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> yet an other entry in the "Linus bullies some poor coder into submission by insulting them until they just stop responding" Has that ever happened? My impre

> yet an other entry in the "Linus bullies some poor coder into submission by insulting them until they just stop responding" Has that ever happened? My impression was that he only ever takes a rough tone with high profile coders and is nice and polite to "poor coders". Also, he never insults them personally, but says that their code/argument is bad and that they are smart enough to know that already. Hence, they should stop making excuses and fix it already.

simias 7y ago
I still think that this tone is counterproductive, but that might be personal preference. I hate working in an environment where I know I can end up on the receiving end of some public humiliation if I voice a dissenting opinion or make a mistake. That's how you end up with people censuring themselves and not pointing out when somebody is actually making a mistake because they don't want to suffer the abuse. This is especially inexcusable coming from Linus because it's not like he needs to resort to these tactics to be heard or make an impression, he's one of the most respected software devs in existence (and for good reasons). You could remove all the abuse from his posts and you'd lose exactly nothing IMO. But this discussion is hackneyed, I know many people love Linus' style and think it's perfectly acceptable and even a good thing, I'm just definitely not one of them.
- mritun 7y ago
  Sigh It’s sad that there are people who think calling garbage code garbage is inappropriate. What goes in their mind? Don’t they smell or call a smell a smell?
TheFlyingFish 7y ago
On at least one memorable occasion [0], he expressed surprise that the developer(s) responsible for some piece of code had survived to adulthood, considering they "were likely too stupid to find a tit to suck on" as a baby. I'm not super aware of the context here, but at first glance it doesn't appear to be a high-profile coder with lots of kernel experience that he's talking about. [0] https://lkml.org/lkml/2012/7/6/495 https://lkml.org/lkml/2012/7/6/495

simias 7y ago

I still think that this tone is counterproductive, but that might be personal preference. I hate working in an environment where I know I can end up on the receiving end of some public humiliation if I voice a dissenting opinion or make a mistake. That's how you end up with people censuring themselves and not pointing out when somebody is actually making a mistake because they don't want to suffer the abuse. This is especially inexcusable coming from Linus because it's not like he needs to resort to these tactics to be heard or make an impression, he's one of the most respected software devs in existence (and for good reasons). You could remove all the abuse from his posts and you'd lose exactly nothing IMO. But this discussion is hackneyed, I know many people love Linus' style and think it's perfectly acceptable and even a good thing, I'm just definitely not one of them.

mritun 7y ago
Sigh It’s sad that there are people who think calling garbage code garbage is inappropriate. What goes in their mind? Don’t they smell or call a smell a smell?

TheFlyingFish 7y ago

On at least one memorable occasion [0], he expressed surprise that the developer(s) responsible for some piece of code had survived to adulthood, considering they "were likely too stupid to find a tit to suck on" as a baby. I'm not super aware of the context here, but at first glance it doesn't appear to be a high-profile coder with lots of kernel experience that he's talking about. [0] https://lkml.org/lkml/2012/7/6/495 https://lkml.org/lkml/2012/7/6/495