17 ms·

Closing a door

357 points by clessg 11y ago

ahh 11y ago
For the record: I feel a lot "safer" and more respected by Linus than I do by Sarah. Linus just wants me to submit good code and demands that I live up to his standards: if I don't, he'll call me out and tell me to do it again better. I can do that. Sarah wants me to agree with her politically: if I don't, she'll quietly organize a campaign against me behind my back. I'm good at writing proper code. I'm bad at winning political knife fights. So have fun with your next project, Sarah, whatever it is! You organize your communities the way you like and I'll organize mine the way I do. We'll see who gets more done and has more fun!
- rishabhsagar 11y ago
  Woah! What campaign?! I don't think she is drumming up any support. Asking for polite and decent conversations without being called a 'cry baby' or being asked to 'go back to kitchen' is not political knife fight, it is basic courtesy in a public forum IMO.
  - meapix 11y ago
    The problem with "basic courtesy" is that you need to understand other people's culture/background/personal life to make it "correct". There are people who will be offended just by criticizing their code, not their personal life.
    - tptacek 11y ago
      This whole post that we're commenting on is about exactly that distinction, so this is a bogus argument.
    - pron 11y ago
      She's not complaining about people being offended for some obscure cultural reasons. She states that the community is abrasive and led by assholes. The significance of being spat on is open to cultural interpretation; the significance of being stabbed with a knife is pretty unequivocal. Let's start with that.
  - tomjen3 11y ago
    Ahh has probably, like me, run into the social justice worriers. There is a community so toxic and full of hatred for (white heterosexual) men that they make Ulrich Drepper sound like miss Manners. Many of their complaints are the same complaints Sarah posted, so it does seem reasonable (to me) to assume she was one of them. Normally they complain about some project not caring about their feelings, demand change, tear apart anyone who argues against them and then force anybody who disagree with them out. Death threats and emails to peoples employers suggesting they be fired are commonly used. I don't think Sarah is one of them, because to work for that long on a project requires sharp technical skills, which the social justice warriors don't tend to have as well as a willingness to work with people don't agree with you. I certainly wouldn't fault anybody for suspecting knives though.
    - reitanqild 11y ago
      she seems different: honest but tired. We must be able to defend Linus without attacking anyone criticizing the Linux kernel maintainers. Not everything is perfect on that list.
    - chris_wot 11y ago
      It's not in any way reasonable to assume that someone is badly behaved without any specific evidence. To lump someone into a stereotypical grouping because you just assume they live up to that stereotype is the sign of a rather weak or insecure personality!
- meapix 11y ago
  I kinda prefer Linus's method as you know what will happen to you if you don't verify/validate (a kind of respect to everybody's time) before submitting.
  - Flow 11y ago
    There are many more people than Linus on LKML and the other lists. Don't make this about Linus.
  - meapix 11y ago
    example? the emails I've read so far are from Linus.
- devit 11y ago
  To be honest, she did at least part of her campaign in public on the LKML directly interacting with Linus among others, and there doesn't seem to be evidence of she doing any "organizing against someone's back". That said, I agree that it's problematic to try to enforce anything not regarding code, since the enforcer (or who succeeds them) can then abuse the enforcement itself as an harassing and exclusion tool (the so-called "Nazi moderator" problem).
- nommm-nommm 11y ago
  Why do some people have to think everything is about politics? There is a difference between demanding and expecting great code and being an asshole. You can demand good code without alienating others.
- chris_wot 11y ago
  Whoa. Where did Sarah ever ask you to support her political agenda and opinions?
EwanToo 11y ago
A sad post, but not an unexpected one given the tone on the kernel mailing list - I'm sure many others have left without saying anything.
- hapless 11y ago
  It takes courage to speak at all.
- deelowe 11y ago
  I don't get it. Why are so many OK with the personal attacks, unprofessional language, and generally toxic communications within the Linux kernel development community? Is it because Linus himself is one of the worst? While I appreciate the technical talent of the kernel devs, I have lost nearly all respect for these developers. This issue needs to be resolved before it gets worse.
  - ChuckMcM 11y ago
    Linus. Groups, packs, tribes, mobs, will emulate the behavior of the leader. For the members it is a sign that they respect the leader and a sign of loyalty. The problem is that Linus isn't really a dick head, among the times I've interacted with him (few) he was pleasant and respectful. Except the high 'hits' if you search for him are generally him being brutally critical, both technically and personally. And that is a challenge. People emulate their leader, and so their leader has to project the kind of leadership they want, all the time. And worse, only the gross strokes are really picked up, the subtley it always lost. So an outburst from a leader that might have had specific triggers, is read as simply an outburst. The triggers never surface by themselves to the consciousness of the folks following. People who want Linus' respect in the kernel community, act as they perceive he acts. The result is suboptimal for community harmony. That is my observation anyway.
    - debacle 11y ago
      Most of the hits for Linus being brutal on Google are him dressing down someone doing something arrogant and/or stupid. Generally he seems relatively pragmatic but gruff.
sssilver 11y ago
Different teams have different cultures that work for them. It's not impossible that the culture that alienates some people is the very culture that enables the phenomenal engineering of the Linux kernel. I personally would feel privileged to be a part of a group that puts engineering excellence beyond anything, including my own hurt feelings. There would be beauty for me in that emotional austerity and sheer directness. That being said, I empathize with the author. If a team culture that delivers doesn't work for someone, the best thing to do is to move on. Keep looking, don't settle.
- pron 11y ago
  > I personally would feel privileged to be a part of a group that puts engineering excellence beyond anything I wonder if other -- perhaps more minor -- achievements that displayed engineering excellence like the Apollo Program, invention of the transistor, the first compiler etc. espoused this same "enabling" culture. > including my own hurt feelings This is a meme that keeps coming up and shows a complete misunderstanding of this situation and others like it. This is not about hurt feelings. It is about marginalization, which is pushing (or keeping) qualified people away. Sometimes, the means of the marginalization is a hostile environment. Sometimes there are other means. The author's feelings have not been hurt; she just couldn't stand working in an environment of assholes. > If a team culture that delivers doesn't work for someone, the best thing to do is to move on The best thing for whom? That person perhaps. But the best thing for our industry is that people speak up -- as Sarah Sharp has -- people listen, and people change things.
  - zeveb 11y ago
    > I wonder if other -- perhaps more minor -- achievements that displayed engineering excellence like the Apollo Program, invention of the transistor, the first compiler etc. espoused this same "enabling" culture. You might be surprised. While I don't know about those particular projects, I know that, for example, Admiral Rickover was direct and blunt with those in the U.S. Navy's nuclear propulsion programme. He didn't suffer fools kindly, or at all. But then, he had the health and safety of his men, the nation and the world to worry about. I'd take a few hurt feelings over another Therac-25. > It is about marginalization, which is pushing (or keeping) qualified people away. No, mariginalisation is about pushing or keeping away people rejected by the group. When it keeps the unqualified away, it's a good thing. In the pursuit of excellence, even someone who's excellent on an absolute scale may not be excellent enough. A team of the best dozen engineers in the world will necessarily not include the 13th-best engineer: he is incredibly good, but he's just not good enough for that team. Is the kernel team marginalising the good enough along with the bad? I honestly don't know.
drewg123 11y ago
Its not just women that are being put off. I'm a man, and when I worked for an IHV, I dreaded every interaction with the Linux kernel community due to the tone of the interactions. It was by far the most hostile community we engaged with. I often submitted patches through either junior developers in our company who were Linux enthusiasts, or through friends who were established in the Linux community just to avoid dealing with the people on the subsystem list. By contrast the *BSD communities were far more helpful, as were the closed-source MacOSX and Solaris driver/kernel mailing lists, as well as the private interactions with folks from Apple and Sun.
- zeveb 11y ago
  > By contrast the *BSD communities were far more helpful I think I'd take Linux Torvald's criticism over Theo de Raadt's any day of the week…
  - webaholic 11y ago
    You are narrowing it to only Linus. It goes much deeper than that.
    - drewg123 11y ago
      Indeed -- it was the subsystem maintainer (and a few people on the list) that were the problem. We never dealt with Linus himself.
  - drewg123 11y ago
    I was speaking mostly of FreeBSD -- that's the only BSD we had direct support for. We did have some friendly interactions with OpenBSD, but not directly with Theo.
  - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
    The Linux kernel is structured in a tree-like hierarchy such that most neophytes will likely never directly encounter Linus, but be chewed off by a subsystem maintainer long before that. In contrast, Theo is just another hacker who also happens to be project leader, compared to the more "ivory tower" approach of Linus.
chasing 11y ago
There's a weird myth floating around that being honest, direct, or "real" means being an asshole. And there's another related myth that being an asshole is acceptable.
- arbitrage 11y ago
  Sure. Nice strawman. It's not a myth, however, that shouting, cursing, and attacking your coworkers makes you an asshole.
  - zem 11y ago
    It's not a straw man. If you have never run into people who explicitly excuse their asshole behaviour by saying they're just being "blunt" or "honest" you're either lucky or unobservant.
    - JoshTriplett 11y ago
      > people who explicitly excuse their asshole behaviour by saying they're just being "blunt" or "honest" You can find several such excuses on this page, even.
  - 1024core 11y ago
    You missed the point completely (I think). The GP was implying that there's a myth that if you really want to be "real", you have to act like an asshole. Which is not true, and hence the "myth".
zeveb 11y ago
> I need communication that is technically brutal but personally respectful. And sometimes being personally disrespectful yields better results. Which is, after all, what one wants out of a software project: results, not happy feelings. I think we'd all like to be personally respected (I know I would). But I also think that almost all of us have done things which aren't respectable (I know I have); and I believe that at least for some people, the shame of public disrespect is part of the learning experience involved in not doing it again. If this atmosphere of harsh personal criticism does yield better results, then it's necessary. I'm reminded of the old adage, 'if you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.' Heat is necessary to cook (a kitchen in summer is miserable, particularly without air conditioning); interpersonal heat may be necessary to produce better software. I myself don't do so well in an atmosphere of intense personal criticism, and have great difficulty giving it, but I consider those my own personality flaws.
- chasing 11y ago
  > If this atmosphere of harsh personal criticism does yield better results, then it's necessary. That's a pretty big "if." And my personal experience is that, no, working in an "atmosphere of harsh personal criticism" does not yield better results. It makes good people go away. It causes people who don't want to be attacked to just keep their mouths shut and not say anything. It makes people wary of floating ideas that could be interesting but also risk being abusively mocked. It makes people not want to ask questions. It kills social cohesion. Etc.
  - PeterisP 11y ago
    The evidence in large open source projects seems to support that "if" - I mean, if an atmosphere of harsh personal criticism would significantly harm the end result, and a friendlier atmosphere would improve it without undue burden to all the participants (as in, people can leave/not join because of hostile environment but also because of being asked to change their ways), then for any competing or forked project we'd expect to see the friendliest community to win, and that's often not the case. Since many (most?) large high-profile projects seem to have the problem of hostile atmosphere, then it suggests that when all things are taken into account, then policies that allow various contributors/maintainers to be as [un]hostile as they want have outperformed policies that would require them to be civil or leave the project. I mean, we're seeing developers contribute to projects run by assholes instead of saying "well, I'm ready to maintain a fork and not be an asshole" and having everyone jump ship. So no matter what they're saying, in practice they're showing that yes, that they prefer that ugly "leadership" over the alternative - pushing away the person that doesn't want to change.
pron 11y ago
Some background (found through simple Googling): http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/linus-torvalds-defends-his-right-to-shame-linux-kernel-developers/ http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/linus-... http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-07/22/sarah-sharp http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-07/22/sarah-sharp
- meapix 11y ago
  That finger is for Nvidia. There is a chinese proverb that say: "When the sage points at the moon, the fool looks at the finger.". Nvidia is the problem here, not the finger.
  - pron 11y ago
    And does the sage read the story (which, BTW, is about Sarah Sharp) that goes with the picture of the finger or is he just on the lookout for moons? :)
tylerflint 11y ago
> We are human. We make mistakes, and we correct them. We get frustrated with someone, we over-react, and then we apologize and try to work together towards a solution. Wisdom.
nanodano 11y ago
The Linux project has been around for a couple decades now. Has this attitude been a trend from the very beginning, or is it something that formed over time?
- philliphaydon 11y ago
  Yes. Pretty much been that way for a long time.
nappy-doo 11y ago
Sigh. Story time. A long time ago (2006,7,8?) before Sarah took over USB development, I tried to start getting fixes into the un-maintained USB stack. I submitted fixes for leaks, segfaults, and general cleanup and documentation. At the time, the "maintainer" was one of the most unhelpful, and ugly people I ever dealt with over e-mail. After months of writing with the person over a simple leak he'd introduced, I gave up, deciding to fix it on a branch, and publish our code rather than deal with that developer. I vowed I'd never go back -- and I still haven't. I'm not saying all kernel developers are jerks, but I'm not interested in working with those that are. As such, I'm just not willing to spend my time trying to help. (And maybe some developers want to keep it that way. So, I guess we're both happier for it.)
- lolo_ 11y ago
  This makes me wonder if this subsystem is a particular culprit for these issues. It seems like it's pot luck as to how friendly one subsystem is in comparison to another. That's not to say something shouldn't be done here, but does tally with what I've heard about this in the past.
  - digi_owl 11y ago
    Could be. Sometimes it seems that a project or similar gets started by someone with serious technical knowhow, but then as it heads more towards maintenance it gets put up for grabs for anyone to take over. At that point you get someone with more interest in the position than the tech stepping in, and it all descends into hell.
droopybuns 11y ago
This article helped me understand a frustration I have with millennials. >>I feel powerless in a community that had a “Code of Conflict” without a specific list of behaviors to avoid and a community with no teeth to enforce it. It never would have occurred to me that I was ever entitled to procedures for handling conflict in a community. I have operated under the following rule for community bullshit: Endure it, fix it, or abandon it. The fashionable "sad departure" missive just reeks of entitlement. Reading these notes make me feel embarrassed for the author. Younger people seem to be celebrating a style that whines about community. It isn't leadership.
- pron 11y ago
  > It never would have occurred to me that I was ever entitled to... No one thinks they're entitled. They're just saying what they think is right. > procedures for handling conflict in a community You're missing the point. If the community was well-behaved procedure wouldn't be necessary. It's not procedure she's asking for -- it's decent behavior -- and suggesting that perhaps procedure is a possible fix. If it isn't, we'll try others. > Endure it, fix it, or abandon it. First she endured it (for about 8 years), then she tried to fix it ([1], [2]), and now she's leaving. You've found a true successor. > Younger people seem to be celebrating a style that whines about community Tell that to Martin Luther. Also, why use that word "whine"? Linus whines about a whole lot of stuff yet no one calls him a whiner. [1]: http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/linus-torvalds-defends-his-right-to-shame-linux-kernel-developers/ http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/linus-... [2]: http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-07/22/sarah-sharp http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-07/22/sarah-sharp
  - droopybuns 11y ago
    >>No one thinks they're entitled. Said every entitled person everywhere. This also applies to people who talk about privilege. >>Also, why use that word "whine"? Stylewise: "Disappointment" demonstrates leadership. "Sad" demonstrates entitlement. >>Linus [...] I don't think anyone who leads people should defend Linus' behavior. He's an asshole that has provided a powerful, free & useful kernel. Until there is a better FOSS alternative to Linux, it makes sense to endure him. But deciding to defend his behavior indicates a lack of compassion for people's feelings.
lolo_ 11y ago
I have contributed some trivial commits (so far) and though I encountered some harsh comments it was nothing I felt was overly personal. But of course, my experience is pretty limited at this point. I get the impression that the level of these issues varies wildly depending on the subsystem in question. For example, Greg Kroah-Hartman is friendly and helpful to a ridiculous degree, I literally don't understand how he gets so much done and maintains helpfulness (and he's working on the staging drivers with some of the roughest code in the entire kernel.) I feel sorry that Sarah has had this happen, and it's sad that this could happen to anyone, but in particular it's sad that it's happened to a woman when we have such a massive under representation of women already in our industry and probably even more so in the kernel. I don't know what the answer is, but for those areas of the kernel that are a problem a balance needs to be found between directness and talking to somebody like a human being. As for Linus, I think he gets somewhat misrepresented in many places. His vitriol is reserved for senior kernel maintainers who should know better and do things which (in many cases) could very negatively impact users, I've seen a number of threads where he's been let's say, less than civil, which were all about kernel code breaking user code and the subsystem maintainers saying 'well they're doing it wrong so let's just break their applications'. In those kind of circumstances you're glad that Linus strongly objects.
- JoshTriplett 11y ago
  > As for Linus, I think he gets somewhat misrepresented in many places. His vitriol is reserved for senior kernel maintainers who should know better and do things which (in many cases) could very negatively impact users Which sure doesn't make the already thankless task of becoming a senior kernel maintainer any more appealing. And it creates a terrible culture where people see that and perpetuate it.
  - maxxxxx 11y ago
    Does Linus ever make mistakes and does he receive the same treatment?
    - qntm 11y ago
Grue3 11y ago
I was with her until >I have the right to replace any comment I feel like with “fart fart fart fart”. Right after >I would prefer the communication style within the Linux kernel community to be more respectful. Way to not practice what you preach.
- zyxley 11y ago
  A policy of tolerance and respect does not require being tolerant and respectful of intolerance and disrepect.
  - Grue3 11y ago
    And so, the vicious circle continues. Did you not notice how the policy of replacing messages with farts is not limited solely to intolerant and disrespectful ones? It's exactly the kind of passive aggression that is typical amongst nerds, and the kind she was seemingly railing against in the beginning of the rant.
    - chris_wot 11y ago
      If someone threatens to rape or kill her (which seems to happens to pretty much every woman who works in tech who speaks out against sexism) then fart noises is mild.
      - Grue3 11y ago
        Do you seriously suggest this as a reasonable reaction, rather than, say, reporting it to the police?
        chris_wot 11y ago
        If the police could take action to locate the one making the threats, then reporting them is a reasonable option. But here's a thought: if you saw graffiti on a wall you owned, then you could report it police AND paint over the top of it with a fresh coat of paint. Let's say you are a Jew, and the graffiti was spewing Neo-Nazi propaganda, targeted at you. You would be justified, because the wall is your property, to mock the perpetrators on your newly repainted wall. It's your wall - and you are free to express yourself on your own property. Sarah's "wall" is similarly her blog post. You can make offensive remarks, but she is free to remove your offensive remarks and mock you in their place. And at the same time collect evidence of threatening behaviour and report it to the police. Not sure why this is such a difficult concept...
matt_morgan 11y ago
USB in Linux is really, really good. It didn't use to be. This is a big loss.
- digi_owl 11y ago
  Not sure if it was Sharp directly that produced that, or if she more acted as the representative of a larger USB team at Intel (somewhat ironic given that Intel at the corporate level didn't seem interested at all in USB3 at first).
doomrobo 11y ago
>What that means is they are privileging the emotional needs of other Linux kernel developers (to release their frustrations on others, to be blunt, rude, or curse to blow off steam) over my own emotional needs (the need to be respected as a person, to not receive verbal or emotional abuse). This seems to be imply that these people don't also have the need to be respected. It's a choice to privilege everybody's need to blow off steam over everybody's need to be respected. Not just hers.
- intortus 11y ago
  Hence the sentence that you omitted: > There’s an awful power dynamic there that favors the established maintainer over basic human decency. In any project there will be emotional conflicts. That doesn't mean there should be an overwhelming trend toward coddling incumbents. Not only is it morally suspect, it's really bad for the health of the project.
AdmiralAsshat 11y ago
I'm pretty sure Sarah has confronted Linus over this exact issue in the past, and he was pretty adamant that it would not change: http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/linus-torvalds-defends-his-right-to-shame-linux-kernel-developers/ http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/linus-... So, there you go. This is what happens, and what will continue to happen, when the leader defends that kind of behavior.
reitanqild 11y ago
I worked in a place where I'd be scolded once in a while when I did something stupid and I enjoyed it[0] for a while as long as it was fair. It quickly became annoying when it turned out the same people who criticised others harshly swept their own mistakes under the rug ... [0]: "As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another."
adrianlmm 11y ago
What I'd like to know is if she was disrespected in any way, cause despise the Linus behavior, he only is that way with people he knows and with people he has confidence. so, was she disrespected or not?
bjornstjerne 11y ago
I'm glad she was able to figure out that the team culture didn't fit her and leave for something more suitable to her preferences. Different people are different, and a single team cannot accommodate every style.
- pron 11y ago
  So abuse and public humiliation is a style now? Well, if it is, her point is that it's a bad style, a very bad style, and it would be best if it goes out of fashion. Kinda like writing spaghetti code with lots of gotos. That, too, is a style, but generally recognized as a bad one, even if some people like it.
nommm-nommm 11y ago
Its easy to say "This is the way it is, tough cookies, deal with it. Grow a thicker skin if you want to play." It takes a bigger man (apologies for the sexism - can't think of a better term) to put their head down and become a better person.
- copsarebastards 11y ago
  You can't think of the word "person"?
  - nommm-nommm 11y ago
    Doesn't have the same effect/meaning. "Term" was the wrong word - "Expression" is more of what I meant. "Man up" doesn't have the same connotations as "person up." (For example)
    - copsarebastards 11y ago
      I agree on "man up" versus "person up", but "bigger person" has exactly the same connotations as "bigger man". To be clear here, I'm not offended by your statement. I think communicating using common idioms which happen to contain a gender word isn't sexist, and quibbling over gendered language like that just drives real sexism underground. I'm talking about it purely from a writing perspective. Looking at it more, I wouldn't have used either phrase, to be honest. I'd have gone with something like "It's harder to admit you screwed up and become a better person" (drop the euphemisms and draw a dichotomy between easy/hard).
      - nommm-nommm 11y ago
        Terms that connote power/prestige/respect are terms that also connote masculinity. There's no "happen to contain" it isn't happenstance. No quibbling here; Language matters a lot. (For what it is worth the language terminology brainfart on my part was probably due to the several pints I had ingested before writing that ..)
JoelJacobson 11y ago
https://lwn.net/Articles/105375/ https://lwn.net/Articles/105375/ (Linus on Kernel Mangement Style, 2004) If everyone would read this before getting involved in the kernel project, hopefully those not compatible with the culture would not get involved in the first place.
- pzone 11y ago
  Do you understand that this whole article is designed to point out the major losses from categorically excluding developers "not compatible with the culture?"
mst 11y ago
I do wish there was some separation in the description between abrasiveness and sexism/homophobia - I've only ever really seen the former on lkml, and am far more tolerant of it than the latter.
- forgottenpass 11y ago
  and am far more tolerant of it than the latter Which is why you see them addressed in the same breath so often. It brings in the political capital of the latter, to gripe about the former.
xixi77 11y ago
She (and everyone here) talks about it being OK to criticize code but not OK to offend people personally, which seems like a rather reasonable concept -- but does anyone have actual examples of the latter, to put everything in context? I see http://marc.info/?l=linux-kernel&m=135628421403144&w=2 http://marc.info/?l=linux-kernel&m=135628421403144&w=2 and http://marc.info/?l=linux-acpi&m=136157944603147&w=2 http://marc.info/?l=linux-acpi&m=136157944603147&w=2 quoted, but to me it looks like both are about code?
- antirez 11y ago
  The content is about a bug, but the form is bad. You can effectively communicate that the patch is bad and that the approach is to never break user space without saying shut up, is crap, and without to be so verbal aggressive IMHO.
  - amadvance 11y ago
    This seems the result of years of frustration telling the same thing again and again. Even the 2009 Alan Cox rant was about the 'never break userspace' issue: https://lkml.org/lkml/2009/7/28/373 https://lkml.org/lkml/2009/7/28/373 For sure being rude doesn't seem to work ;)
acd 11y ago
I think some developers need to go out and meet more people in person. There is no need for a toxic communication style. Usually things are said much harder to people on mailing lists than is said face to face. Get out talk to people. People working isolated being an issue
xname2 11y ago
I don't get it. If you don't like it, just leave, work with another team. It IS that simple. BUT, don't simply say "xx turns women away", because not every woman is the same.
osilas 11y ago
一群素质低下的IT流氓
osilas 11y ago
一群IT流氓！
aerovistae 11y ago
As a web developer (as in the world of JavaScript / Python / PHP / Ruby ), I don't really know much about C or operating system stuff. So I have a total noob question. What goes into "maintaining" USB development? I mean, the USB ports have worked for years, no? What is there to be done? To my naive ears this is like hearing that someone is actively contributing to the technology behind light switches. Can someone in the know describe what goes into this?
- aerovistae 11y ago
  Andddd the only response is for someone to give me a downvote. Love it.

357 points by clessg 11y ago

ahh 11y ago

For the record: I feel a lot "safer" and more respected by Linus than I do by Sarah. Linus just wants me to submit good code and demands that I live up to his standards: if I don't, he'll call me out and tell me to do it again better. I can do that. Sarah wants me to agree with her politically: if I don't, she'll quietly organize a campaign against me behind my back. I'm good at writing proper code. I'm bad at winning political knife fights. So have fun with your next project, Sarah, whatever it is! You organize your communities the way you like and I'll organize mine the way I do. We'll see who gets more done and has more fun!

rishabhsagar 11y ago
Woah! What campaign?! I don't think she is drumming up any support. Asking for polite and decent conversations without being called a 'cry baby' or being asked to 'go back to kitchen' is not political knife fight, it is basic courtesy in a public forum IMO.
- meapix 11y ago
  The problem with "basic courtesy" is that you need to understand other people's culture/background/personal life to make it "correct". There are people who will be offended just by criticizing their code, not their personal life.
  - tptacek 11y ago
    This whole post that we're commenting on is about exactly that distinction, so this is a bogus argument.
  - pron 11y ago
    She's not complaining about people being offended for some obscure cultural reasons. She states that the community is abrasive and led by assholes. The significance of being spat on is open to cultural interpretation; the significance of being stabbed with a knife is pretty unequivocal. Let's start with that.
- tomjen3 11y ago
  Ahh has probably, like me, run into the social justice worriers. There is a community so toxic and full of hatred for (white heterosexual) men that they make Ulrich Drepper sound like miss Manners. Many of their complaints are the same complaints Sarah posted, so it does seem reasonable (to me) to assume she was one of them. Normally they complain about some project not caring about their feelings, demand change, tear apart anyone who argues against them and then force anybody who disagree with them out. Death threats and emails to peoples employers suggesting they be fired are commonly used. I don't think Sarah is one of them, because to work for that long on a project requires sharp technical skills, which the social justice warriors don't tend to have as well as a willingness to work with people don't agree with you. I certainly wouldn't fault anybody for suspecting knives though.
  - reitanqild 11y ago
    she seems different: honest but tired. We must be able to defend Linus without attacking anyone criticizing the Linux kernel maintainers. Not everything is perfect on that list.
  - chris_wot 11y ago
    It's not in any way reasonable to assume that someone is badly behaved without any specific evidence. To lump someone into a stereotypical grouping because you just assume they live up to that stereotype is the sign of a rather weak or insecure personality!
meapix 11y ago
I kinda prefer Linus's method as you know what will happen to you if you don't verify/validate (a kind of respect to everybody's time) before submitting.
- Flow 11y ago
  There are many more people than Linus on LKML and the other lists. Don't make this about Linus.
- meapix 11y ago
  example? the emails I've read so far are from Linus.
devit 11y ago
To be honest, she did at least part of her campaign in public on the LKML directly interacting with Linus among others, and there doesn't seem to be evidence of she doing any "organizing against someone's back". That said, I agree that it's problematic to try to enforce anything not regarding code, since the enforcer (or who succeeds them) can then abuse the enforcement itself as an harassing and exclusion tool (the so-called "Nazi moderator" problem).
nommm-nommm 11y ago
Why do some people have to think everything is about politics? There is a difference between demanding and expecting great code and being an asshole. You can demand good code without alienating others.
chris_wot 11y ago
Whoa. Where did Sarah ever ask you to support her political agenda and opinions?

EwanToo 11y ago

A sad post, but not an unexpected one given the tone on the kernel mailing list - I'm sure many others have left without saying anything.

hapless 11y ago
It takes courage to speak at all.
deelowe 11y ago
I don't get it. Why are so many OK with the personal attacks, unprofessional language, and generally toxic communications within the Linux kernel development community? Is it because Linus himself is one of the worst? While I appreciate the technical talent of the kernel devs, I have lost nearly all respect for these developers. This issue needs to be resolved before it gets worse.
- ChuckMcM 11y ago
  Linus. Groups, packs, tribes, mobs, will emulate the behavior of the leader. For the members it is a sign that they respect the leader and a sign of loyalty. The problem is that Linus isn't really a dick head, among the times I've interacted with him (few) he was pleasant and respectful. Except the high 'hits' if you search for him are generally him being brutally critical, both technically and personally. And that is a challenge. People emulate their leader, and so their leader has to project the kind of leadership they want, all the time. And worse, only the gross strokes are really picked up, the subtley it always lost. So an outburst from a leader that might have had specific triggers, is read as simply an outburst. The triggers never surface by themselves to the consciousness of the folks following. People who want Linus' respect in the kernel community, act as they perceive he acts. The result is suboptimal for community harmony. That is my observation anyway.
  - debacle 11y ago
    Most of the hits for Linus being brutal on Google are him dressing down someone doing something arrogant and/or stupid. Generally he seems relatively pragmatic but gruff.

sssilver 11y ago

Different teams have different cultures that work for them. It's not impossible that the culture that alienates some people is the very culture that enables the phenomenal engineering of the Linux kernel. I personally would feel privileged to be a part of a group that puts engineering excellence beyond anything, including my own hurt feelings. There would be beauty for me in that emotional austerity and sheer directness. That being said, I empathize with the author. If a team culture that delivers doesn't work for someone, the best thing to do is to move on. Keep looking, don't settle.

pron 11y ago
> I personally would feel privileged to be a part of a group that puts engineering excellence beyond anything I wonder if other -- perhaps more minor -- achievements that displayed engineering excellence like the Apollo Program, invention of the transistor, the first compiler etc. espoused this same "enabling" culture. > including my own hurt feelings This is a meme that keeps coming up and shows a complete misunderstanding of this situation and others like it. This is not about hurt feelings. It is about marginalization, which is pushing (or keeping) qualified people away. Sometimes, the means of the marginalization is a hostile environment. Sometimes there are other means. The author's feelings have not been hurt; she just couldn't stand working in an environment of assholes. > If a team culture that delivers doesn't work for someone, the best thing to do is to move on The best thing for whom? That person perhaps. But the best thing for our industry is that people speak up -- as Sarah Sharp has -- people listen, and people change things.
- zeveb 11y ago
  > I wonder if other -- perhaps more minor -- achievements that displayed engineering excellence like the Apollo Program, invention of the transistor, the first compiler etc. espoused this same "enabling" culture. You might be surprised. While I don't know about those particular projects, I know that, for example, Admiral Rickover was direct and blunt with those in the U.S. Navy's nuclear propulsion programme. He didn't suffer fools kindly, or at all. But then, he had the health and safety of his men, the nation and the world to worry about. I'd take a few hurt feelings over another Therac-25. > It is about marginalization, which is pushing (or keeping) qualified people away. No, mariginalisation is about pushing or keeping away people rejected by the group. When it keeps the unqualified away, it's a good thing. In the pursuit of excellence, even someone who's excellent on an absolute scale may not be excellent enough. A team of the best dozen engineers in the world will necessarily not include the 13th-best engineer: he is incredibly good, but he's just not good enough for that team. Is the kernel team marginalising the good enough along with the bad? I honestly don't know.

drewg123 11y ago

Its not just women that are being put off. I'm a man, and when I worked for an IHV, I dreaded every interaction with the Linux kernel community due to the tone of the interactions. It was by far the most hostile community we engaged with. I often submitted patches through either junior developers in our company who were Linux enthusiasts, or through friends who were established in the Linux community just to avoid dealing with the people on the subsystem list. By contrast the *BSD communities were far more helpful, as were the closed-source MacOSX and Solaris driver/kernel mailing lists, as well as the private interactions with folks from Apple and Sun.

zeveb 11y ago
> By contrast the *BSD communities were far more helpful I think I'd take Linux Torvald's criticism over Theo de Raadt's any day of the week…
- webaholic 11y ago
  You are narrowing it to only Linus. It goes much deeper than that.
  - drewg123 11y ago
    Indeed -- it was the subsystem maintainer (and a few people on the list) that were the problem. We never dealt with Linus himself.
- drewg123 11y ago
  I was speaking mostly of FreeBSD -- that's the only BSD we had direct support for. We did have some friendly interactions with OpenBSD, but not directly with Theo.
- vezzy-fnord 11y ago
  The Linux kernel is structured in a tree-like hierarchy such that most neophytes will likely never directly encounter Linus, but be chewed off by a subsystem maintainer long before that. In contrast, Theo is just another hacker who also happens to be project leader, compared to the more "ivory tower" approach of Linus.

chasing 11y ago

There's a weird myth floating around that being honest, direct, or "real" means being an asshole. And there's another related myth that being an asshole is acceptable.

arbitrage 11y ago
Sure. Nice strawman. It's not a myth, however, that shouting, cursing, and attacking your coworkers makes you an asshole.
- zem 11y ago
  It's not a straw man. If you have never run into people who explicitly excuse their asshole behaviour by saying they're just being "blunt" or "honest" you're either lucky or unobservant.
  - JoshTriplett 11y ago
    > people who explicitly excuse their asshole behaviour by saying they're just being "blunt" or "honest" You can find several such excuses on this page, even.
- 1024core 11y ago
  You missed the point completely (I think). The GP was implying that there's a myth that if you really want to be "real", you have to act like an asshole. Which is not true, and hence the "myth".

zeveb 11y ago

> I need communication that is technically brutal but personally respectful. And sometimes being personally disrespectful yields better results. Which is, after all, what one wants out of a software project: results, not happy feelings. I think we'd all like to be personally respected (I know I would). But I also think that almost all of us have done things which aren't respectable (I know I have); and I believe that at least for some people, the shame of public disrespect is part of the learning experience involved in not doing it again. If this atmosphere of harsh personal criticism does yield better results, then it's necessary. I'm reminded of the old adage, 'if you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.' Heat is necessary to cook (a kitchen in summer is miserable, particularly without air conditioning); interpersonal heat may be necessary to produce better software. I myself don't do so well in an atmosphere of intense personal criticism, and have great difficulty giving it, but I consider those my own personality flaws.

chasing 11y ago
> If this atmosphere of harsh personal criticism does yield better results, then it's necessary. That's a pretty big "if." And my personal experience is that, no, working in an "atmosphere of harsh personal criticism" does not yield better results. It makes good people go away. It causes people who don't want to be attacked to just keep their mouths shut and not say anything. It makes people wary of floating ideas that could be interesting but also risk being abusively mocked. It makes people not want to ask questions. It kills social cohesion. Etc.
- PeterisP 11y ago
  The evidence in large open source projects seems to support that "if" - I mean, if an atmosphere of harsh personal criticism would significantly harm the end result, and a friendlier atmosphere would improve it without undue burden to all the participants (as in, people can leave/not join because of hostile environment but also because of being asked to change their ways), then for any competing or forked project we'd expect to see the friendliest community to win, and that's often not the case. Since many (most?) large high-profile projects seem to have the problem of hostile atmosphere, then it suggests that when all things are taken into account, then policies that allow various contributors/maintainers to be as [un]hostile as they want have outperformed policies that would require them to be civil or leave the project. I mean, we're seeing developers contribute to projects run by assholes instead of saying "well, I'm ready to maintain a fork and not be an asshole" and having everyone jump ship. So no matter what they're saying, in practice they're showing that yes, that they prefer that ugly "leadership" over the alternative - pushing away the person that doesn't want to change.

pron 11y ago

Some background (found through simple Googling): http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/linus-torvalds-defends-his-right-to-shame-linux-kernel-developers/ http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/linus-... http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-07/22/sarah-sharp http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-07/22/sarah-sharp

meapix 11y ago
That finger is for Nvidia. There is a chinese proverb that say: "When the sage points at the moon, the fool looks at the finger.". Nvidia is the problem here, not the finger.
- pron 11y ago
  And does the sage read the story (which, BTW, is about Sarah Sharp) that goes with the picture of the finger or is he just on the lookout for moons? :)

tylerflint 11y ago

> We are human. We make mistakes, and we correct them. We get frustrated with someone, we over-react, and then we apologize and try to work together towards a solution. Wisdom.

nanodano 11y ago

The Linux project has been around for a couple decades now. Has this attitude been a trend from the very beginning, or is it something that formed over time?

philliphaydon 11y ago
Yes. Pretty much been that way for a long time.

nappy-doo 11y ago

Sigh. Story time. A long time ago (2006,7,8?) before Sarah took over USB development, I tried to start getting fixes into the un-maintained USB stack. I submitted fixes for leaks, segfaults, and general cleanup and documentation. At the time, the "maintainer" was one of the most unhelpful, and ugly people I ever dealt with over e-mail. After months of writing with the person over a simple leak he'd introduced, I gave up, deciding to fix it on a branch, and publish our code rather than deal with that developer. I vowed I'd never go back -- and I still haven't. I'm not saying all kernel developers are jerks, but I'm not interested in working with those that are. As such, I'm just not willing to spend my time trying to help. (And maybe some developers want to keep it that way. So, I guess we're both happier for it.)

lolo_ 11y ago
This makes me wonder if this subsystem is a particular culprit for these issues. It seems like it's pot luck as to how friendly one subsystem is in comparison to another. That's not to say something shouldn't be done here, but does tally with what I've heard about this in the past.
- digi_owl 11y ago
  Could be. Sometimes it seems that a project or similar gets started by someone with serious technical knowhow, but then as it heads more towards maintenance it gets put up for grabs for anyone to take over. At that point you get someone with more interest in the position than the tech stepping in, and it all descends into hell.

droopybuns 11y ago

This article helped me understand a frustration I have with millennials. >>I feel powerless in a community that had a “Code of Conflict” without a specific list of behaviors to avoid and a community with no teeth to enforce it. It never would have occurred to me that I was ever entitled to procedures for handling conflict in a community. I have operated under the following rule for community bullshit: Endure it, fix it, or abandon it. The fashionable "sad departure" missive just reeks of entitlement. Reading these notes make me feel embarrassed for the author. Younger people seem to be celebrating a style that whines about community. It isn't leadership.

pron 11y ago
> It never would have occurred to me that I was ever entitled to... No one thinks they're entitled. They're just saying what they think is right. > procedures for handling conflict in a community You're missing the point. If the community was well-behaved procedure wouldn't be necessary. It's not procedure she's asking for -- it's decent behavior -- and suggesting that perhaps procedure is a possible fix. If it isn't, we'll try others. > Endure it, fix it, or abandon it. First she endured it (for about 8 years), then she tried to fix it ([1], [2]), and now she's leaving. You've found a true successor. > Younger people seem to be celebrating a style that whines about community Tell that to Martin Luther. Also, why use that word "whine"? Linus whines about a whole lot of stuff yet no one calls him a whiner. [1]: http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/linus-torvalds-defends-his-right-to-shame-linux-kernel-developers/ http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/linus-... [2]: http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-07/22/sarah-sharp http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-07/22/sarah-sharp
- droopybuns 11y ago
  >>No one thinks they're entitled. Said every entitled person everywhere. This also applies to people who talk about privilege. >>Also, why use that word "whine"? Stylewise: "Disappointment" demonstrates leadership. "Sad" demonstrates entitlement. >>Linus [...] I don't think anyone who leads people should defend Linus' behavior. He's an asshole that has provided a powerful, free & useful kernel. Until there is a better FOSS alternative to Linux, it makes sense to endure him. But deciding to defend his behavior indicates a lack of compassion for people's feelings.

lolo_ 11y ago

I have contributed some trivial commits (so far) and though I encountered some harsh comments it was nothing I felt was overly personal. But of course, my experience is pretty limited at this point. I get the impression that the level of these issues varies wildly depending on the subsystem in question. For example, Greg Kroah-Hartman is friendly and helpful to a ridiculous degree, I literally don't understand how he gets so much done and maintains helpfulness (and he's working on the staging drivers with some of the roughest code in the entire kernel.) I feel sorry that Sarah has had this happen, and it's sad that this could happen to anyone, but in particular it's sad that it's happened to a woman when we have such a massive under representation of women already in our industry and probably even more so in the kernel. I don't know what the answer is, but for those areas of the kernel that are a problem a balance needs to be found between directness and talking to somebody like a human being. As for Linus, I think he gets somewhat misrepresented in many places. His vitriol is reserved for senior kernel maintainers who should know better and do things which (in many cases) could very negatively impact users, I've seen a number of threads where he's been let's say, less than civil, which were all about kernel code breaking user code and the subsystem maintainers saying 'well they're doing it wrong so let's just break their applications'. In those kind of circumstances you're glad that Linus strongly objects.

JoshTriplett 11y ago
> As for Linus, I think he gets somewhat misrepresented in many places. His vitriol is reserved for senior kernel maintainers who should know better and do things which (in many cases) could very negatively impact users Which sure doesn't make the already thankless task of becoming a senior kernel maintainer any more appealing. And it creates a terrible culture where people see that and perpetuate it.
- maxxxxx 11y ago
  Does Linus ever make mistakes and does he receive the same treatment?
  - qntm 11y ago

Grue3 11y ago

I was with her until >I have the right to replace any comment I feel like with “fart fart fart fart”. Right after >I would prefer the communication style within the Linux kernel community to be more respectful. Way to not practice what you preach.

zyxley 11y ago
A policy of tolerance and respect does not require being tolerant and respectful of intolerance and disrepect.
- Grue3 11y ago
  And so, the vicious circle continues. Did you not notice how the policy of replacing messages with farts is not limited solely to intolerant and disrespectful ones? It's exactly the kind of passive aggression that is typical amongst nerds, and the kind she was seemingly railing against in the beginning of the rant.
  - chris_wot 11y ago
    If someone threatens to rape or kill her (which seems to happens to pretty much every woman who works in tech who speaks out against sexism) then fart noises is mild.
    - Grue3 11y ago
      Do you seriously suggest this as a reasonable reaction, rather than, say, reporting it to the police?
      - chris_wot 11y ago
        If the police could take action to locate the one making the threats, then reporting them is a reasonable option. But here's a thought: if you saw graffiti on a wall you owned, then you could report it police AND paint over the top of it with a fresh coat of paint. Let's say you are a Jew, and the graffiti was spewing Neo-Nazi propaganda, targeted at you. You would be justified, because the wall is your property, to mock the perpetrators on your newly repainted wall. It's your wall - and you are free to express yourself on your own property. Sarah's "wall" is similarly her blog post. You can make offensive remarks, but she is free to remove your offensive remarks and mock you in their place. And at the same time collect evidence of threatening behaviour and report it to the police. Not sure why this is such a difficult concept...

matt_morgan 11y ago

USB in Linux is really, really good. It didn't use to be. This is a big loss.

digi_owl 11y ago
Not sure if it was Sharp directly that produced that, or if she more acted as the representative of a larger USB team at Intel (somewhat ironic given that Intel at the corporate level didn't seem interested at all in USB3 at first).

doomrobo 11y ago

>What that means is they are privileging the emotional needs of other Linux kernel developers (to release their frustrations on others, to be blunt, rude, or curse to blow off steam) over my own emotional needs (the need to be respected as a person, to not receive verbal or emotional abuse). This seems to be imply that these people don't also have the need to be respected. It's a choice to privilege everybody's need to blow off steam over everybody's need to be respected. Not just hers.

intortus 11y ago
Hence the sentence that you omitted: > There’s an awful power dynamic there that favors the established maintainer over basic human decency. In any project there will be emotional conflicts. That doesn't mean there should be an overwhelming trend toward coddling incumbents. Not only is it morally suspect, it's really bad for the health of the project.

AdmiralAsshat 11y ago

I'm pretty sure Sarah has confronted Linus over this exact issue in the past, and he was pretty adamant that it would not change: http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/linus-torvalds-defends-his-right-to-shame-linux-kernel-developers/ http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/linus-... So, there you go. This is what happens, and what will continue to happen, when the leader defends that kind of behavior.

reitanqild 11y ago

I worked in a place where I'd be scolded once in a while when I did something stupid and I enjoyed it[0] for a while as long as it was fair. It quickly became annoying when it turned out the same people who criticised others harshly swept their own mistakes under the rug ... [0]: "As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another."

adrianlmm 11y ago

What I'd like to know is if she was disrespected in any way, cause despise the Linus behavior, he only is that way with people he knows and with people he has confidence. so, was she disrespected or not?

bjornstjerne 11y ago

I'm glad she was able to figure out that the team culture didn't fit her and leave for something more suitable to her preferences. Different people are different, and a single team cannot accommodate every style.

pron 11y ago
So abuse and public humiliation is a style now? Well, if it is, her point is that it's a bad style, a very bad style, and it would be best if it goes out of fashion. Kinda like writing spaghetti code with lots of gotos. That, too, is a style, but generally recognized as a bad one, even if some people like it.

nommm-nommm 11y ago

Its easy to say "This is the way it is, tough cookies, deal with it. Grow a thicker skin if you want to play." It takes a bigger man (apologies for the sexism - can't think of a better term) to put their head down and become a better person.

copsarebastards 11y ago
You can't think of the word "person"?
- nommm-nommm 11y ago
  Doesn't have the same effect/meaning. "Term" was the wrong word - "Expression" is more of what I meant. "Man up" doesn't have the same connotations as "person up." (For example)
  - copsarebastards 11y ago
    I agree on "man up" versus "person up", but "bigger person" has exactly the same connotations as "bigger man". To be clear here, I'm not offended by your statement. I think communicating using common idioms which happen to contain a gender word isn't sexist, and quibbling over gendered language like that just drives real sexism underground. I'm talking about it purely from a writing perspective. Looking at it more, I wouldn't have used either phrase, to be honest. I'd have gone with something like "It's harder to admit you screwed up and become a better person" (drop the euphemisms and draw a dichotomy between easy/hard).
    - nommm-nommm 11y ago
      Terms that connote power/prestige/respect are terms that also connote masculinity. There's no "happen to contain" it isn't happenstance. No quibbling here; Language matters a lot. (For what it is worth the language terminology brainfart on my part was probably due to the several pints I had ingested before writing that ..)

JoelJacobson 11y ago

https://lwn.net/Articles/105375/ https://lwn.net/Articles/105375/ (Linus on Kernel Mangement Style, 2004) If everyone would read this before getting involved in the kernel project, hopefully those not compatible with the culture would not get involved in the first place.

pzone 11y ago
Do you understand that this whole article is designed to point out the major losses from categorically excluding developers "not compatible with the culture?"

mst 11y ago

I do wish there was some separation in the description between abrasiveness and sexism/homophobia - I've only ever really seen the former on lkml, and am far more tolerant of it than the latter.

forgottenpass 11y ago
and am far more tolerant of it than the latter Which is why you see them addressed in the same breath so often. It brings in the political capital of the latter, to gripe about the former.

xixi77 11y ago

She (and everyone here) talks about it being OK to criticize code but not OK to offend people personally, which seems like a rather reasonable concept -- but does anyone have actual examples of the latter, to put everything in context? I see http://marc.info/?l=linux-kernel&m=135628421403144&w=2 http://marc.info/?l=linux-kernel&m=135628421403144&w=2 and http://marc.info/?l=linux-acpi&m=136157944603147&w=2 http://marc.info/?l=linux-acpi&m=136157944603147&w=2 quoted, but to me it looks like both are about code?

antirez 11y ago
The content is about a bug, but the form is bad. You can effectively communicate that the patch is bad and that the approach is to never break user space without saying shut up, is crap, and without to be so verbal aggressive IMHO.
- amadvance 11y ago
  This seems the result of years of frustration telling the same thing again and again. Even the 2009 Alan Cox rant was about the 'never break userspace' issue: https://lkml.org/lkml/2009/7/28/373 https://lkml.org/lkml/2009/7/28/373 For sure being rude doesn't seem to work ;)

acd 11y ago

I think some developers need to go out and meet more people in person. There is no need for a toxic communication style. Usually things are said much harder to people on mailing lists than is said face to face. Get out talk to people. People working isolated being an issue

xname2 11y ago

I don't get it. If you don't like it, just leave, work with another team. It IS that simple. BUT, don't simply say "xx turns women away", because not every woman is the same.

osilas 11y ago

一群素质低下的IT流氓

osilas 11y ago

一群IT流氓！

aerovistae 11y ago

As a web developer (as in the world of JavaScript / Python / PHP / Ruby ), I don't really know much about C or operating system stuff. So I have a total noob question. What goes into "maintaining" USB development? I mean, the USB ports have worked for years, no? What is there to be done? To my naive ears this is like hearing that someone is actively contributing to the technology behind light switches. Can someone in the know describe what goes into this?

aerovistae 11y ago
Andddd the only response is for someone to give me a downvote. Love it.