I hate poorly written software. Being a programmer myself, it bugs the shit out of me. The other day was my birthday (go ahead, you may sing to me if you’d like), and my girlfriend got me 2 software packages.
One is a graphics program, where you can insert pictures from their own catalog. There is also a feature where you can insert your own picture from a file. But when you click it, it just opens a browser advertising the very product I’m using. Turns out I have the “basic” version, and if I want to use the one and only feature that makes this product useful to me, I have to upgrade to the “standard” version. What the fuckity fuck? If I click on Tools/Insert Picture, I don’t want to see your goddamn ads, I want to insert a picture!
In the other program, none of the graphics actually fit on the page. The window they are in is so small that there is text on top of the graphics, making both unviewable. In another view, the graphic is half off the page.
Every screen has a help button that brings up the help for that screen, with hyperlinks for every feature on that page. Cool. So I went to look up help on the one feature that I really needed. No hyperlink. Just the text “(This feature) used only in rare circumstances.” Yeah, the very circumstances I’m in! So I google search the problem, and lo and behold, there is a downloadable article on how to do what I want to do. For $10.95.
What the fuck? I shouldn’t have to spend (my girlfriend’s money) on a product that merely tells me that I have to spend more money. Damn extortionists! Burn in hell, you online muggers.
The OP seems to be complaining about having paid for said crappy software and for being advertised to in spite of the fact that he’s already bought the product.
There is very little of either in the Linux world.
Black455 seems to be suggesting that (a) changing operating system would solve all problems, and (b) that it’s the only way to solve the problem. tdn just had bad luck in getting some crappy software. (I don’t see there’s a huge difference between tearing one’s hair out over annoying ads within a programme and tearing one’s hair out trying to install something on Linux. IMHO, obviously.)
I agree 100% with the OP, but where does piracy come in? Are you going to track down the makers of this software and hang them from the yardarm? Call them scurvy swabs?
Actually, I just wanted to start a drunken fight about something other than the election. Forgive me.
On closer reading, it looks like the OP isn’t endorsing software piracy. It’s word play to illustrate the scummy, underhanded nature of certain commercial software firms.
Still, I find myself a whole helluva lot less frustrated when I stick to software where there’s an understanding that any money I pay is purely a token of my appreciation for the fine work of the programmers.
Luckily for me, I work for a small company where the only real IT policies are “Don’t look at porn, and don’t fuck up the production server.”
The same thing happened to my father once - he bought the software, just to find out that the features he wanted to use were in some sort of advanced version. So he brought the stuff back to the store the next day and got his money back. Simple as that.
Good thing for him, but it may be harder for me. They were gifts from my girlfriend, and complaining to her might hurt her feelings. And she ordered them online, so returning them is kind of a pain.
Would not using the software because it’s so crap hurt her even more though? It sounds like she gave you the programs as a surprise, but would saying ‘look dearest, I appreciate you getting me a surprise present, but I like to chose the software I use’ be so bad?
