The 'when' question

[dfort]

The M50 came out after Game of Thrones season 7 and before season 8 started we got this teaser:

magiclantern-fishy.2019Apr01.M50101.zip

Ah nice but Canon announced firmware update 1.0.2 in January. No worries:

BTW, Greg already sent me the updated stubs for 1.0.2, so the next build will run on latest firmware.

When? Not wanting to bug  a1ex I went ahead and updated the main repository to 1.0.2 but where is the "fishy" code and has there been any other update to 1.0.2? I wanted to see if there was anything new at a1ex.magiclantern.fm/bleeding-edge/M50/ but found myself in the forbidden zone until I got to this:

Hola, mundo!

Ok that went nowhere--how about checking out the information in the "fishy" autoexec.bin:

Code: [Select]

Magic Lantern fishy.2019Apr01.M50101
Camera   : M50
Firmware : 101
Changeset: dd284faf66c8 (fishy-april-fools) tip
Built on : 2019-04-01 12:00:19 by alex@thinkpad

Where's that changeset? Not on the main repository or in any of the bitbucket.org/a1ex/ repositories. Hum, seems this is accessible only to the one sitting on the iron throne. Will it take an act of Congress to get the full unredacted source code to this "fishy" build?

Ok, enough kidding around. What I really wanted to ask is if there would be an update before I leave for vacation on Tuesday but figured that was inappropriate to post.

[a1ex]

When?

I'm really sorry. Today was my first "truly free" day after April 1st (i.e. not claimed by work and family). Guess what I did, other than answering @garry23's posts - I slept all day long. Sorry, had to.

That's exactly why I'm hesitating to publish the Patreon page - because I'm unable to meet the expectations right now. Sorry

What I really wanted to ask is if there would be an update before I leave for vacation on Tuesday but figured that was inappropriate to post.

I'm not leaving anywhere. My initial plan was to catch up with coding, until reading this. Somehow I end up handling "bugging" requests as "reducing the priority", as that's when I start to wonder - why I'm even doing this?!

The remaining task - for me - is "just" to redo the M50 changes in a clean way, keeping all other models working in the same codebase, and considering other DIGIC 6/7/8 models (i.e. to see what exactly applies to M50, what applies only to DIGIC 7/8, what also applies to DIGIC 6 and so on). Yes, this takes time and I have trouble completing it during breaks (that's why I usually choose smaller tasks to work on).

Bugging me does not help at all - see for example 1300D. On the contrary, I think I'm going to take a longer break now.

Happy Easter...

[dfort]

Well I did say I didn't want to bug you and what I wanted to post was inappropriate so I didn't post it--or did I?

I'm going on vacation with the M50 but also taking along an EOSM because I won't leave home without Magic Lantern.

In any case, have a nice break. Watch out for Easter eggs!

[Walter Schulz]

That's exactly why I'm hesitating to publish the Patreon page - because I'm unable to meet the expectations right now. Sorry

Am I the only one sniffing a "Chicken or the egg" here? Or in programmers terms: Deadlock.

I take the liberty asking you to drop condition "right now". Don't know who came up with this part anyway ...

[a1ex]

Read: in the coming weeks or maybe months (unpredictable things happened and are likely to happen). I've got some time with the holidays, but... didn't have the energy to code anything.

Promising to work on XYZ, only to be unable to deliver a couple of months later, and having supporters ask when it's ready, is the last thing I want. All these "when" questions asked all the time... eventually resulted in me developing the above reaction, i.e. priority inversion upon seeing this question. Not just with ML, but also in other contexts. I didn't have this "bug" 5 years ago, for example.

If you are wondering - right before seeing the "when" question for the M50 port, I was working precisely on that. The M50 is in the exact same place I've left it a few days ago. I know, it doesn't seem right, I need to do something to fix it.

So, I'm rather tempted to take a longer break (1-2 months, maybe more, I don't know) and make a decision afterwards.

[Walter Schulz]

Come on. We will always have people/trolls/twits/morons/naggers unable to grab the concept. No matter how often it is declared to be useless or annoying. We had naggers posting directly under replies offering in no unclear terms that their requests/"encouragements" are unwanted. And we will have a lot of them in the future.


And had a WTF moment with dfort's post, too.

[a1ex]

I know that. TLDR - I'm looking for a way to regain motivation without pushing myself too hard.

[baladev]

a1ex, if I may..

I don't know you and you don't know me and I'm a nobody here or in general. But I feel you are going through something in you life possibly. Something that makes you doubt if this project is worth doing or maybe your time/effort is better applied somewhere else.. This is very normal and something I can relate to. Or maybe you are an artist at heart and nothing kills creativity and fun better than pressure and lack of respect and appreciation from others.

I know that behind that nick there's a living person, who feels and fights his own demons as we all do. I can't even imagine to what number of hours this number of messages below your nick translates to.. a lot. You have already done for us, for this project so much and you owe nothing to anyone. Do whatever you need to do to go through whatever you are going through and make it right for yourself. Maybe it even means stopping working on ML. We often forget that a person is more important than stuff..

No matter your decision, I will respect you the same. You have already done for me much more than I will ever do for you. Now take care of yourself and do the right thing that makes you feel better. I wish you all the best!

[calle2010]

The M50 is in the exact same place I've left it a few days ago. I know, it doesn't seem right, I need to do something to fix it.

I have no idea how the M50 code looks like. Is there anything holding you back from pushing it to an experimental branch with lots of "TODO" comments and leave it to the community to solve these?

If cleaning up the code is beyond the capabilities of anybody else but you, which could well be the case, then ML as a project has a serious issue.

[scrax]

a1ex, if I may..

I don't know you and you don't know me and I'm a nobody here or in general. But I feel you are going through something in you life possibly. Something that makes you doubt if this project is worth doing or maybe your time/effort is better applied somewhere else.. This is very normal and something I can relate to. Or maybe you are an artist at heart and nothing kills creativity and fun better than pressure and lack of respect and appreciation from others.

I know that behind that nick there's a living person, who feels and fights his own demons as we all do. I can't even imagine to what number of hours this number of messages below your nick translates to.. a lot. You have already done for us, for this project so much and you owe nothing to anyone. Do whatever you need to do to go through whatever you are going through and make it right for yourself. Maybe it even means stopping working on ML. We often forget that a person is more important than stuff..

No matter your decision, I will respect you the same. You have already done for me much more than I will ever do for you. Now take care of yourself and do the right thing that makes you feel better. I wish you all the best!

I totally agree with you, can't say it better.

@A1ex: All the time, the knowledge, the lessons, the work and the good feeling you gifted to the comunity is so great that is impossible to misure. You always had the right answer, and I've never had the feeling you are not doing enought. I really have a lot of ammiration in how you manged all this. Take all the time you need to fell good. I really admire you and your talent (and not only yours of course I have a lot of gratitude for all the people who in a way or another partecipated in ML project).
I'm confident that even now you will take the right decision, don't worry.
There could be trolls coming and going, bad feeling and so on but nothing will let me think that you have to be sorry for having to live you life like you want.
I'm wanished for years without even knowing why, and when back last month you made me fell at home again like It was yesterday that I left. You are really an example for me. I whish you and your family all the best!

[RouletteRun]

This is my first ever post in this forum.

I got my M50 maybe a couple of months ago and I found this site due to a post in the M50 User's Group on Facebook where I am a member. Before posting, I went back to April 1st and read forward.

I personally cannot code myself out of a wet paper bag, but I have been involved in cryptocurrencies (Bitcoin, etc.) since 2014 and have been involved in crypto projects that were coded by others and over the years I have learned that there is no Estimated Time of Arrival (ETA) for the completion of a project. A coding project is finished when it's finished. Most projects of this type are as it appears is the case with Alex, done in the dev's spare time and if that person has a real life job, spare time can sometimes be hard to come by, especially if they also have a family who commands their attention.

I'm as interested as anyone to see what kind of results this project might be able to achieve but some of you need to tamp down your expectations on a completion date of this project because it's obvious to me that Alex is feeling pressured and pressure is not going to help him complete this project. I applaud those of you who have offered to assist in testing and such, that's the kind of support Alex needs to complete the project. The rest of us need to give Alex a break on our expectations of when a working model will be ready. Getting Alex frustrated and upset is not going to get you where you want to be.

[dfort]

I have no idea how the M50 code looks like.

https://bitbucket.org/hudson/magic-lantern/src/digic6-dumper/platform/M50.102/

Hey guys sorry if I trolled. If you re-read my post the only important part is: "...where is the "fishy" code and has there been any other update to 1.0.2?" Please understand that I pitched in, did the 1.0.1 to 1.0.2 firmware update and I would have liked to have updated the "fishy" version before taking some time off myself but--well, my bags are packed and I'm ready to go. Not a big deal, there are some users more qualified than I am who own M50's and are chomping on the bit to get started. I know there are because I've been contacted by a few and have even visited one here in Los Angeles. Unfortunately they will have to wait a while longer. My bad.

Much of my ML time has switched from getting users to compile to getting users to share their code. Some of this I've done on the forum but I've been doing most of it in private because when I asked someone to share their code in public--it was met with resistance. In some cases the tools in the Magic Lantern toolset can be used to reverse engineer the code and then share it. The work that is being done behind the scenes have been more successful. Danne's EOSM/100D bleeding edge experiments have been getting some attention and with the help of theBilalFakhouri and Levas we were able to integrate their 700D and 6D codes respectively. I even have a 650D test in the works but my post on that topic remains unanswered.

Back on this topic, I couldn't track down the code for the M50 April fools build so I documented the steps I took that should have worked. That's when I had my WTF moment--the code is locked up somewhere. How to handle it? My humor didn't quite hit the mark, I did get some PM's about it being inappropriate. Again, sorry about that. In hindsight I should have just [REDACTED].

[70MM13]

A1ex,
I really hope it's not too late for you to feel good about magic lantern again.
What you have accomplished is simply incredible, and I'm sure that everyone in this community feels the same way.
The simple fact is that this project is reaching critical mass.

You need to do what you think is best, and what is best for you above all else!

The "magic" in magic lantern is real, and you created that magic.  Nothing will ever take that away.

Follow your inspiration, wherever it leads you.

You have inspired all of us, and I thank you sincerely!  I can't thank you enough for what YOU have enabled me and everyone else here to do...

You rock, my friend.

I repeat the opening sentence to close.

Stay cool!

[calle2010]

https://bitbucket.org/hudson/magic-lantern/src/digic6-dumper/platform/M50.102/

Hey guys sorry if I trolled. If you re-read my post the only important part is: "...where is the "fishy" code and has there been any other update to 1.0.2?"

I know your repository and I did understand your intention. Also I understood that in the "fishy" code there would be important changes applicable to D7 models as well. Is there the nearly finished code for the display, for example?

So I fully agree with what you intended, but not with the words you chose.

[Audionut]

I think I'm going to take a longer break now.

You don't owe us, or this project anything.  You've given your free time, for almost nine years, to this project, and have driven the project (with the assistance of all other contributors) from a single camera build, to what it is today.

Back when I was very active, I have some very fond memories of spending lots of time discussing various things related to this project, with you.  You're assistance and patience was really appreciated.  You have not only contributed significant time to the project, but also to helping a countless number of general users, and more importantly, to users who have gone on to actively contribute to this project, who most likely would not have, without the assistance you provided.

Did you forget this is a hobby?

How to handle it? My humor didn't quite hit the mark, I did get some PM's about it being inappropriate.

It's easy to get lost in excitement, and clearly, if you had the foresight to see the actual outcome, things would have been typed differently, of that I am sure.

Given your contributions to the project, personally, I would rather see people just leave it alone.  You're both adults, and you're both quite capable of resolving any issues that arise.  a1ex even acknowledges that he currently suffers from sick and tired of dumb users bug.

I didn't have this "bug" 5 years ago, for example.

If people contributed to this project with the enthusiasm that they contribute to a misunderstanding, we likely wouldn't even be having this discussion.

[Danne]

I thought working with ml projects was "taking a break"

[Levas]

My advice to A1ex:
Take a break from this forum.

Change the text "5D Mark Free" on your account to "Out of office" or "Taking a break, don't know how long" or something like that.



That way you don't feel the need/pressure to answer questions or problems on the forum and don't feel responsible what is going on here.
The forum is a big distraction with all the questions and problems.
Maybe consider even stop reading the forum for a while to get some rest.

And if you consider to going further with development, you can set up some rules for how you want it to share or handle on the forum.
Maybe a topic where, for example, you are the only person who can post new messages, a topic where nobody can reply, just you post some status updates or share some thoughts or links to code and that's it.
No discussion, no questions -> no distraction or pressure for you.

[a1ex]

Good idea, leaving the project in the hands of Danne and dfort for a while.

Have fun!

[a1ex]

That wasn't an offense; I've just picked the persons capable - in my opinion - to take care of the ML project on the development side, from the contributors currently active.

Of course, there's no obligation to accept this role. And you may do this while "taking a break" (your own words).

[tsengvane]

thx a1ex !

you did a lot of great jobs!

[Danne]

Sorry, misunderstood you @a1ex.
Well, I gladly help in any way I can. I'd be honoured.
However. Pretty hard to take on your legacy but a few areas might be places i could help.

[a1ex]

Thanks; there are no specific goals while I'll be away. I'll see how things will end up and decide the next steps afterwards. Just keep things rolling - i.e. what you'd have done anyway.

[Danne]

Cool. Doable.

[Levas]

That wasn't an offense

None taken 

I know how to compile and I know how to work with the code you made for crop_rec.c.
And that's about all I know about development 

Enjoy your break 

[dfort]

What happened to my break? Just landed in Costa Rica.



Have a nice break a1ex!