompt informing users of other options but not necessarily being removed from the OS raising questions about what constitutes ownership (I can buy a car and replace the wheels, I can't buy the OS and replace IE) as well as what we understand malware to be vs public perception as well as data and privacy issues that go along with all of this.

You can read more about the specific issue and subsequent outcome here:
http://ec.europa.eu/competition/publica ... 0_1_12.pdf
"The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing" - Socrates

https://heavenlysphere.com/

24
An interesting case, to be sure, Paul! Thanks for the link.

As an afterthought to your previous post: I do think that "malware" should be defined in rather precise terms, and not just refer to any software that a particular user may have issues with, for any piece of software could have its critics (due possibly to bugs), and if those critics cry "malware!" prematurely, it could well scare off other potential users, who would thus lose out on the opportunity of exploring some new program which could have had real value for them.

In the case of Microsoft, I don't know whether or not any malicious intent (such as the intention of somehow cornering the browser market) was concerned, though I know that we - a mere molecule on the software landscape when compared to Microsoft - have never had any malicious intent of any sort, as should be clear by now.

Yes, you are right. There is no software without a bug or two somewhere, or so it would seem. Yet we proceed undaunted, "killing" each bug as it appears as quickly as we can. Thus, I am glad on the one hand that Arvind pointed out those two flaws - though of course, his jumping to the conclusion of "malware" was out of line in my view: no doubt an expression of his frustration.

On an astrological note: there being 5 planets in Aries now - the sign opposite my MC, Mars and Neptune - and also, with Mars approaching the opposition to my Sun, I suppose it's no wonder that I encounter "opposition" somewhere or another - and better in a forum than getting hit by a car, or something of that variety!

Enjoy your day....

David
Co-creator of Omnicycles Software (now free!), designed to offer new ways of studying the chart. Download at: http://www.omnicycles.com/omnicycles.com.zip