> Facebook never did stuff like this, never forced us to change layouts like this. They have given the users a transition period to use the new layout.
This is total bullshit. That's a fairly recent change for Facebook. For a long time they rolled out changes to the UI without warning. Hell, they'd even break documented APIs frequently. Even "breaking" API changes only get 30 days warning, and that 30 day minimum window was set in 2011 after developer complaints!
Extensions based on specific HTML structure in a third-party service will often break, and spectacularly so. It's not as if Google+ broke APIs without warning - they redesigned a site. Google never asked anyone to write extensions that change the look/function of Google+, and having done so doesn't mean they owe you a thing.
Google may not have asked anyone to write extensions for the platform, but a not insignificant amount of people have and a community has been built around those people. In many cases Google staff have gotten behind these extensions and helped the community to flourish.
Mohamed has spent a very large amount of time developing extensions and helping educate many other users on the platform, so when all that time has been nullified by a single change you have to see why he is upset.
Google doesn't HAVE to do anything here, as you said, they didn't ask for this community, but they have been more than happy to get behind it. It would have been nice of them though, and a showing of community spirit and a real urge to support developers on the platform more if they gave a little notice that changes were coming that would adversely effect most currently active G+ extensions.
Given that they have been weathering a storm in relation to their official API, generating a bit of rapport with developers of extensions would have gone a long way.
> Google may not have asked anyone to write extensions for the platform, but a not insignificant amount of people have and a community has been built around those people.
So? This is like gardening on someone else's land. If they decide they want to build a shed there, it's their right, and whining "but I put so much work into my garden!" is absurd.
> Mohamed has spent a very large amount of time developing extensions and helping educate many other users on the platform, so when all that time has been nullified by a single change you have to see why he is upset.
Reaching out to dozens or hundreds of folks who've built creaky extensions based on exact HTML/JS structure would likely have slowed development of actual, usual features and needed design changes. It's not as if G+ is the leader in the space and able to rest on their laurels while others catch up.
So? This is like gardening on someone else's land. If they decide they want to build a shed there, it's their right, and whining "but I put so much work into my garden!" is absurd.
No it isn't. It's like creating a map to Google's free garden that they are desperate for people to use. If they move the garden the map will be wrong. It's their right to do so, but they're desperately trying to get people to use the garden, so you would think that they might try to reach out to the map makers in advance.
Just read the blog for the Social Fixer extension (formerly known as Better Facebook). http://socialfixer.com/blog/
It is amazing how much work he has done as a single person to add new UI features and remove features people don't like while keeping up with the front end changes made by an entire team. You can see from the blog that these changes happen fairly frequently.
This is total bullshit. That's a fairly recent change for Facebook. For a long time they rolled out changes to the UI without warning. Hell, they'd even break documented APIs frequently. Even "breaking" API changes only get 30 days warning, and that 30 day minimum window was set in 2011 after developer complaints!
Extensions based on specific HTML structure in a third-party service will often break, and spectacularly so. It's not as if Google+ broke APIs without warning - they redesigned a site. Google never asked anyone to write extensions that change the look/function of Google+, and having done so doesn't mean they owe you a thing.