Whats happening ?

[Kappes Buur]

https://ibb.co/GvSFRp0K

I noticed that the GitHub link (green) on the Start page links to ZDoom/gzdoom
But on the other pages (yellow) the link goes to UZDoom/UZDoom

Why ?

[SanyaWaffles]

I'm just an observer so take what I say with a grain of salt.

TL;DR: After several disagreements over the years coming to a head after an event last week (namely Graf putting AI-generated code into the engine and then berating those against it, several devs left GZDoom's dev team and a new fork was made called UZDoom which aims to have a more collaborative mindset towards development.

There's a lot of details but that's the gist of it.

[Kappes Buur]

I read through the threads on Doomworld, so I know of the drama.
What I am womdering is, what does UZDoom have to do with this forum?

For example, when Skulltag got ousted by the Zandronum team, it created a completely new set of webpages for Zandronum instead of continuing under the Skulltag banner.

Should the UZDoom team not do likewise and create their own whole set of webpages instead of using the ZDoom/GZDoom webpages.

An the UZDoom GitHub page it is mentioned that UZDoom is based the DOOM engine. While that is true in the far, far distant past, it is more based on Randi's ZDoom, Rachel's QDoom and Graf's GZDoom.

Is it so difficult for the UZ team to acknowledge the contributions made by those before them and state that fact, to give credit where/when credit is due.

[Enjay]

It would be nice if there was some actual information about it on here.
Changes to the site are creeping in and (clearly) people are noticing but the UZDoom team has decided to hold their discussion on Doomworld (in an already 13 page long thread).
Despite the fact that the UZDoom team have declared themselves to be the official ZDoom port (and announced that GZDoom will be demoted to unofficial), and most (if not all) of them are members here, they have said nothing on ZDoom.org, their presumed eventual home.

It's not a good look, and it's making things awkward. I have personally received several messages asking me what's going on because people seem to think I'd be likely to know.

Given that the site seems to be moving towards UZDoom support, I assume that someone will say something on here sometime.

Here's the Doomworld thread if you want it.
https://www.doomworld.com/forum/topic/155567-uzdoom/
[edit]Ah, I see you've seen it.[/edit]

[Enjay]

Is it so difficult for the UZ team to acknowledge the contributions made by those before them and state that fact.

It's a concern that other contributors to GZDoom's code have also raised.

What I am womdering is, what does UZDoom have to do with this forum?

I'm just trying to figure it out myself, but it does seem as if the UZDoom declaration of "we're official now" is perhaps going to be accurate and they may well be hosted here/have their central information point here. Other GZDoom forks have done so and the forum has always been happy to support other suitable forks. However, UZDoom is going a step further and declaring themselves the official ZDoom port and demoting GZDoom. I have no idea how that will be received or supported, but it seems like it might be.

[Kappes Buur]

Oh btw, I learned of the imgur decision to not show images for UK users,
does the ibb image show up?

[bimshwel]

I noticed that the forum is now "ZDF" which while correct I suppose is not an abbreviation that I recall being aware of previously.

[Enjay]

Yes, I noticed that change too. Again, no idea.

[Enjay]

Oh btw, I learned of the imgur decision to not show images for UK users,
does the ibb image show up?

Yes, it does.
Frankly, many threads on here (and across the Internet) are just a mess of purple placeholder images telling UK users that the content is not allowed in their area. It's no one here's fault, of course, but it is frustrating.

A lot of people (myself included initially) assumed that it was something to do with the UK's new Online Safety Act - requiring sites with adult content to have more robust age verification (usually including quite invasive things like facial recognition - it's not well thought through legislation).

However, it's not because of that and people claiming so are wrong. It is government related, but it's a separate issue. The government watchdog was carrying out an investigation into online user data, and data security and paying particular attention to what organisations do with younger users' data. The government had Media Labs (Imgur's owners) under the microscope and told Media Labs to provide evidence of their data security for user data, and sought assurances about what they did with their data. Further, they said that if Media Labs failed to provide the information, then they would fine Media Labs. Media Labs, in what they described as a "purely commercial decision" declined to provide the requested information and decided, instead, to block all UK users. The government's official line is "doesn't matter, you're still liable for any fines for breaches committed before you banned UK users".

Like I mentioned, the timing is unfortunate and a lot of people are blaming the new law (and using it as a political lever) even though it's a separate issue and Media Labs do actually seem to be the ones being evasive.

[Boondorl]

Hey, just wanted to say we'll be posting an announcement here super soon. Just finalizing the details and making sure all the admins are ok with it.

[Enjay]

Thanks for the info. I look forward to reading it.

Not sure why the main post so far was on Doomworld and this site, the home of Zdoom and its community didn't even get a mirror link though. Seems like a mis-step to me, but whatever. It wasn't my decision.

[Caligari87]

Sorry folks, I've been absent due to Real Life issues. Most of the discussion about this has been happening in realtime on Discord since that's where the most active developers live.

When stuff like this happens, it can be hard to determine who has the final say because this whole site and community is a collective, with a few key maintainers and contributors; there's no longer a single person at the head, least of all me.

The way I see it, this site has always been for the mainline family of ZDoom ports. GZDoom just happened to be the main version most broadly supported and developed, along with others like LZDoom and QZDoom which also existed here officially. Since pretty much every developer I've talked to has universally agreed to fork over their development efforts to UZDoom, it makes sense to give it similar top billing. GZDoom will also still live here and Graf will have final say on what happens with it.

The announcement referenced by Boondorl has been run past most of the development team so far and will serve as the official thread for discussion of the change once it's up.

[Jay0]

Thanks for the info. I look forward to reading it.

Not sure why the main post so far was on Doomworld and this site, the home of Zdoom and its community didn't even get a mirror link though. Seems like a mis-step to me, but whatever. It wasn't my decision.

it was just to quell early rumors and misinformation, since a lot was starting to spread there

[Caligari87]

An the UZDoom GitHub page it is mentioned that UZDoom is based the DOOM engine. While that is true in the far, far distant past, it is more based on Randi's ZDoom, Rachel's QDoom and Graf's GZDoom.

Is it so difficult for the UZ team to acknowledge the contributions made by those before them and state that fact, to give credit where/when credit is due.

The wording on the page is the same as GZDoom's with the name changed since right now it's literally just a fork. There's no stolen valor being attempted.

[Boondorl]

Not sure why the main post so far was on Doomworld and this site, the home of Zdoom and its community didn't even get a mirror link though. Seems like a mis-step to me, but whatever. It wasn't my decision.

Sorry, to be clear, that was an official statement but not the official statement. We were in a mad dash and the entire internet was starting to pop off so we wanted to get something out ASAP to stomp speculation, but knew the main site needed something way more formal. We weren't expecting to do this at all so nothing was really prepared and we've been working out the details on how we want to handle this. And to be honest, things were still pretty hot and it's probably better to have waited for things to cool off a bit. Now that we have a plan we feel much more comfortable making an announcement that isn't just vaguely gesturing towards what the future will hold. We want to give concrete answers and reasoning to these decisions lest we only fuel more speculation.