Privacy Rewrite GSoC Project

[Felipe Contreras]

On Fri, Aug 7, 2009 at 9:46 AM, Ethan Blanton<elb at pidgin.im> wrote:
> I am breaking my normal rule of not replying to your valueless trolls,
> because you're screwing with one of our SoC students.  I expect this
> to be your last email on the topic.

What makes you think these are "valueless trolls"? Without proof you
are merely slandering and you didn't even gave any explanation.

Anyway, I am certain at some point in the future you'll come to
realize what am saying is true. Just like it turns out I was right
about the nickname implementation, the PurpleDude, GLib 2.0.0
dependency, the "status message" independent of the "status", etc.
When I pushed all those ideas I'm sure you considered them "trolling"
but in the end they somehow turned out the be sensible.

Perhaps you are just wrong (just like you were wrong in the past),
perhaps I'm not trolling, maybe you should have good faith in order to
have a civilized discussion, and maybe you owe me an apology.

> Felipe Contreras spake unto us the ollowing wisdom:
>> > Regarding "Allow All", I am in favor of supporting this feature for every
>> > protocol. For protocols like MSN, we can produce a confirmation dialog,
>> > telling user the consequences of the action, asking the user to confirm that
>> > he really wants to choose this option. If we are choosing to implement a
>> > single coherent interface, we should avoid exceptions, and instead figure
>> > out ways to handle the rough edges.
>>
>> Think about this use-case:
>> Dude, I feel like chatting, but I normally have too many people
>> blocked, let's "allow all"
>>
>> AIM: protocol supports it, a bit is switched
>> MSN: protocol doesn't support it, all contacts are manually unblocked
>>
>> Hmm, I'm back to my usual busy status, I want my usually blocked
>> people to be blocked again
>>
>> AIM: protocol supports it, a bit is switched
>> MSN: protocol doesn't support it, you are screwed
>>
>> You want all of the protocols to work the same? Sorry, that's just not
>> possible.
>
> This is simply another case of not understanding data structures vs.
> behavior, if in a bit more abstract sense.
>
> There is no reason that, when switching to "Allow all" on MSN, we
> can't keep track of the previous block list state, and restore it when
> changing back from "Allow all" to "Block below".
>
> I'm not sure I think that Allow all is a useful state to support in
> the UI, but that's a very different issue from "it can't be done".
> I'm tired of hearing that things can't be done, or are a problem, when
> the *real* claim being put forth is "I don't like this, and I haven't
> thought about it.
>
> If you don't understand something, tell us you don't undersatnd it and
> we'll explain.  Don't assume that our capabilities are limited by your
> imagination, however.

Oh really? Then explain me how this would work:

 * login to Pidgin... click "permit all".
 * login to MSN official client, er, how do I block my usual denied contacts?

You can't. Same thing happens if you login into another computer, or
you use another client, local or web. The world doesn't revolve around
your local Pidgin, you know?

-- 
Felipe Contreras