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[riffraffselbow]

"But with NINE women, we could have the baby finished in one month!"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-Month
The Mythical Man-Month isn't settled canon, but it's close to it. Tehran summed up the basic idea quite nicely.

That said, I think pace of the project could be increased in the long run with the addition of a few trusted developers, but that's ignoring the bigger question: would toady enjoy it as much? Toady strikes me as a classic "old soul" programmer; afraid of becoming an administrator, instead of a day-to-day coder.

[eerr]

Ungrateful, inconsiderate, impatient and selfish are the words that came to mind after reading the op and I apologize if that's an unfair judgement of you.

Really, why all the hate. OP made a valid point: Our criticism of the development of DF ought to be permitted to extend to how Toady makes the game, not just what he puts into it. He won't have to listen to it, it IS his creation after all, but why shouldn't we be allowed to discuss alternative options?

What are you going on about?

We are just giving the OP some constructive criticism based on what we know and have read on this forums, if you think that's hate, you haven't been involved in any flamewars before.

Those are hardly words I would use in constructive criticism. Regardless of wether you agree or disagree with his point this really has been poor form for a generally well mannered forum.

pssssh.

[Urist McDepravity]

TL;DR;

@Subj. Yes, I would. Moreover, yes, I did it numerous times. And its fun.
And I believe adv. mode will be 1000x more awesome when we get permanent environment changes and all skills/abilities from fort mode, because it will be ultimate hermit site builder, w/out annoying migrants and traders.

[LASD]

I'd like note too that Toady is allowing people to help him in a way he's comfortable with. First, there's the ports to Mac and Linux that weren't made by Toady. There's Baughn, who keeps battling the FPS problems that were the greatest complaint on the game. There's also Footkerchief that helps with the FotF-thread by providing people with answers on questions that Toady has already answered, which saves time. But the major thing Footkerchief contributes to the game is managing the bug tracker by resolving duplicates and stickying the worst bugs for Toady to focus on.

DF is not a one-man project. My view is that the team consists primarily of Toady and ThreeToe, but also of Baughn and Footkerchief (and the DF Talk guys). The others don't fix gameplay bugs, but they contribute significantly on the project that saves time on Toady's part, which he uses to fix 'em.

P.S. I've never actually heard the "Just one man" defence before. The ones I see are "It's only an alpha" and "it's free", which work better as there's not much you can say to those.

[KrunkSplein]

Let me go ahead and address some of the confusion in this thread.

There are several reasons why the responses to OP have been vitriolic.  Despite Einstein's trolling attempt, it has nothing to do with messiah worship.  It has everything to do with the fact that Toady has developed - and continues to develop - a game that entertains for far longer than any AAA-title, and does so for free.  The OP (and some - but not all - posts supporting him) come off as insulting.  For those of us who have enjoyed DF for YEARS, having it (and Toady) insulted can ONLY result in outrage.  I'm surprised that the responses have been as light-handed as they are.

As a programmer who has worked on individual- and team-driven projects, I have some minor insight into project management, and how things invariably unfold.  Both systems work great, better than their counterpart depending on the circumstances.  With team projects, the organized method is to have the team break down the system into a series of smaller black-boxes that individuals can work on.  The important bit there is that the project is designed from the ground up to be a team effort.  Taking an individual project and throwing people at it hinders productivity far more than it adds through parallel work.  As a perfect example, look at Baughn's amazing work with the graphics rendering.  For the vast majority of people, it speeds up play significantly, and that is a very good thing.  However, as anyone who was desperately waiting for the new release will tell you, it takes a truly substantial amount of time for Toady to merge the graphics code back into the prime code base.  This is because the project was never intended for multiple developers.  Was Baughn's work worth it?  Hell yes!  It's a near-perfect success.  But it took a substantial amount of effort to make it happen, and the graphics are probably the most compartmentalized section of the project (note: that's a guess given most project structures).

The dev log of Dwarf Fortress is what I read when I feel myself getting too cocky.  I show it to other developers to watch their dumbfounded reactions.  The complexity of this game is immeasurable, and yet Toady has externalized as much as possible to the RAWs so the modders can do their thing.

Are there bugs?  Yes.
Would multithreading kick ass?  Yes.
Do we want a finished DF within our lifetimes?  Yes.
Will pestering Toady help any of those things?  No.

If you want to make DF a better game, submit bugs into the tracker.  Try and recreate them.  See if you can discover the circumstances under which an esoteric bug occurs.  Add that information into the tracker.

Every feature you would request, every bug fix you would cry over - Toady (and the tracker) knows of them.  He does his best to prioritize these things and address them as quickly as possible.

And to address a post in particular:

But you can at least have them submit fixes to you for known bugs (not suggestions, not new development, just KNOWN BUGS that are on your to-do list to fix). Then you can look over their code and test it out.

The problem with that is the assumption that the codebase remains static long enough for simultaneous development to occur without stepping on toes.  Even using source repositories and merge tools, multiple people working on the same file can be disastrous.  Secondly, you are assuming that someone brought in would have the knowledge necessary to know where in the code the bug would be.  Toady knows his code inside and out.  The ramp-up time for supplemental developers would be enormous.

For fuck's sake, man. It's been eight years. You're on 0.31.10. You will not complete DF in your lifetime unless you step back and start letting a few someone elses help.

Skipping over how insulting and infuriating that is, I think you are severely underestimating the amount of development which has occurred over time.  In the last few years, the game has gone from 2D with static features to a 3D game complex enough to allow calculators to be created with magma flow.  You are underestimating Toady.

Okay I'm done.

[Makbeth]

The OP (and some - but not all - posts supporting him) come off as insulting.  For those of us who have enjoyed DF for YEARS, having it (and Toady) insulted can ONLY result in outrage. 

One wonders what discussion is possible without you taking offense at it.

I did not demand Toady change anything.  I did not denounce him or his game.  I did not suggest he give up control. 

All I did was disagree with his methods and explain why I disagreed with them, and suggest that a common knee-jerk reaction to criticism of the game elsewhere cites those methods as a defense, when they could actually be contributing to the problem. 

I was not aware of Toady's motivations for the project at the time, and some of those who did not immediately label me a troll pointed them out, among other things I wasn't aware of.  I have since changed my mind.  I still think the small dev team leads to some unfortunate problems, but now I see that there are very few scenarios where a different strategy would work better, and Toady should be allowed to continue having fun the way he wants to.

The original post achieved its purpose.  I stated my opinion, got a response, and though it required a great deal of sifting, I found some of those responses to be helpful. 

But now I'm wondering just why it is that it is so easy to be labeled a troll here.  This is without a doubt the single most volatile forum I've ever posted on, unless you count political Youtube videos (well, Youtube in general I guess).

To the posters who did not label me a troll or change the subject to hermit forts:

Thank you for your responses both on and off the forums, I appreciate it.  You and the advice/information you gave are the reason I signed up here, and the reason I did not decide to just stop coming here after the initial responses.

[Makbeth]

This is without a doubt the single most volatile forum I've ever posted on

You're sheltered, and I envy you.

Well, I've picked my forums carefully in the past.  I've made a habit of only signing up with small, specialized communities.

[SmileyMan]

If you don't like it, get a dev team together and write a better program quicker, and put Bay12 out of business.  If you don't have the skill or inclination to do that (an certainly no-one else seems to have done so far), then maybe Bay12's business and development model is optimal for this style of game and its attendent market?  Capitalism seems to think so.

[Beeskee]

To the posters who did not label me a troll or change the subject to hermit forts:

Thank you for your responses both on and off the forums, I appreciate it.  You and the advice/information you gave are the reason I signed up here, and the reason I did not decide to just stop coming here after the initial responses.

There's a lot of geeks here, unfortunately some with the "slashdot" mentality of labeling someone as a troll when they disagree with their opinion.

(Some of that may be overreaction due to the GIFT)

Keep in mind that forums are like the cesspools of the internet. Some of them might be clear, sparkly, even drinkable, but most contain a thousand years of distilled human waste products. This forum is relatively unmuddied, only the occasional floater disturbing an otherwise placid surface.

[Makbeth]

If you don't like it, get a dev team together and write a better program quicker, and put Bay12 out of business.  If you don't have the skill or inclination to do that (an certainly no-one else seems to have done so far), then maybe Bay12's business and development model is optimal for this style of game and its attendent market?  Capitalism seems to think so.

Did you read the following?

I have since changed my mind.  I still think the small dev team leads to some unfortunate problems, but now I see that there are very few scenarios where a different strategy would work better, and Toady should be allowed to continue having fun the way he wants to.

I believe that addresses your comment.  And I never had any illusions that I could do anything better than a shameful job in comparison; game development is not what I'm good at, and not what I want to dedicate my life to.

[Kilo24]

But now I'm wondering just why it is that it is so easy to be labeled a troll here.  This is without a doubt the single most volatile forum I've ever posted on, unless you count political Youtube videos (well, Youtube in general I guess).

It's one of the things that Toady has been rather adamant about. Getting more people to work on the source is almost up there multithreading and multiplayer as to their tendency to spawn short ill-conceived topics whose posters obviously didn't note what Toady's actually said about them.  A decent few people just glanced over the argument and lumped it in there with those topics - even though you never said "why doesn't Toady open-source DF?".

It's more that you leaped on one of the pricklier topics on this forums immediately, even though you did have something good to say about it. 

Besides, getting collaborators to work on DF already happened, so it's been shown that Toady isn't completely against the concept.

To the posters who did not label me a troll or change the subject to hermit forts:

Thank you for your responses both on and off the forums, I appreciate it.  You and the advice/information you gave are the reason I signed up here, and the reason I did not decide to just stop coming here after the initial responses.

Speaking for myself, I like people who can present a good argument, and you did.

[Jordrake]

To the posters who did not label me a troll or change the subject to hermit forts:

I didn't label you a troll, but after noting the pointlessness of the topic I did change the subject.
I don't know if that applies to me or not.

[spooq]

Common videogame code like path-finding could be farmed out in exactly the same way as the graphics were. Define an interface, and go. It is a good model for this game. There is no artistic integrity to be lost in a better path-finder.

I'd also put money on the code being amazingly bad, or at the very least old-fashioned. Not that it really matters either way. Lots of good commercial games have terrible code. In the end, the code either runs or crashes, is fast or slow, does the job or not.

Toady does not have the kind of exposure to other programmers ideas that you get in a commercial situation. It is pretty obvious he doesn't do regression testing, for example.

Toady is writing his Great American Novel, in a new medium, virgin territory. He will need an editor before anyone will ever be able to read the full thing. I'm quite jealous of him being able to make an artistic statement in the way he is. One day, it might be normal to work on a single program for your entire life.

[Makbeth]

Good point.  I wouldn't wish the task of reading and modifying my particle animation scripts on anyone.  Towards completion I have a hard time understanding them if I've been away for more than a couple days, and they tend to only be about a month's work each.  I can't imagine what DF must look like under the hood. 

But I rarely document my own scripts.  I'll bet with a project of this size you either document it or die.

Or, who knows.  Maybe Toady is a mutant and percieves the entirety of the code at all times, even away from the computer.  Maybe Version One plays in his head, and is powering his fey mood, demanding that he bring it into being or perish.

I like that explanation better.

[mallocks]

Good point.  I wouldn't wish the task of reading and modifying my particle animation scripts on anyone.  Towards completion I have a hard time understanding them if I've been away for more than a couple days, and they tend to only be about a month's work each.  I can't imagine what DF must look like under the hood. 

But I rarely document my own scripts.  I'll bet with a project of this size you either document it or die.

Or, who knows.  Maybe Toady is a mutant and percieves the entirety of the code at all times, even away from the computer.  Maybe Version One plays in his head, and is powering his fey mood, demanding that he bring it into being or perish.

I like that explanation better.

This is something Toady has addressed pretty closely, in one of the DF Talks:

I leave enough comments that I can come back in six months and know what I've done. I don't use perfect variable names but I use pretty good variable names. I remember reading some forum somewhere where people were like 'well he probably just names his variables 'a', 'b', 'c', 'd' and 'foo fah foo flam blum blum blum' like he's an idiot or something' but you give things meaningful names and you need fewer comments, right? I can pretty much read through my code, it reads pretty straightforward to me, because things have sensible names.