• axib@beehaw.org
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    7 hours ago

    I’m trying to politely explain that if you want people to care more about your software, then you should go to more effort to explain it. If you just dump your source code online with minimal explanation, not as many people will care as if you explain what you’re trying to solve, how your thing works, and maybe alternatives that you considered, future features you’d like to address. Going through the source is the hardest part that many people might not want to bother doing. But most people might read a brief description and watch a short video, even if they aren’t all that interested in your idea at first. Even if they are skeptical of the need for a barter system, they can still appreciate the work you put in, and offer advice on the technical side, to help you with this and future projects.

    I did skim your source and it looks like it’s mostly wrappers around a database. Some ideas, if you wanted to write about it:

    • what are the different options that I user has? It looks like they can say “I want X” or “I have Y”, then what happens next? I shouldn’t need to read your source code to understand what your software does.
    • I saw something about connecting to your database over TOR, I don’t quite understand that. If there’s an exchange of real good, what is the benefit of TOR? Don’t you have to break anonymity to trade real goods?
    • how is your database hosted? If this is for a “currencies have collapsed” type of scenario, instead of relying on TOR, it might make sense to rely on a decentralized database that exists on everyone’s phones.
    • security concerns: it looks like people can write to the database. Does that mean someone could also erase all the entries? How can you prevent abuse like that?
    • danielhanrahantng@beehaw.orgOP
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      6 hours ago

      Security concerns: I don’t necessarily see that as abuse, anyone can record all records of something and if something gets wrongfully deleted someone can add it back in. There may be times when someone needs to delete a certain record, for example: when someone is bartering something in exchange to harm someone. Database hosting: anyone can host the database because I have the files in the repository. TOR: the benefit of TOR is to prevent some entity from tracking exchanges and it keeps people anonymous and with bartering real life goods you don’t necessarily need to break anonymity, there can be intermediaries to keep things anonymous. What happens next: when a person sees the record and they have what the other person wants, the first person can contact the person who has the record and negotiate the trade.