Steam OpenID API and Vanilla Forums plugin

Avaine

What is Steam?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steam_(software)

Where's Steam OpenID documentation?
http://steamcommunity.com/dev

What I want?

• Just simple plugin to log in through Steam OpenID

Why should We do that?

• Because Steam Community have a lot of users?
• Because Steam OpenID API already exist?
• Because it can attract users to use vanilla forums?
• Because You can Help Me and other people?
• Because It will be great feature?

I think that it is not hard to do.
Please, listen to my request.
Can You do this?

// sorry for My English

businessdad

I could try making one, if nobody else volunteers. Would you like to sponsor it?

Avaine

Sorry, I'm not rich guy. I can not offer money.

Probably I will use "Social Login" by "Login Radius" to time when someone create simple plugin.

x00

Or you could do it yourself after all you think it is simple....what are you waiting for? There are plenty connect examples including Open ID.

I'm sorry but post like this should come with an automatic slap on the wrist. The level of entitlement that some people have these days that they expect other people just to drop everything and give up all their time. so they can benefit for no effort, completely misunderstanding the whole concept open source.

It is also always their priority that is the most important, and they are automatically experts on business strategy, despite not having lifted a finger.

businessdad

+1 for x00. For the record, the "Login with Steam" plugin is ready, I'm going to make it available soon. In my shop, obviously. It will be interesting to see how many people don't have $10 for it.

Avaine

@x00: Vanilla Forum is Open Source so what's the problem with my Topic (Question)?
Is this Freelancers forum or... wtf?

@businessdad: 10$ is good price. Not expensive.

peregrine

@businessdad said:
+1 for x00. For the record, the "Login with Steam" plugin is ready, I'm going to make it available soon. In my shop, obviously. It will be interesting to see how many people don't have $10 for it.

I guess thats what the business in businessdad stands for. And I applaud you for your efforts.

For the record, I much prefer the sponsorship route. In that way the plugin becomes open-source and provides developers with ideas. if every add-on on this site were a $10 fee. I probably would have never ever have been able to create the 20+ free plugins I uploaded. But then again, most of the people who have messaged me for a sponsored (paid) plugin, just want to know my rates rather than making a dollar offer for each plugin. Since I don't provide rates or give prices for developing things. They must provide the offer, and then I decide if I can and will do it for the offer. So, in some respects your technique saves the bother, and is a much better business model than mine. But is less appealing for the developer community that wants to learn from other plugins (analogous to going to the library rather than going to the bookstore). And for the record I have never bought a plugin for vanilla since I don't have a forum and probably never will (my loss) . I was looking forward to more of your uploaded plugins, but alas, I won't see them. And I totally understand everybody has their own business model. In summary, I've gotten used to the "entitlement" method for learning from other people's plugins that are added to the uploads section on this forum, as well as GPL licensing strictures that allow the plugins to be improved upon and code being able to be re-used without more stringent copyright restrictions.

It would be pretty rewarding to people who write plugins and themes that are uploaded to the to site, if some of the people who use the plugins or themes, (who had deeper pockets) provided a small monetary contribution of thanks, and probably more plugins would get developed. A symbiotic relationship.

x00

@Avaine just for your information Open Source isn't and never has meant it doesn't cost or you can't charge for work, despite many people thinking that.

It doesn't concern freeloaders. It actually meant that the source is released so people can adapt an use it as it as they see fit.

it is not an invitation for the entitled to expect work for free.

Sorry If I'm being a bit harsh, but I'm trying to make a point, which hopefully will make an impression.

peregrine

I think @Avaine would have remained unscathed, if he just said feature request.

without the words

"I think that it is not hard to do."

this phrase in itself triggers undesired responses. Since it belittles the time and effort of the people who have the time and ability to do it.

"simple to do"
"real easy"
"I don't have the time but can you do it for me?

probably should be avoided.

But I think feature requests are a valuable request, even if the person wants it for free.

Kasper

@businessdad said:
+1 for x00. For the record, the "Login with Steam" plugin is ready, I'm going to make it available soon. In my shop, obviously. It will be interesting to see how many people don't have $10 for it.

I for one am going to buy that - would very much like to take a look at the source.

As a sidenote: When I had the VanillaBootstrap forums online and put a donation link in the header, loads of people actually donated. I received well over $100 in donations without ever directly asking for it - I just put a link in my header with a "Help out a hard working student". Point is, if you give users the option to donate a bit of money, a lot of them will actually donate - not much, but it adds up in the end. Heck, I was able to buy a game on Steam as well as donate a bunch of money to other projects.

businessdad

@peregrine I understand your point. Fact is, I don't code as a hobby, nor as a passion anymore. It's my job, and, although I still kind of like it (real passion for it is long time gone), I do it to pay the bills.

However, I still try to contribute, when I can, and, from time to time, I give my product(s) away for free, without compromising on quality like many other developers do (i.e. "I give it to you for free, but the way it is, it is. If you want it fixed, pay me"). My Cron and Logger plugins are an example: they address what, for me, are big "holes" in Vanilla, and they both took a significant amount of time to write. Also, if you look at them, you will see that the code is clean, organised and documented, unlike what I find, more often than not, in a lot of free and paid software (not only for Vanilla).

About the business model:

• Donations didn't work for me. I'm not a student, but a professional working full time in Development. As much as I would appreciate the thought, I can't do much with a dollar or two of donations, as the cost of life is way too high, here (standard rates, where I live, are about $65 an hour for people with middle seniority).
• I am also not a big fan of sponsorship. Sponsorship is given to push the development of software, but it's not always easy to find an agreement. For example, a sponsor would expect his requirements to be met, which may make a plugin too custom to be useful to others. Also, he would expect some level of support, which may not always be guaranteed if the sponsored amount is too low.

For the above reasons, and many others, I chose the business model I use today. It may not be everybody's taste, but it allows me to focus on producing good quality code and ensure customer satisfaction.

Source: 15 years of experience in IT.

DirtyDog

It's really pretty sad how much of a struggle it is to get plugins made and people paid around here. I was looking at the plugin farm for Expression Engine (devote-ee.com) and it's pretty incredible. EE is not a huge CMS either, it's a pretty niche product. At Xenforo (a product threatened with extinction due to an ongoing lawsuit), someone managed to pull down over 1000 dollars to crowd source a gallery addon. What's it going to take to get this development community functioning again? Any ideas?

businessdad

On the topic of belittling people's skills and efforts, you should see some of the job offers I receive from elance. A good 80% of them describes the job as "simple, easy, won't take more than a couple of minutes" and has a budget of $50 (which means that the poster expects to pay about $20).

Every time I get these offers I ask the same question: if you know that it's so easy, why don't you do it yourself, instead of spending the required "couple of minutes" in posting the job?

Anyway, it's a long story and I'm seriously off topic now. I will probably post something about it on my blog, without cluttering the forum.

businessdad

@DirtyDog Although it may sound "pompous", by selling some of my work I'm trying to change the culture, here on the Community. My message is that quality has a value and that everyone should be rewarded for their efforts. For example, my LoginGuard plugin costs $60. Some people would call it expensive, but it shields their site from some fairly common hacking attempts.

If you consider how much would it cost to fix a hack, even simply in terms of restoring a backup (if you have any) and testing everything and without counting the damage in terms of reputation, nor the eventual loss of revenue, then $60 becomes very cheap.

It's also true that plenty of free addons are, in fairness, good, but, even when they are not, who can blame a Developer who chooses not to support them at all, if he has more profitable options? Sure, collaboration and contributions are good things, but not everybody does this as a hobby.

By the way, I care so much about quality that, several times, I joined some Open Source projects and found myself bombarding the main Developers to refactor it completely, because their code was pure cr#p. Yes, it worked, but I can't put my name on something made with haste and sticky tape.

businessdad

Many thanks to kasperisager, who (perhaps) involuntarily made me noticed I already wrote about the whole topic of "getting paid for what we do". I will still write more about it, though.

businessdad

@businessdad said:
I will still write more about it, though.

As promised: Being a Developer must not become a burden.

businessdad

Also, Steam Sign In plugin is now available.

Please use my Contact Form for Support requests. I recently integrated a ticketing system with the shop to better keep track of issues and manage them more easily. Thanks.