[jraph]

> Does it mean that to share criticism you must be able to build it?

No. I've reported a lot of tickets/feature requests for a lot of projects that seemed to be taken good.

But criticism that seems entitled is rarely appreciated, and surprise about some obviously, severely underfunded project missing features is not very impressive neither.

There is a shitload of other missing features OP could have mentioned on this anniversary post and I guess it can feel a bit depressing too. "27 years! Happy birthday! Still no job though?". Eeh.

You can express constructive criticism with some humility.

"It's a shame nobody has been able to work on adjustment layers and layer styles, which are important features in such a piece of software."

OP did not feel entitled to me, but I can understand who their message could have been taken somewhat badly.

[Waterluvian]

I appreciate what you’re saying. Do you mind if I dig into something a wee bit? Because us engineering types are often a bit communicatively tone deaf.

What specifically in the comment suggests a sense of entitlement? For me, I see none. I see a, “as an expert user, it’s surprising that such an important feature has been missing forever and I would like to criticize that.”

Edit: I’m not allowed to reply to your response but thank you for taking the time to respond.

[jraph]

Whoops, I edited to state that OP didn't feel entitled to me in the meantime. Sorry for this. It's more the "surprise about some obviously, severely underfunded project missing features is not very impressive" part. To be clear, I'm almost 100% sure the OP comment was written with good intent.

I don't work on the Gimp, I've read developers working on it at length, I think as a developer reading this comment I would be thinking "Well, we do what we can". Jehan, who wrote the post, contributes to the Gimp thanks to donations to his Ze Marmot project, his team cannot pay itself very well. They are going out of their way improving the Gimp anyway, indeed prioritizing features they need the most most certainly. But you can do only so much.

It might just be a matter of form/formulation. But it matters, because people won't take the time analyzing a comment for several minutes to completely put themselves in the commenter's shoes.

edit: you can respond by clicking on the "X minutes ago" link I think, but I saw your edit :-)

[Waterluvian]

Holy cow. I’ve been on HN forever and I assumed when the reply button disappears it’s because they don’t want flamewars or whatever. Thanks!!!

[jraph]

I think you are right, but there's a bypass for us to use wisely :-)