[soraminazuki]

Totally.

There are clear explanations in the release notes and the wiki entry linked from the relevant place in the preference pane [1]. The full release note is displayed before updating. There are numerous comments here explaining how it's impossible to accidentally enable the feature. It's opt-in, you have to input a paid API key, you can use a offline model instead, and the data it sends are totally customizable and by default limited to the output of "uname" and the prompt that you explicitly enter.

Yet people are ignoring all of that and writing all sorts of misinformation.

iTerm2 is featureful yet solid, constantly improved on, doesn't work against the user, and is free. I've submitted patches before and the author was nice and responsive. The AI feature is minimal, non-intrusive, and doesn't advertise its existence once you decided not to opt in unlike commercial products hyped up about AI. It's thankless work even without HN piling on and the author deserves much better.

[1]: https://gitlab.com/gnachman/iterm2/-/wikis/AI-Prompt

[oneeyedpigeon]

These aren't mutually exclusive—it's perfectly possible to be fully aware that this version of iTerm introduces optional AI and be concerned about it. Dismissing these concerns as people "ignoring [the optional aspect] and writing all sorts of misinformation" is disingenuous and unfair.

The most obvious concern is that it becomes non-optional in future, but there are plenty of related concerns ranging all the way up to the general principle of the use of AI technology.

[soraminazuki]

Have you used iTerm2? Saw the amount of work that's put into it? Checked how long it has been cared for, maintained, and continuously improved on by basically one person for more than a decade? All for free and no ads? The iTerm2 developer is a person you can actually trust.

https://github.com/gnachman/iTerm2/graphs/contributors

But all of a sudden you now have people up in arms about how a spyware of a feature was sneakily forced upon them, and be righteous about it. This is sad.

[soraminazuki]

Also, what does it even mean for this feature to become non-optional? It doesn't work without the user typing in a question. Do you seriously think that iTerm2 is the kind of software that's scheming to force users to use AI?

https://gitlab.com/gnachman/iterm2/-/wikis/AI-Prompt

[flohofwoe]

I haven't seen any of that pressing the update button on the updater dialog box that automatically pops up (as I usually do, since typically iTerm2 updates don't have such sneaky surprises). Only after the update there was a little slideshow where the AI stuff was hidden somewhere on the 3rd or 4th slide.

[soraminazuki]

You should have. iTerm2 uses Sparkle update and it shows release notes. It was there.

There's a screenshot of how it should look like in Sparkle's project page.

https://sparkle-project.org

Care to explain what's so "sneaky" about it? What did the iTerm2 dev do to you?

You saw the dialog. It's not so hard to verify again. Yet you so quickly accused me of lying. Shame on you.

[joshstrange]

Sneaky? Hidden?

It is _opt in_ and it’s not the main feature of this release. If it was the first slide you people would be complaining about that too. Maybe it’s best you just uninstall iTerm2 and use the default terminal if you can’t be sure you won’t trip one day, accidentally open the preferences, and enter in an OpenAI key by accident. Don’t forget to get a refund, oh wait…