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The amazingly useful SC Controller [GitHub] project, a third-party open source driver and user interface for the Steam Controller has a new release out. Sadly, the last for a while.

Here's what's new in 0.4.5:

  • On-screen keyboard can be now used with DS4 gamepad
  • Improved editing profile using controller
  • Allowed SVG custom menu icons
  • Allowed displaying multiple OSD messages, with different font size and display time
  • Bug fixes

In the release notes, the developer Kozec said this:

This is last SC-Controller release for a while. With all that mess happening around Linux this week, I've decided to move away as far as possible. I plan to finish all "enhancements" eventually, just not right now.

They went into further detail in a Patreon post, here's the gist of it:

As you probably already heard, earlier this week, Linux became part of political movement. It's movement that I strongly disagree with and wish to not be associated with in any way. Because of that, I don't feel welcomed in Linux community anymore.

Or, to write it like human being, with all this mess, coding is not fun at all.

So I'm throwing hands up and walking through the middle.

For those who don't really understand, it's likely as a result of the new Code of Conduct for the Linux Kernel. Something that has become a hot sticky mess in the wider community. Regardless of my own feelings about the CoC, I just hope people can find a way to get along and treat everyone with respect, regardless of who they are and where they come from.

I'm pretty sad about this, I use SC Controller practically every day for taming the Steam Controller outside of Steam and for those Steam games that don't detect it normally.

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Tags: Apps, Drivers
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tuubi Sep 27, 2018
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Quoting: slaapliedjeI'm not sure how the agenda is hidden, it's pretty plain. When contributors, even of software that isn't directly part of the source code (like the SC controller that just integrates with the kernel) decide to stop developing because of it, it's already caused damage. Whether intentional or not.
He paused development to make a statement. The price of progress I guess. Maybe he'll come around when this storm in a teacup blows over.
slaapliedje Sep 27, 2018
Quoting: tuubi
Quoting: slaapliedjeI'm not sure how the agenda is hidden, it's pretty plain. When contributors, even of software that isn't directly part of the source code (like the SC controller that just integrates with the kernel) decide to stop developing because of it, it's already caused damage. Whether intentional or not.
He paused development to make a statement. The price of progress I guess. Maybe he'll come around when this storm in a teacup blows over.

I find it sad that it's come down to this. Like during a war, I can see protestors. But when people are like 'I want you to respect that I don't want to be identified as a male or female'? It's like being okay with watching a child burn themselves and then they say "I want to burn myself, just accept me for burning myself, I identify as a burner." You still want to take the lighters away...

Being paranoid because you might use the wrong pronoun to address someone is rather kind of silly once you think about it...
Purple Library Guy Sep 27, 2018
Quoting: slaapliedje
Quoting: tuubi
Quoting: slaapliedjeI'm not sure how the agenda is hidden, it's pretty plain. When contributors, even of software that isn't directly part of the source code (like the SC controller that just integrates with the kernel) decide to stop developing because of it, it's already caused damage. Whether intentional or not.
He paused development to make a statement. The price of progress I guess. Maybe he'll come around when this storm in a teacup blows over.

I find it sad that it's come down to this. Like during a war, I can see protestors. But when people are like 'I want you to respect that I don't want to be identified as a male or female'? It's like being okay with watching a child burn themselves and then they say "I want to burn myself, just accept me for burning myself, I identify as a burner." You still want to take the lighters away...
Wait, what? WTF difference does it make?! Someone wants to call themselves a girl or a boy or neither or whatever . . . either they know more about themselves than you know about them (seems quite likely), or they don't--but even if they don't, who gives a shit? Burning themselves my ass, how the hell does what gender role they're rocking do any harm? Sure, I'd want people to be pretty damn sure what they're getting into before they go for surgery that's awfully hard to reverse, but how they identify . . . whatever.

And like, we can call people by the internet handle they choose (even though it's totally not their name and may not even be a reference to a human being), and if they decide to change it we call them by the new version. One of the more respected people around the Linux gaming scene calls himself a piece of cheese, nobody bats an eye. What makes a pronoun such a big hairy deal? Hell, most of the people on the internet we don't even know what gender they biologically are, we just use whatever pronoun seems to apply or whatever one they specify if it comes up. So like, people identifying as this or that doesn't even change the process any.

This kind of stuff is just rationalizing. The bottom line here is a discomfort with people thinking a different way from you, not a concern for the person in question.
scaine Sep 27, 2018
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Quoting: slaapliedje
Quoting: tuubi
Quoting: slaapliedjeI'm not sure how the agenda is hidden, it's pretty plain. When contributors, even of software that isn't directly part of the source code (like the SC controller that just integrates with the kernel) decide to stop developing because of it, it's already caused damage. Whether intentional or not.
He paused development to make a statement. The price of progress I guess. Maybe he'll come around when this storm in a teacup blows over.

I find it sad that it's come down to this. Like during a war, I can see protestors. But when people are like 'I want you to respect that I don't want to be identified as a male or female'? It's like being okay with watching a child burn themselves and then they say "I want to burn myself, just accept me for burning myself, I identify as a burner." You still want to take the lighters away...

Being paranoid because you might use the wrong pronoun to address someone is rather kind of silly once you think about it...

Man, this complete lack of understanding of the CoC is depressing. The FUD, like this, well, it's just very difficult to keep dealing with.

So. The CoC says NOTHING about having to respect someone for having different gender identity. It says respect their contribution and be inclusive REGARDLESS of their gender identity (as one example). And as for the insulting comparison of having a gender identity being compared to a clueless child burning themselves? Yeah, I'm not even going to respond to that. And you want to take their lighters away, do you? What does that even mean? You want to "fix" people with a different gender identity to you? Jesus.

Since you don't appear to have read it - here it again: https://www.contributor-covenant.org/version/1/4/code-of-conduct

But why bother? The detractors, at this point, aren't even pretending to have read it. Just pure, unfiltered FUD. Next time one of you wants to extrapolate some conspiracy theory about why you, personally, don't like this CoC, at least have the guts to actually quote where you see the CoC tripping you up.

And if you're right? Great - let the Linux Foundation know. Submit a request into the Git repo and actually do something about it, instead of spreading FUD like this.
TheSyldat Sep 27, 2018
Quoting: slaapliedjeI'm not sure how the agenda is hidden, it's pretty plain. When contributors, even of software that isn't directly part of the source code (like the SC controller that just integrates with the kernel) decide to stop developing because of it.
This just this . I'm sorry to all the nay sayers and doomsday announcers but it's been a solid 23 pages now and none of you have brought on the table any valid arguments wahtsoever. Heck even the REAL subject of the news isn't discussed because "oh my god a CoC has been adopted" ...
A CoC that need I remind you has been adopted by a ton of other software and hardware project leaders companies and fundations and have received the same critcisms from the people it's supposed to defend and yet the people that are supposedly defended and empowered by it keep on repeating that it's wording is too vague for its own good but that on the other end the paranoia surrounding having a code of conduct needs to stop.

How in the entire hell is "the agenda" hidden here . Looks like an open conversation to me and not just at the Linux fundation level but at Microsoft Headquarters , at Google Headquarters, at Apple headquarters , heck even at Thyssenkrupp (yep even the software branch of a metalurgy group known to develop its own software for its own puprposes adopted that template some few years back (in 2013 to be precise ) ... and I sure as all fuck don't see Thysenkrupp going down the drain ... heck if anything their division that speciliazes in elevators is giving their days of old rival OTIS a run for their money lately ... )

So with all that in mind given that we are the very first ones to critize it in the first place and that the conversation has been fairly opened about just about everywhere can FINALLY stop the conspiracy talk yes or no ????


Last edited by TheSyldat on 27 September 2018 at 11:01 pm UTC
tuubi Sep 27, 2018
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Quoting: slaapliedjeBeing paranoid because you might use the wrong pronoun to address someone is rather kind of silly once you think about it...
Apparently there's one thing we can agree on. It is a really silly thing to be paranoid about, and merits some self-analysis on the part of the sufferer.

My suggestion: Let's adopt Finnish as the official language of the Internet. We have no gendered pronouns to trigger this preposterous phobia.


I'll pretend you didn't write the rest of your post because it's simply too sad to contemplate.
slaapliedje Sep 28, 2018
Quoting: scaine
Quoting: slaapliedje
Quoting: tuubi
Quoting: slaapliedjeI'm not sure how the agenda is hidden, it's pretty plain. When contributors, even of software that isn't directly part of the source code (like the SC controller that just integrates with the kernel) decide to stop developing because of it, it's already caused damage. Whether intentional or not.
He paused development to make a statement. The price of progress I guess. Maybe he'll come around when this storm in a teacup blows over.

I find it sad that it's come down to this. Like during a war, I can see protestors. But when people are like 'I want you to respect that I don't want to be identified as a male or female'? It's like being okay with watching a child burn themselves and then they say "I want to burn myself, just accept me for burning myself, I identify as a burner." You still want to take the lighters away...

Being paranoid because you might use the wrong pronoun to address someone is rather kind of silly once you think about it...

Man, this complete lack of understanding of the CoC is depressing. The FUD, like this, well, it's just very difficult to keep dealing with.

So. The CoC says NOTHING about having to respect someone for having different gender identity. It says respect their contribution and be inclusive REGARDLESS of their gender identity (as one example). And as for the insulting comparison of having a gender identity being compared to a clueless child burning themselves? Yeah, I'm not even going to respond to that. And you want to take their lighters away, do you? What does that even mean? You want to "fix" people with a different gender identity to you? Jesus.

Since you don't appear to have read it - here it again: https://www.contributor-covenant.org/version/1/4/code-of-conduct

But why bother? The detractors, at this point, aren't even pretending to have read it. Just pure, unfiltered FUD. Next time one of you wants to extrapolate some conspiracy theory about why you, personally, don't like this CoC, at least have the guts to actually quote where you see the CoC tripping you up.

And if you're right? Great - let the Linux Foundation know. Submit a request into the Git repo and actually do something about it, instead of spreading FUD like this.

I actually wasn't talking about the CoC. I was referring to people who are trying to push things like the CoC onto everything.

Clearly my analogy failed. No, the lighter in this would be the stamping on others because we don't feel like referring to people as cheese. For code contributors I don't give a damn if you are an antelope, just if the code is good. That is why people are upset about this. The identity of the contributor should not matter at all, only code quality. If in 'the real world' you want to dress up as Winnie the Poo and get whipped, cool, go for it, but you don't need to describe that in a mailing list about kernel development because no one cares. When some code gets rejected and someone cries bigot, how is that fair to anyone if the code then gets accepted just to prevent someone's feelings getting hurt.

This should be like separating church and stare, except it is separating Code and Social standing.

Maybe that is clearer? Also the identity thing is messing with language. Think of Spanish for example. Amigo, Amiga and... what? Shall we start with Amigoa?
slaapliedje Sep 28, 2018
Quoting: tuubi
Quoting: slaapliedjeBeing paranoid because you might use the wrong pronoun to address someone is rather kind of silly once you think about it...
Apparently there's one thing we can agree on. It is a really silly thing to be paranoid about, and merits some self-analysis on the part of the sufferer.

My suggestion: Let's adopt Finnish as the official language of the Internet. We have no gendered pronouns to trigger this preposterous phobia.


I'll pretend you didn't write the rest of your post because it's simply too sad to contemplate.

I can agree on adopting Finnish, English kind of sucks.

For the rest of what I wrote... I have dealt with overly religious people all my life, and have multiple family members with mental illness. One of which at one point thought he was Jesus and at another that he was going to invent a water powered engine. A comment that five pieces of chicken on a plate meant that five people were going to die that night....

I have also been friends with MANY people who have had identity crises throughout their lives, but that usually results in people not knowing what to do for a living, not what even the most basic thing we are by our very chromosomes. This to me means we are at a strange point in our civilization / evolution where people are 'allowed' to contemplate such things.

Before anyone says I am evil, let me explain (which will help explain my previous post).

In previous eras there was always some huge calamity, war, depression, plague, etc. The mere survival of humankind or at least groups of it, would not allow people to even really have time to think if they should be a man or a woman or a they. We now live in a time where there really is no war to protest, homosexuals are widely accepted, and for the most part things are going pretty well for the first time in the world for a decade.

There is always going to be a group of people that are outraged about something, whether they are justified or not. I recall some gay people a while back comparing their hardships to black people, and I thought that ridiculous. Now this outcry from non-binaries feels similar, with outcries of being repressed or not accepted. If people are not accepting them in social circles, why do they feel that github is a social circle and that Codes of Conduct must be pushed on everyone?

When it would be easier in a digital community to have a 'vote off the island' system for when they are being a dick. If this truly was a 'don't be a dick' document, then I think everyone can agree to it, if someone was potentially being a dick, they should be called out on it, and most likely they will stop and try a bit harder to be nondickish.

Vaguery helps no one, if everyone labels a person a dick they can then vote them out.

Actual community syle.

(The burning child analogy was meant to point out some people egg on being insulted / abused because they like it. If they keep insisting to be called something (outside of say having an alias online, like "my name is maple_syrup, but I identify as unicorn horn, so call me that..." yeah, I am going to call you maple_syrup because I can always copy/paste the name.))
TheSyldat Sep 28, 2018
And that last comment of yours is totally not trolling ...
Seriously just read yourself back here . Kindly "an evil non binary" ...
baccilus Sep 28, 2018
Quoting: slaapliedje
Quoting: tuubi
Quoting: slaapliedjeBeing paranoid because you might use the wrong pronoun to address someone is rather kind of silly once you think about it...
Apparently there's one thing we can agree on. It is a really silly thing to be paranoid about, and merits some self-analysis on the part of the sufferer.

My suggestion: Let's adopt Finnish as the official language of the Internet. We have no gendered pronouns to trigger this preposterous phobia.


I'll pretend you didn't write the rest of your post because it's simply too sad to contemplate.

I can agree on adopting Finnish, English kind of sucks.

For the rest of what I wrote... I have dealt with overly religious people all my life, and have multiple family members with mental illness. One of which at one point thought he was Jesus and at another that he was going to invent a water powered engine. A comment that five pieces of chicken on a plate meant that five people were going to die that night....

I have also been friends with MANY people who have had identity crises throughout their lives, but that usually results in people not knowing what to do for a living, not what even the most basic thing we are by our very chromosomes. This to me means we are at a strange point in our civilization / evolution where people are 'allowed' to contemplate such things.

Before anyone says I am evil, let me explain (which will help explain my previous post).

In previous eras there was always some huge calamity, war, depression, plague, etc. The mere survival of humankind or at least groups of it, would not allow people to even really have time to think if they should be a man or a woman or a they. We now live in a time where there really is no war to protest, homosexuals are widely accepted, and for the most part things are going pretty well for the first time in the world for a decade.

There is always going to be a group of people that are outraged about something, whether they are justified or not. I recall some gay people a while back comparing their hardships to black people, and I thought that ridiculous. Now this outcry from non-binaries feels similar, with outcries of being repressed or not accepted. If people are not accepting them in social circles, why do they feel that github is a social circle and that Codes of Conduct must be pushed on everyone?

When it would be easier in a digital community to have a 'vote off the island' system for when they are being a dick. If this truly was a 'don't be a dick' document, then I think everyone can agree to it, if someone was potentially being a dick, they should be called out on it, and most likely they will stop and try a bit harder to be nondickish.

Vaguery helps no one, if everyone labels a person a dick they can then vote them out.

Actual community syle.

(The burning child analogy was meant to point out some people egg on being insulted / abused because they like it. If they keep insisting to be called something (outside of say having an alias online, like "my name is maple_syrup, but I identify as unicorn horn, so call me that..." yeah, I am going to call you maple_syrup because I can always copy/paste the name.))
You are bad at analogies but I get your point. They overreact because it works. They mislabel those they don't like and from then point onward, they believe their own words. e.g., if they call someone Nazi, from that point onward, they will only tallk about the dangers of Nazism. They will not define what being a nazi is and if the person they called a nazi can be called one.
One more important change that occurs when this ideology percolates an organization is that people loose the concept of degrees of badness. e.g., catcalling is equated with all kinds of assaults. Saying something hurtful can be compared with causing physical harm. And so there are no degrees of punishments either.


Last edited by baccilus on 28 September 2018 at 6:45 am UTC
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