Open Source Tasker?

[moocow1452]

I know it's crazy, and cuts into Pent's food bill more than it would affect any of us, but do you think it's time that Tasker was open sourced? Tasker is nearly cohesive enough to run phone backends all by itself, and with Firefox mobile and Raspberry Pi's abound, someone is going to want to intergrate either tasker itself or some of it's pipes into their next project. Plus, many hands makes work lighter when it comes to dev work.

[baudi]

No,

[Cptnodegard]

No indeed

[Wietse van Buitenen]

is you high?

[Nixx]

Would be an idea though to double the price (or put a price on the kid-factory) and find another Pent to work on it..
As I don't want to imagine how long his ToDo list must be. :)
Perhaps it's possible to have multiple devs working on seperate parts (scenes / tasks / profiles / factory / interface design / new features).
Would speed up the developing process allot and be able to make it a more extended app-engine.

[Matt]

While I can see how that may be good for other people as Pent was the one that came up with the idea and put what must have been *massive* amounts of work into getting Tasker to where it is now I think he'd be nuts to open source it.

Matt

[CodeMonkey]

No.

I've worked on far too many "design by committee" projects to want to use one.

I bought Tasker because of its available functionality and because I trusted Pent to drive it forward.

[Joey Carlini]

Ok, I understand the logic behind wanting to keep it under Pent's command, but I still wonder what happens when someone wants to make a Rom integrated deeply with Tasker, or try and implement the same style of programming on the PC or in the cloud. I guess I'm scared Tasker is too powerful to keep closed source, and that it might live and die by Pent, for all the good and bad that it implies. Am I thinking too broadly for reason, or do I have a valid concern here?

[Wietse van Buitenen]

the concern of what will happen to Tasker should something happen with Pent is valid.

This doesn't mean he has to open source it, it just mean he needs a backup plan for that case..

Tasker is extremely powerful and I think a lot of people depend on it for all sorts of daily stuff :)

[Packy Anderson]

On Sunday, August 26, 2012 4:46:20 AM UTC-4, CodeMonkey wrote:

I've worked on far too many "design by committee" projects to want to use one.

Open source doesn't mean "design by committee".  It means that the source is open for other people to see.  The Linux Kernel isn't design by committee: every single feature change to the kernel goes by Linus for approval.  There are plenty of open source projects that only have one contributor, or only one person with commit privilege.

Besides, if you want to not ever use open source software, you're too late: Android is open sourrce (developed in private by Google, with the source released to the public afterward). If you want to only use closed source software, Apple iOS is that way =>.

On Sunday, August 26, 2012 11:32:01 PM UTC-4, moocow1452 wrote:

Ok, I understand the logic behind wanting to keep it under Pent's command, but I still wonder what happens when someone wants to make a Rom integrated deeply with Tasker, or try and implement the same style of programming on the PC or in the cloud. I guess I'm scared Tasker is too powerful to keep closed source, and that it might live and die by Pent, for all the good and bad that it implies. Am I thinking too broadly for reason, or do I have a valid concern here?

I think if someone wanted to make a ROM deeply integrated with Tasker, it could be done by having the ROM provide what a Tasker/Locale plugin provide.  There's nothing stopping a ROM developer from doing that.  As far as extending Tasker's style of programming to a PC or "the cloud", there's already efforts to do exactly that.  I'm reading a lot about "If this, then that", a website that appears to provide Tasker-like functionality on PCs and "the cloud".  Personally, I haven't looked too deeply into it because Tasker fills all the needs I have on Android, and, as a coder, I've already got the tools to do everything I want on PCs and "the cloud".

In the end, Tasker is Pent's hard work.  As a coder myself, I'm not going to tell another coder what to do with his or her code.  Keeping code source closed is a long accepted and well-established way of making a living as a programmer.  If you give the source away, there's nothing to prevent someone else from taking the source, tweaking it and selling it for less.  Open source projects work on a completely different business model.  Asking Pent to open his source without having an alternative business model proposed for him is just selfish.

[Michael Yeager]

Absolutely not. If he invites someone in to help do something or to take over sometime in the future, so be it. If he just stops work on it then that's what happens. I will probably spend years learning what it's capable of now. New features may make things easier here and there and may greatly extend it's capabilities but I bought it for what it's capable of now...

[Rarry]

Pent on his own seems to manage better customer service than most companies with hundreds of employees so I've no desire to see any changes.  

I wonder if he's thought about source code escrow though, in case of any unforeseen events?

[CodeMonkey]

On Monday, 27 August 2012 15:40:27 UTC+1, Packy Anderson wrote:

Open source doesn't mean "design by committee".  It means that the source is open for other people to see.  The Linux Kernel isn't design by committee: every single feature change to the kernel goes by Linus for approval.  There are plenty of open source projects that only have one contributor, or only one person with commit privilege.

Besides, if you want to not ever use open source software, you're too late: Android is open sourrce (developed in private by Google, with the source released to the public afterward). If you want to only use closed source software, Apple iOS is that way =>.

Perhaps I expressed myself poorly - I'm well aware of the history of Android having used it since it's first public release, however I'm also aware that there is some debate about to what degree it is open source. You are correct that open source by definition doesn't mean "design by committee", however if poorly controlled it can invite it in.

Differing motivations aside (which aren't really relevant here) we seem to agree that a jump to open sourcing Tasker would be bad (whether for Pent, the users, or both).

[Kris Kitchen]

@Pent Any chance of you opening this up? 

[Pent]

@Pent Any chance of you opening this up? 

I won't even bother asking my 3 dependents what they think of that idea, I'm fairly
sure I know what the answer is.

I'm not even sure it would be overall beneficial to Tasker users.

Currently people only have to trust one coder with all those permissions
Tasker has and he has a track record of 4 years non-abuse.

Anyone that wants to contribute code to Tasker can do so via a plugin
and apply their licencing model of choice.

Pent

[Pent]

On the other hand, it's not out of the question in the future, especially if
I'm not able to code at all for health reasons at some point.

Pent

[CazMaz]

Keep to the code!

[Benjamin Sproule]

Just my 2 cents, I would really like to pay for Tasker (I've been using the 7 day trial version for the last couple of days), but I'm a bit worried about having something with so many permissions on a device that I will potentially hold a lot of sensitive data on. Would be nice to have a way to see the code, just for personal reassurance.

[Scott Miller]

Take a look at how many downloads Tasker has, and read the play store reviews. Tasker can't do all the wonderful things it does without those permissions. If there was any serious risk to using it, there wouldn't be so many active users.

Scott

[Benjamin Sproule]

Just because a lot of people use it, doesn't mean that it's not got unknown dodgy capabilities (e.g. Microsoft applications, Google applications, etc.). I understand the need for all the permissions, and I'm grateful that Android shows what permissions are being used (and having a system that requires the developer to specify which permissions are needed), but again, these restrictions don't enforce developers to play nice, especially when the application requires so many permissions to do its advertised job.

I'd like to stress that I have no reason to distrust Pent and I have no evidence that Tasker does do anything unscrupulous, but that doesn't mean that I wouldn't feel more comfortable knowing that the source code could be reviewed by anybody. I will also still pay for the app after the trial has run out because it does such a great job and has doubled my battery life.

[Daniel D]

As others have pointed out, this project is an income source for Pent (probably second or third most important). Giving the complexity and the length of the project and more importantly the learning and coding efforts, IMHO Pent still has to gain some in order to make for the invested resources. So the loss of income will never be an option.

The only way this project could continue as open source software is if there will be a steadily small revenue for Pent (like there is now) or if somebody would buy the project from him (high, one time revenue).

Personally I can only imagine the second solution: some big firm (like Google) will buy Tasker for a big sum (few million/billion $), make it open source and act as a regulator or keep Pent as commit approver.

But this solution is a two side blade. We've seen projects being bought and trashed, we've seen successful stories too.

So guys, if you want Tasker to be open sourced, start lobbying big investors into buying Tasker and make it open source! Stop asking for it here as it is very disrespectful towards Pent!

Wish you all a nice day!

[Pent]

Just my 2 cents, I would really like to pay for Tasker (I've been using the 7 day trial version for the last couple of days), but I'm a bit worried about having something with so many permissions on a device that I will potentially hold a lot of sensitive data on. Would be nice to have a way to see the code, just for personal reassurance.

I don't really have much to add to what I already wrote on this thread.

I obviously can't prove that I'm trustworthy, you can only judge my character from my posts here.

I guess I would add that I have no motivation to abuse those permissions.

Pent

[Marnix Reckman]

and I had hoped you'd like to see my nudes ;)

Pent is stand-up guy and his application can only be this awesome by trusting him.

as we say in dutch "Like the innkeeper is, so he trusts his guests." (literal translation..)

meaning as much as "A person who is untrustworthy is unlikely to trust others"

Marnix Reckman
freelance 3D artist
www.m.rckmn.nl

DE +49 (0)178 80 888 11
NL +31 (0)6 180 888 28

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[Pent]

and I had hoped you'd like to see my nudes ;)

Hey, we don't want none of your liberal Dutch views around here :-)

Pent
 

[Jay M]

I dont see the need to open source it, if your that worried about it just decompile it, this is what Android police do, remember when they found out Virus Shield was fake and they posted the source code.Actually I would be surprised if they haven't already looked over Taskers code its a very popular app and the amount of permissions it requires can be scary.

IIRC Tasker v1 was released in 2009 were at the end of 2014 now if there was something to find I'm sure someone would have found it by now.

Jay M

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[Benjamin Sproule]

@Nixx, I've already installed the app, so I can't be that untrustworthy :P

@Jay M, I could decompile it, but having to decompile it after every update would become annoying. Fair point about Android police though, but the fact it's been out for 5 years doesn't mean that an app is solid.

And for those that don't pay for open source software, why not? I happily pay for software that I could get for free, because someone has put a lot of effort into it. But anyway, Pent is happy, I'm too lazy to create an alternative, so take my money!

[Jay M]

@Jay M, I could decompile it, but having to decompile it after every update would become annoying

True true, but reading through source code after ever update would also be annoying.

but the fact it's been out for 5 years doesn't mean that an app is solid.

True true

Jay M