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Once I was interested in obscure code base because my motivation was to discover smth which a few people would know about. But these days, I see github repo wit

Once I was interested in obscure code base because my motivation was to discover smth which a few people would know about. But these days, I see github repo with large number of contributors, who are smarter than me (often), it's an instant motivation killer. I rarely checkout other's code unless it's related to the problem I am solving.

justboxing 9y ago
What's 'smth' ?
- Waterluvian 9y ago
  "something" I think.
deckard1 9y ago
If you work at a company with a large code base, you quickly come to realize that few people know how everything works. Most people only know a single part of the code that they are working on intimately. It's this intimately part that scares some people. Because each person working on the code intimately creates the picture that each person knows everything about the code. Which just isn't true. Start small and make sure you talk to the maintainers and make sure they are comfortable with you and what you want to work on. Introduce tiny patches to begin with. You'll disarm any gatekeepers this way, and get people on your side with you. The larger the project, the more politics involved generally.
John_KZ 9y ago
I actually suffer from an extra problem. I no longer trust any program you can download off the internet, except for trusted repositories (ie most of canonical's ubuntu repos, debian etc). That has been a massive drag for me, because I can't just download super convinient programs on my work computer. It pretty much stalled my interest in (amateur/hobby) programming alongside with stopping the use of pirated software, except in VMs, which are slow and inconvenient enough to not bother running them very often.
- QasimK 9y ago
  I'm almost at the same stage that you are. I think that as powerful as traditional desktop operating systems have been, they are clearly less secure than mobile operating systems which sandbox applications. People have sensitive data on their devices, and it is simply far too easy to get harmful malware on your machine. Whether from an external developer becoming compromised, or actual malicious behaviour. I still download popular 3rd-party programs (i.e. not in the OS repos), especially if they are open-source (i.e. just GitHub), and there is evidence of active maintenance with a significant number of contributors to the project, or if it is from a reputable, popular real-life person. I think it is a real shame. I should be able to download any program and know that they aren't just going to be trawling through the files on my PC without the OS at least asking me (and so on). It's a tricky balance between sandboxed "useless" apps, and god-mode, but something that I feel desktop OS's need to focus on if their platform is to survive.
- exikyut 9y ago
  Sounds like there's a story behind this. What happened?

justboxing 9y ago

What's 'smth' ?

Waterluvian 9y ago
"something" I think.

deckard1 9y ago

If you work at a company with a large code base, you quickly come to realize that few people know how everything works. Most people only know a single part of the code that they are working on intimately. It's this intimately part that scares some people. Because each person working on the code intimately creates the picture that each person knows everything about the code. Which just isn't true. Start small and make sure you talk to the maintainers and make sure they are comfortable with you and what you want to work on. Introduce tiny patches to begin with. You'll disarm any gatekeepers this way, and get people on your side with you. The larger the project, the more politics involved generally.

John_KZ 9y ago

I actually suffer from an extra problem. I no longer trust any program you can download off the internet, except for trusted repositories (ie most of canonical's ubuntu repos, debian etc). That has been a massive drag for me, because I can't just download super convinient programs on my work computer. It pretty much stalled my interest in (amateur/hobby) programming alongside with stopping the use of pirated software, except in VMs, which are slow and inconvenient enough to not bother running them very often.

QasimK 9y ago
I'm almost at the same stage that you are. I think that as powerful as traditional desktop operating systems have been, they are clearly less secure than mobile operating systems which sandbox applications. People have sensitive data on their devices, and it is simply far too easy to get harmful malware on your machine. Whether from an external developer becoming compromised, or actual malicious behaviour. I still download popular 3rd-party programs (i.e. not in the OS repos), especially if they are open-source (i.e. just GitHub), and there is evidence of active maintenance with a significant number of contributors to the project, or if it is from a reputable, popular real-life person. I think it is a real shame. I should be able to download any program and know that they aren't just going to be trawling through the files on my PC without the OS at least asking me (and so on). It's a tricky balance between sandboxed "useless" apps, and god-mode, but something that I feel desktop OS's need to focus on if their platform is to survive.
exikyut 9y ago
Sounds like there's a story behind this. What happened?