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at what point does it change from "backing" to "having influence over" or "affecting design decisions"?

• SwellJoe 16y ago
  He that writes the code has an extreme amount of influence, and can effect design decisions. Linus is the benevolent dictator, but if the code is clean and doesn't stomp on other stuff, it goes in. It's always been that way...and is as it should be in most large-scale Open Source projects. If you want to see examples of conflicts and how they were resolved, or not resolved, look at the ZFS in Linux discussion or the history of ReiserFS (somehow filesystems bring out the fight in people), though there have been other points of contention where developers wanted to push a little too far into the core design in ways that Linus didn't like. With companies and individuals that do it well, like Red Hat and IBM (individuals end up becoming Linus' "lieutinents", like Alan Cox for a famous example), it is almost invisible...they produce code that Linus likes, they take his advice on changes without making it a fight, and so he trusts them more and more over time, to the point that now it's pretty rare to see a Red Hat sponsored contribution lead to significant conflict. Do you have concerns about someone like Red Hat or IBM having influence over the kernel? I'd be curious what those concerns are based on.