You know, at the risk of sounding like a snot, I’ve actually had a similar thought. The only thing stopping me from saying the same thing is that I have no idea what else it is that Sam does. 
johnjamesjacoby – This is my second attempt. First time His Majesty didn’t answer me. Next time I will ask Matt.
Or may be Wikipedia 
I encourage both of you to adopt one of the many other forum programs.
There is no timetable for bbPress, Sam works on it at his own schedule.
If you are in a rush, there are plenty of other options.
It’s done when it’s done. You shouldn’t be using the alpha on a live site.
The next alpha will break many plugins because of the change to an internal rewrite engine so don’t count on using it unless you don’t use any of my plugins.
You know, it’s responses like that, that really tend to make sour what is otherwise the sweet enthusiasm of enjoying being part of a growing project. I mean no disrespect to anyone on this forum; developers, moderators, etc… But quite honestly it’s that type of holier than thou attitude that is going to upset your core audience…
- I’m here because I want to be.
- I’m here because I can be.
- I’m here on my own schedule, just like Sam.
- If that’s really how you feel, then the reasons I’m here shouldn’t matter.
- This isn’t rushing, this is a valid question; “What is it you say you do here?”
- You shouldn’t talk to people like they are children.
- Thanks for the… er… warning I guess, Tom Smykowski.
I see …
But, _ck_, I’m asking our … sissy …
oh came on, everybody knows there is only one developer working on this project, you can’t demand so much. I’m very glad with what has been done so far. I have a wp-bbpress integration running again and it is thanks to Sam, so the only word I can say is thanks.
I guess this thread should be addressed right to Automattic; “hey Matt, we love bbpress, send more resources here”.
I agree – more resources would be great!
I have BBpress running on one site too, but I really want it to become as good as WordPress, because BBpress already rocks (even though it’s in Alpha)! I just want to say, keep up the good work!
johnjamesjacoby, you see what you want to see, and you hear what you want to hear. I predict no less than 10 people will read this post and think I’m being bitchy. I’m not, but I can’t help what you want to see and hear.
Close your eyes and pretend _ck_ said all that with a bright smile and a sympathetic attitude, if it helps. But those are the facts.
Example: Calling sam ‘your majesty’ and other similar titles sounded smarmy to me, and really insulting to a developer giving his time to a free product. But. I decided that I was wrong with that assumption and chose to ignore any feeling of ‘attitude’ I caught from wiseacre, or you, because you were probably frustrated with the lack of development of a product you dig. And you’re venting. Which is perfectly fine.
Beta products, baby products, aren’t for sissies (note: NOT calling you a sissy!). They break, they’re poorly supported because more time is spent developing than helping. Have patience. Have faith. Offer help. Go through the trac tickets and suggest solutions if you know of them, or offer more information (i.e. I could reproduce this by doing the hokey pokey on v 1.0-a6). _ck_ has certainly done that, which is why, for her dedication and perseverance, she’s a forum mod.
Banging away and complaining it’s not done yet isn’t endearing and it’s not really polite either. It causes dev burn out, because who wants to write product for people who don’t appreciate the work?
So yes, Matt! “Developers, Developers, Developers!”
Guys, guys, guys … stay for a minute …
I’m asking a simle question …
Simple question with Yes/No answer … BUT …
I’m asking Sam, not _ck_, ganzua, johnhiler, inboedelverzekering or Ipstenu.
I’m asking Sam … please … “Yes” or “No” …
The biggest problem I have with people hassling Sam is that you are distracting him from other work he can be doing to help us all, especially when for now he is the only main developer on the project. He shouldn’t have to stop to answer end-user questions each week (unless he wants to).
It’s easy to burn out on large programming projects which is why he moves around to working on different parts of bbPress at different times and I have a low tolerance for people who can’t see the major effort he has done and just want things done yesterday, especially when it is completely free and you have plenty of other choices.
Try writing a plugin someday and you’ll get an appreciation for what kind of concentration and knowledge it takes to develop good code. Sam has done a massive amount of work on bbPress 1.0 and should be left alone to continue in whatever pattern suits him best.
If you have bug reports or feature ideas, make a quality report in TRAC and Sam will get to them when he gets to them. Don’t pester him here unless he solicits for the input.
Some thoughts…
– An employee only has to report his results to his employer. So, it doesn’t matter if Sam works for Automattic or not. In this context is that bbPress is open source: if you need anything (that can’t be done on a plugin), you are free to fork bbPress and add what you need. It’s just simple as that.
– “code uploads” aren’t needed on a daily basis, specially when you are the only developer.
– If you wanted only Sam to reply, then you should have used a less public medium, don’t you think?
> An employee only has to report his results to his employer
Yes, and so what? I’m asking is he employee or not
> If you wanted only Sam to reply
Not only, but replay
And last from me – I will excuse for all bad words after the answer.
> An employee only has to report his results to his employer
Yes, and so what? I’m asking is he employee or not
That information is confidential in many states. No one is required to tell someone who they work for, even for insurance (your insurance has the right to turn you down due to lack of trust in that case, but still). As such, that question can be dismissed as ‘not your business’, pardon me for the crudity
So here’s my question for you. Towards what end will you go with the information of Sam’s employment? If you find out that yes, he is an Automattic employee and assigned to bbPress, will that make you react differently than if you found out, say, he was assigned to bbPress, WordPress and was asked to fill in at Akismet?
Basically this: Why does it matter who he works for?
If you’re asking ‘Why is bbPress development so slow?’ you could just ask that and anyone would tell you: There are few developers working on it at the moment. Cause the only other question I can find is like when you watch Survivor, and the Jury person says ‘My question for the finalists is that you suck.’ While entertaining to watch, it’s not a question. 
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe the real underlining question is…
Does bbPress have a future?
The slowness in creating a stable 1.0 product has many of us who love bbPress, and are not technical/programmers, concerned that bbPress will go to the wayside.
Does bbPress have a future?
I can’t foretell if bbpress has future but it does have a long past, there were times in the past when it had less future than now and it’s still here, therefore, we can assure it has future. So spoke Groucho.
Answer 2; It has future because Sam is working on it and it is being developed better than ever before.
frooyo, thank you. That was (to me) helpful and explanatory.
My guess is that until bbPress stops being used as WordPress’s forum of choice, it will continue to have a future. At that point, worry.
I don’t even know how to respond anymore, because really there is no way to defend myself while I’m in someone elses house. I can only speculate what Sam’s duties with Automattic are, because it’s none of my business. I can only assume from what I’ve read (where it’s been hinted at) that Sam is the sole developer behind bbPress, because again it’s none of my business who’s working on it really.
Suffice it to say that I think it’s really sad that my above response was met with such hostility and defensiveness, especially from someone holding the responsibility of moderation, considering there never really was any offense that I see dignified that kind of response. I really didn’t mean any harm or attitude; I even mentioned that I knew I was risking sounding a little off tone, but I think the question is probably a semi valid one, and I can’t speak for anyone else but myself when I ask…
I’m neither complaining, nor banging away. I’ve filed trac tickets and proposed solutions where I felt I qualified enough to supply one. I’ve written my own plugins and modified existing ones to work for specific situations. If what you think is that I’m pressuring or pestering anyone for anything, than I think that there’s a misunderstanding from the get go. I’m not saying it isn’t on my end, but what I will say is that I feel I’ve done my best to be friendly, contribute, and understand how the bbPress family is trying to run business here. I ask that you try to realize that to the new comer, some of what you all have come to know as common knowledge may not be for others, and that maybe… Just maybe, there are better ways to moderate a forum and still get your point across… Again, maybe it’s just me, but moderators typically wear many hats, sometimes one of which is the bouncer at the front door, protecting the crowd. I don’t see this forum as having a particularly riotous clientel, so I can’t say that much muscle is really even necessary…
Okay I’m rambling now…
My point being, that if Sam’s only job is to work on bbPress for Automattic, and he hasn’t been around or made any updates or changes, then I’d like to apply for his job.
Let me give you a little unofficial insight (half my opinion, half fact).
Automattic has millions in investment funding, it’s not going away, neither is bbPress.
But right now bbPress doesn’t make any money for Matt – in fact, it’s the opposite, it costs him to pay people to code it – so you won’t see lots of money thrown into developing it. bbPress was originally written by Matt to run the WordPress.org forums but it’s new goal is apparently to eventually power TalkPress (a forums version of WordPress.com)
Currently Sam is the only one working on bbPress but that’s only because other resources are being diverted to other projects. There have been at one time three or maybe four developers (including Matt) on bbPress. Just because there is only one person working on it now is NOT a sign that it is going away. It’s simply because Matt has only so many coders and needs them elsewhere. (You may notice Michael is temporarily MIA).
The people complaining were obviously not around for WordPress development and haven’t read any history about it. WordPress was nearly the EXACT same way. Until there was a commercial project based on it (ie. WordPress.com) development was in bursts. Nothing for weeks, and then a frenzy, before a new release.WordPress didn’t really make it’s mark until 2.0 – 2.1, then it took off and then Matt could justify paying lots of people to support it.
Like I keep saying but no one listens, bbPress is PRE-RELEASE software. It’s not even 1.0 yet. And just like WordPress, people who come onboard someday at version 2.0 – 2.1 will wonder what the heck you were complaining about.
If you are using bbPress right now, you are an EARLY ADOPTER.
You are experiencing EARLY ADOPTER BLUES.
Some people complain, some people try to contribute, some people go elsewhere.
Great post _ck_. Very inspiring and insightful for nitwits like me who are avid users but don’t know the big picture yet.
_ck_, why waste your time to repeat best known things?
If there is only single developer for the project then he must be insured.
http://www.firelawlawyer.com/family-law-attorney.html
