Hibernating APX

For almost a month, I did not release any updates to the APX project (the last update was just pushed in december, but was actually wrote in november). I will be focusing on job and study for the majority of the year, so there is not timeframe existing for continuing working on the project as I previously did. But I think there is the importance to speak out some stuff loud.

While I still think that the project fills a gap for unexpierienced users and for automation purposes, it cannot serve it's purpose for this target group properly. rFactor 2 still requires too many steps to be followed to work properly. One example is the fact that the server needs to be started before steam is one example on this.

After having some distance to the whole ecosystem I think these issues are clear blockers for the project. I am sure that this is a big dissapointment for the few users APX has, but reality is like it is. I cannot spend around 15 hours per week working on a project used by like 2 users for a plattform which feels like it's breaking all the time. The plattform feels fragile in terms of it's usability and stability.

The advantage of being an Open Source project? It's not rotting in a dark basement (or on my disks). It's there and can still be modified or used (in it's parts) for other projects (as long as the project license is properly applied). It's surely sad for the amount of time I've spend in the project, but that's the issue of doing free time projects. They all have an super uncertain nature. I won't be calling off the project here completely, for now. But it's not active either. It's like Schrödingers Cat, just for rFactor 2.

Taking actions

So what does that mean now? The GitHub project, website and wiki will remain online (for now). The discord server will also remain online in it's already reduced form. I won't be checking messages ont he discord server often. As APX itself does not really have an master server infrastructure, there won't be any service interruptions on existing installations.

I won't provide bug- or security fixes. As APX is a Django 3.x application I strongly recommend to prevent it's access from the internet as I'm quite sure there will be the need for patches at some point.

The difference compared to the last announcement? I'm not considering the project "active" anymore. Not even a bit.

Looking into the future

I will keep rFactor 2 as a plattform on my radar, even without working on APX. If I see the improvements I consider as a resolve for the blockers for APX, I may consider resuming the project. But not for now.

Sorry and thank you for your understanding.

Photo by Mpho Mojapelo on Unsplash