- cross-posted to:
- linux@discuss.tchncs.de
- hackernews@derp.foo
- cross-posted to:
- linux@discuss.tchncs.de
- hackernews@derp.foo
Hyprland is an open source Wayland compositor based on wlroots, a project I started back in 2017 to make it easier to build good Wayland compositors. It’s a project which is loved by its users for its emphasis on customization and “eye candy” – beautiful graphics and animations, each configuration tailored to the unique look and feel imagined by the user who creates it. It’s a very exciting project!
Unfortunately, the effect is spoilt by an incredibly toxic and hateful community. I cannot recommend Hyprland to anyone who is not prepared to steer well clear of its community spaces. Imagine a high school boys’ locker room come to life on Discord and GitHub and you’ll get an idea of what it’s like.
I empathise with Vaxry. I remember being young, smart, productive… and mean. I did some cool stuff, but I deeply regret the way I treated people. It wasn’t really my fault – I was a product of my environment – but it was my responsibility. Today, I’m proud to have built many welcoming communities, where people are rewarded for their involvement, rather than coming away from their experience hurt. What motivates us to build and give away free software if not bringing joy to ourselves and others? Can we be proud of a community which brings more suffering into the world?
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[A trans person] joined the Discord server and made a big deal out of their pronouns […] because they put their pronouns in their nickname and made a big deal out of them because people were referring to them as “he” [misgendering them], which, on the Internet, let’s be real, is the default.
Damn I didn’t know women didn’t exist on the internet! Also “making a big deal out of ones pronouns” is almost never the case, it’s always just a normal request for the respect of addressing someone properly.
Does drew not know about the existence of singular they? I use that unless i know their gender properly
These are not Drew’s words, he is quoting something said by the project dev. The context that the previous commenter ommitted is:
Following my email conversation with Vaxry, he appeared on a podcast to discuss toxicity in the Hyprland community. This quote from the interview clearly illustrates the attitude of the leadership:
[A trans person] joined the Discord server and made a big deal out of their pronouns […] because they put their pronouns in their nickname and made a big deal out of them because people were referring to them as “he” [misgendering them], which, on the Internet, let’s be real, is the default. And so, one of the moderators changed the pronouns in their nickname to “who/cares”. […] Let’s be real, this isn’t like, calling someone the N-word or something.
As someone on HackerNews said:
I’ve never felt the need for any “community” for my window manager of choice
Hmmm. If abuse happens, is the right idea to say that “I don’t need this community”?
I’m not sure how that HackerNews comment helps in the slightest. If my university has an obscure basket weaving community and people are getting abused in that community, should I just say “Eh we don’t actually need a basket weaving community”.
It’s also amusing to me that a commenter on a relatively obscure and niche website is complaining that that don’t need (or care about abuse that transpired on) a niche community from another website. And then this comment is echoed in yet another niche community.
“You shouldn’t use this window manager because their community is toxic”
“I’m not going to interact with the community”
Seems fair enough
For real. Not everything needs to be a fucking subculture. Next they’ll be saying, “The WinRAR community is toxic”. Like no, your discord server is poorly moderated. The problem starts and ends there.
I just wanted to point out that it’s ridiculous to form some kind religion¹ around a wayland compositor.
Also, I don’t want anybody to think I’m supporting what’s happening there. I just don’t really care about Hyprland’s community because I’m not part of it.
¹Hyprland’s discord server is named “Church of Hyprland”
This is a pretty old joke. See “Church of Emacs”.
Another toxic community founded and maintained by the socially inept. Yep, checks out.
Yeah.
At maximum a bug/issue tracker is needed.
That’s great for you but that might not be true for someone you recommend it to, or decides to give it a try after you mention you use it. Someone might go looking for help or tips there.
File a bug, read FAQ, StackOverflow? If you are messing around with window managers on Linux, a certain level of competency is expected. However, I’m more concerned about the weirdos hanging around in a discord chat of said window manager, harassing strangers. Such a strange hobby.
I can personally vouch for how toxic the Discord server and its moderators/admins are. Went there for support (Hyprland was crashing on startup on AMD, sway worked fine), and was told something along the lines of “if you can’t figure this out you’re stupid and you should stop using Linux”. Figured out the issue on my own and stopped using and recommending Hyprland after that.
I wonder if this comes from the only help / discussion being on Discord which has an infamously horrible search feature.
A forum could even be indexed by search engines so no need for:
- A discord account
- Annoying the developers with frequently asked questions
All this over some discord server drama. I cant blame the dev for wanting to code and not waste his time moderating.
It’s the developer’s responsibility to moderate the discord server properly.
It’s the moderation staff’s responsibility. Sorry for nitpicking, I understand in this case it’s likely the same people.
I just get triggered when I hear that an open source software developer should have any responsibilities at all (maybe apart from some extreme examples), and I wouldn’t like this idea to stick in anyone’s head.
I agree, open source devs don’t owe anyone anything (unless they’re accepting commissions or something). Also, generally speaking, being a good developer does not translate to being a good community moderator. There should be no expectation of the latter.
The developer owes you nothing.
The developer doesn’t owe us anything, but if they’re creating an online community like Discord there are inherent responsibilities that come with that. If they don’t want to moderate, then they shouldn’t create a Discord/Matrix/Whatever server.
Just like how even if the developer doesn’t owe us anything, that doesn’t mean it’s fine for them to push malware as an update to their previously fine code after they’ve established trust.
That douchebag can’t even moderate himself. I wasn’t considering trying out hyprland, but after this I wouldn’t feel safe running his code on any of my computers. I can imagine that it would do some “prank” if it found out that I’m thinking differently
“server”
That’s what they’re called over there, yes.
this guy just learned about discord general chats lol
they’re all this bad, and also they’re absolutely dogshit for open source software so I have no idea why people make them
I’m in the max server limit, 100 right now, and many of those are people who treat discord as github, which is so annoying (but many projects are of questionable legality, like Dan’s palace which makes and distributes completed android and vita ports of other games for free).
One time I got excited since there was announcement for the half life 2 android source port discord. I thought it was a big update or maybe a new game, but what I saw was something like:
the memes channel is for memes, not child porn
It’s just discord that has these issues. Matrix or IRC don’t have these problems. Discord just creates a kind of culture that fosters this stuff.
yeah it really attracts the young gamer crowd, not exactly for serious discussion
This. I’m tired of all short responses that don’t want to discuss the problem or steer the topics to a direction.
Nope it’s all over matrix as well.
I haven’t encountered any of these issue on matrix, but admittedly I haven’t joined a lot of matrix chats.
I was/am a mod for a LGBT room. I had to take a break it’s gotten so bad lately.
If your discord general chat looks like this you are in the wrong discord
You frontin like there’s any better quality chat then that
I stopped using it because of a couple shitty interactions on Discord. I don’t know anything about the developer himself but the company he keeps sucks. Using the word “cucked” when talking about breaks in dependencies… and being told “see if I care” when pointing out a race condition I found in initialization that caused problems with multimonitor setups.
No thanks. Sway works great. No need for eye candy.
Who cares about the community? If it’s useful and works I will use it. It’s not like I’m paying for it. If the community is toxic people will not contribute to the project. If they don’t need contributors they can do whatever they like.
Rare to see people with common sense these days.
Your first mistake was joining a Discord group for a software product. Github pages / bug-tracker or GTFO.
Fucking right? Let alone a open source project.
Hyprland dev’s response to blog post: https://blog.vaxry.net/articles/2023-hyprlandsCommunity
What a tone-deaf response, yikes.
Yeahhh, he’s like “everything was taken out of context to smear me”, he shows the context and it doesn’t make him look any better.
It’s a shame bc I really wanted to get into hyprland, but I won’t get involved with a project that is okay harassing people for being trans.
His response is perfectly rational. You need to stop getting offended over every small thing on the internet.
treating people respectfully is not getting offended. please touch some grass and open your eyes.
Did you read his response? These were a few small incidents blown out of proportion. Maybe grow a thicker skin?
that’s not really the point considering this didn’t occur in a vacuum. this one event can come to just be a grift and what I said will still be true.
I only have two things to say:
- Stop bringing your politics into free software and creating unproductive drama
- Stop being so fragile to get offended by random teenagers on the internet
Removed by mod
Interacting with people without harassment is hardly “politics”.
The final bit is interesting. Vaxry says Q (who was openly bigoted) got punished, but doesn’t mention prisj (who was slightly less open about it).
#generaldoes indeed sometimes have jokes that some people might treat as “controversial”.And if you really need a place with controversial jokes, split it off from your support server or something.
It sucks that cool projects like hyprland are usually riddled with toxic weirdos that ruin it. It also sucks that there’s not much to choose in the wayland space that’s usable and actively developed but I refuse to use hyprland after seeing this.
It wasn’t really my fault – I was a product of my environment
Riiight.
You kinda left out the next line in which he says
But it was my responsibility
That’s the whole statement and tbh I agree. It’s never anyone’s fault for being a bad person, but it is 100% their responsibility to right their wrongs.
I didn’t kinda leave it out, I just left it out
The very next words are “but it was my responsibility”… what exactly is bad about that statement if you don’t intentionally cherry pick a bad quote?
It was his fault too imo
Yeah, I’m not too fond of that statement. I respect ddevault, particularly since I have seen his serious growth into a mature, empathetic person. So ICM surprised that this made it into the post.
Just dont interact with the community. Theres an excelent wiki that details everything.
This is a good enough reason to fork a project and establish a new community with new norms.
People like you are insane
I mean if he is the lead dev, then I doubt this makes much sense.
Hyprland is itself a fork of wlroots, a project that the author of this post created, so this has happened before and they definitely have the skills to bootstrap a new project.
Hyprland is itself a fork of wlroots, a project that the author of this post created
No, it is not. wlroots is plumbing containing parts a compositor commonly would need to implement, and many compositors - including hyprland - sit on top of that to avoid reinventing the wheel over and over again.
Ah yeah I had it wrong. Thanks for the correction.
Take every opinion from Drew DeVault with a grain of salt.
