Policy for Posting Untested Software on Social Media?

General
1

Hey guys, so yesterday MatthewLM released his Android wallet for Peercoin. Yurizhai went ahead and posted it on Reddit. Then I went and posted it on Facebook and Twitter. All posts contained warnings that it’s beta software and to use at your own risk. I got this response though on Twitter…

https://twitter.com/PeercoinPPC/status/510184744114745346

Do you guys feel I should have waited to post about it after people in the community verified it was working ok and safe? I posted it because I wanted to get people’s attention on it so that it can be vetted faster. Maybe that might have been a mistake though. If in the future I posted something early and somebody got ripped off, I’d feel pretty bad about it. What do you think our policy should be for posting untested software on social media?

2

[quote=“Sentinelrv, post:1, topic:2864”]Hey guys, so yesterday MatthewLM released his Android wallet for Peercoin. Yurizhai went ahead and posted it on Reddit. Then I went and posted it on Facebook and Twitter. All posts contained warnings that it’s beta software and to use at your own risk. I got this response though on Twitter…

https://twitter.com/PeercoinPPC/status/510184744114745346

Do you guys feel I should have waited to post about it after people in the community verified it was working ok and safe? I posted it because I wanted to get people’s attention on it so that it can be vetted faster. Maybe that might have been a mistake though. If in the future I posted something early and somebody got ripped off, I’d feel pretty bad about it. What do you think our policy should be for posting untested software on social media?[/quote]

I’m okay with promoting this asap, as you did. Especially with the warning.

Every user of software marked as “beta” or “experimental” should know about the risks involved.

3

In my view, anything posted on Peercoin’s “own brand” social media is deemed to represent the Peercoin community. Therefore, any software posted should be first tested by the community. Otherwise, it is merely the work of an individual

Legalistically, a warning absolves us of responsiblity - but I don’t think it looks good. I think it is in everyone’s interest that the Community tests software before it is advertised, especially where people will be committing actual Peercoins

4

I agree with Robert Llyod when it comes to Twitter/Facebook. Untested software doesn’t belong on places that ‘official’.

5

[quote=“RobertLloyd, post:3, topic:2864”]In my view, anything posted on Peercoin’s “own brand” social media is deemed to represent the Peercoin community. Therefore, any software posted should be first tested by the community. Otherwise, it is merely the work of an individual

Legalistically, a warning absolves us of responsiblity - but I don’t think it looks good. I think it is in everyone’s interest that the Community tests software before it is advertised, especially where people will be committing actual Peercoins[/quote]

I agree with this, but how do we know when something has been fully tested and is safe? With Peerunity and Peershares we had a bunch of people working on that. Will we need dedicated testers for the Android wallet? How will we know when it’s safe to advertise?

6

It depends what we mean by “test”. I guess there are two levels:

(a) If the item has ten functions (send, save, etc.) then a tester should see that each function works as it should

(b) the tester should next verify the workings “behind” the buttons, whether that is the software code and/or the blockchain’s responses

So long as both levels are satisfied, then maybe it is good to go … but it might still be prudent to describe something as “beta” for, say, six months

These are just suggestions (I have no testing experience)

7

That was someone being a little bit of an ass and slightly protective. I could have polished my words.

8

Explain that comment, please

9

He’s the one that tweeted me, the link I included in the original post. He’s saying he came off a little harsh sounding.

10

Haha, I thought LifeDies was referring to me

11

Everyone should take responsibility him/herself. I don’t see problem with a random person telling the news that a software in its beta form is released. If you don’t know what to do with beta software you have to learn one way or another. For the current android release the official community news channel should say that it’s an early beta (I thought even an alpha) release.

12

I posted my initial thoughts trying out the wallet on the announcement thread:

Overall, I’m quite impressed, and I definitely recommend trying it out so we can all help MatthewLM locate bugs (… so far after 2 days I haven’t found any!)

Hopefully, someone experienced with Android development will be able to comment on the source code soon…