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> I will not be sending any more patches due to the attitude that is not only unwelcome but also intimidating to newbies and non experts. Maybe not being nice
by arkh 6y ago
> I will not be sending any more patches due to the attitude that is not only unwelcome but also intimidating to newbies and non experts.
Maybe not being nice is part of the immune system of open source.
- john-radio 6y agoBut G. K-H's correspondence here is completely cordial and professional, and still gets all the results that were needed?
- colechristensen 6y agoI think so. With a large project I think a realist attitude that raises to the level of mean when there’s bullshit around is somewhat necessary to prevent decay. If not you get cluttered up with bad code and people there for the experience. Like how stackoverflow is lost to rule zealots there for the game not for the purpose. Something big and important should be intimidating and isn’t a public service babysitter...
- ethbr0 6y agoIt feels like a corollary of memetic assholery in online communities. Essentially the R0 [0] of being a dick. If I have a community, bombarded by a random number of transient bad actors at random times, then if R0 > some threshold, my community inevitably trends to a cesspool, as each bad actor creates more negative members. If I take steps to decrease R0, one of which may indeed be "blunt- and harshness to new contributors", then my community may survive in the face of equivalent pressures. It's a valid point, and seems to have historical support via evidence of many egalitarian / welcoming communities collapsing due to the accumulation of bad faith participants. The key distinction is probably "Are you being blunt / harsh in the service of the primary goal, or ancillary to the mission?" [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_reproduction_number https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_reproduction_number
- depressedpanda 6y ago> It's a valid point, and seems to have historical support via evidence of many egalitarian / welcoming communities collapsing due to the accumulation of bad faith participants. Could you provide references to some of this historical support?
- yifanl 6y agoKinda a silly example, but several subreddits that started out with the aim of making fun of some subject (i.e. r/prequelmemes and the Star Wars prequels, or r/the_donald and then Presidential candidate Donald Trump) were quickly turned into communities earnestly supporting the initial subject of parody.
- alexeldeib 6y agoI don't think this is silly at all. And the fact that reddit's admins occasionally have to step in with a forceful hand over what the mods do only speaks louder to GP's point.
- ethbr0 6y agoI think Reddit is the broadest example, because it's evidence of both outcomes due to the diversity in moderation policy between subs. Some can tolerate a steady influx of bad actors: some fall apart. There's probably a valid paper in there somewhere.
- tester756 6y ago> Like how stackoverflow is lost to rule zealots there for the game not for the purpose. Like?
- skeletal88 6y agoHonest questions getting downvoted, closed for being too broad, duplicates or just "Wrong" in the eyes of overzealous long time members
- tester756 6y agoThere's nothing wrong with duplicates If they weren't doing it, then quality of SO would decrease for all of us. It's in our interest to have strict mods on SO
- burnished 6y agoYou haven't seen a question closed as a duplicate when it was clear that time or details had made the linked question not an actual duplicate?
- JadeNB 6y agoI think the idea is that it's better to err on the side of too-strict moderation than too-lax. People can always come back to re-try a question at another time, but, once the spirit of the community is lost, there's not much you can do about it. (Not to say I like the StackExchange community much. It's far too top-down directed for me. But I'm very much sympathetic to the spirit of strict moderation.)
- burnished 6y agoI agree with you. Its silly to act like the phenomenon doesn't exist though.
- threatofrain 6y ago
- admax88q 6y agoI'm not sure why you think you have to be mean to avoid bad code. Being nice doesn't mean accepting any and all contributions. It just means not being a jerk or _overly_ harsh when rejecting.
- ABCLAW 6y agoYou can create a strict, high functioning organization without being an asshole. Maintaining high standards and expecting excellence isn't an exercise in babysitting; it's an exercise in aligning contributors to those same standards and expectations. You don't need to do that by telling them they're garbage. You can do it by getting them invested in growth and improvement.
- da_big_ghey 6y agothat is depend on who you are asking. if i am taking "no nonsense" aproach then some people are having no problem. but other people, include especialy woman, are say that it is not "nice" and that there is some problem even if it is neither "mean". also here we are seeing persons are having no interest in "growth and improvement", they are not even creating the good faith contributions to project.
- devmor 6y agoI was enjoying Linus being less aggressive, but maybe we do need angry Linus.
- disintegore 6y agoAngry Greg is doing a great job. Effective, and completely without expletives or personal insults.
- corty 6y agoHe is doing a great job. But I think a few insults earlier on might have prevented a whole lot of trouble.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- depressedpanda 6y agoI enjoyed (and now miss) angry Linus.
- rataata_jr 6y agoI enjoy Linus's wit in insulting people. He's good.
- c2h5oh 6y agoAngry Linus would risk a stroke responding in that email thread.
- pvarangot 6y agoBecause he's old. I think young Linus wouldn't have held back in making judgement about the quality and usefulness of the research being done here.
- c2h5oh 6y agoNo, because people introducing bad code through lack of skill/not enough effort were enough to get him going. People introducing bad code on purpose, for a social experiment, are on a whole new level of bad and so would his anger be.
- motohagiography 6y agoOn the other thread, I suggested this was an attack on critical infrastructure using a university as cover and that this was a criminal/counter-intellgence matter, and then asked whether any of these bug submitters also suggested the project culture was too aggressive and created an unsafe environment, to reduce scrutiny on their backdoors. Talk about predictive power in a hypothesis.
- CoolGuySteve 6y agoGiven its ubiquity in so many industries, tampering with Linux kernel security sounds an awful lot like criminal sabotage under US law. Getting banned from contributing is a light penalty.
- webinvest 6y agoEither that or the CFAA
- _n_b_ 6y ago> criminal sabotage under US law It is pretty comfortably not sabotage under 18 USC 105, which requires proving intent to harm the national defense of the United States. Absent finding an email from one of the researchers saying "this use-after-free is gonna fuck up the tankz," intent would otherwise be nearly impossible to prove.
- dragonwriter 6y ago> It is pretty comfortably not sabotage under 18 USC 105, which requires proving intent to harm the national defense of the United States. Presumably, this reference is intended to be to 18 USC ch. 105 (18 USC §§ 2151-2156). However, the characterization of required intent is inaccurate; the most relevant provision (18 USC § 2154) doesn’t require intent if the defendant has “reason to believe that his act may injure, interfere with, or obstruct the United States or any associate nation in preparing for or carrying on the war or defense activities” (emphasis added) during either a war or declared national emergency. It wouldn’t take much more than showing evidence that the defendant was aware (or even was in a position likely to be exposed to information that would make him aware) that Linux is used somewhere in the defense and national security establishment to support the mental state aspect of the offense. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2154 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2154
- walrus01 6y agoEvery time I have seen Theo from the OpenBSD project come down hard on someone, it was deserved.
- slver 6y agoHonestly WTF would a "newbie and non-expert" have to do with sending KERNEL PATCHES.
- tolbish 6y agoSo they can tell companies "I am a contributor to the Linux kernel"..there are charlatans are in every field. Assuming this wasn't malicious and "I'm a newbie" isn't just a cover.
- MeinBlutIstBlau 6y agoI had a professor in college who gave out references to students and made his assignments so easy a middle school kid could do the homework. He never said why but I'm 100% positive he was gaming the reviews sent back so that he'd stay hired on as an instructor while he built up his lesson plans. I think he figured out how to game it pretty quick seeing as the position had like 3 instructors before him whom students universally hated for either being ridiculously strict or lying through their teeth about even knowing what the difference between public and private meant.
- hmfrh 6y agoNobody is an expert on every subject. You could have PhD level knowledge of the theory behind a specific filesystem or allocator but know next to nothing about the underlying hardware.
- slver 6y agoMy point is that "we're newbies on the topic of the Linux Kernel, so be friendly to us when sending Linux Kernel patches" is the worst argument I've heard about anything in years.
- themulticaster 6y agoI'd say that's a very valid argument in principle. If you want to start contributing to the Linux kernel, you'll have to start somewhere - but you can't start refactoring entire subsystems, rather you'll start with small patches and it's very natural to make minor procedural and technical mistakes at that stage. [1] However, in this particular case, I agree that it is not a valid argument since it is doubtful whether the beginning kernel contributor's patches are in good faith. [1] Torvalds encouraging new contributors to send in trivial patches back in 2004: https://lkml.org/lkml/2004/12/20/255 https://lkml.org/lkml/2004/12/20/255
- alexfromapex 6y agoI disagree, I think it's important to be nice and welcoming to contributors but the immune system should be a robust code of conduct which explicitly lists things like this that will result in a temporary or permanent ban
- jasonwatkinspdx 6y agoThere is nothing about enforcing high standards that requires hostility or meanness. In this case the complaint that greg is being intimidating is being made entirely in bad faith. I don't think anyone else has a problem with greg's reply. So this doesn't really come across as an example that demonstrates your "not being nice is necessary" view.
- mccr8 6y agoBeing rude isn't going to discourage malicious actors, who are motivated by fame or wealth. If you ran a bank and had a bunch of rude bank tellers, you are only going to dissuade customers, not bank robbers.
- mirchibajji 6y agoA better analogy: Attempting to pee in the community pool to research if the maintainers are doing a good job of managing the hygiene standards.
- motohagiography 6y agoBeing nice is expensive, and sending bad code imposes costs on maintainers, so the sharp brevity of maintainers is efficient, and in cases where the submitter has wasted the maintainers time, the maintainer should impose a consequence by barking at them. Sustaining the belief that every submitter is an earnest, good, and altruistic person is painfully expensive and a waste of very valuable minds. Unhinged is unhinged and that needs to be managed, but keeping up the farce that there is some imaginary universe where the submitter is not wasting your time and working the process is wrong. I see this in architecture all the time, where people feign ignorance and appeal to this idea you are obligated to keep up the pretense that they aren't being sneaky. Competent people hold each other accountable. If you can afford civility, absolutely use it, but when people attempt to tax your civility, impose a cost. It's the difference between being civil and harmless.
- betaby 6y agoProper analogy would be 'rude SWAT team', not 'rude bank tellers'.
- devenson 6y agoEnforcing formal behavior makes the deviant behavior more noticeable.
- jallen_dot_dev 6y ago"We're banning you for deliberately submitting buggy patches as an experiment." "Well if you're gonna be a jerk about it, I won't be sending any more patches."
- stuffbyspencer 6y ago"I can excuse r̶a̶c̶i̶s̶m̶ wasting OSS maintainers time, but I draw the line at rudeness!" - (community)
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- praptak 6y ago> Maybe not being nice is part of the immune system of open source. Someone for whom being a bad actor is a day job will not get deterred by being told to fuck off. Being nasty might deter some low key negative contributors - maybe someone who overestimates their ability or someone "too smart to follow the rules". But it might also deter someone who could become a good contributor.
- dmos62 6y agoNot being nice is always to protect self. Not always effective though, and not always necessary.
- cptskippy 6y agoAttacking those critical of your questionable behavior and then refusing to participate further is a common response people have when caught red handed. This is just a form of "well I'll just take my business elsewhere!". Chances are he'll try again under a pseudonym.
- Ar-Curunir 6y agoInstead of not being nice, maybe Linux should adopt some sort of CI and testing infrastructure.
- da_big_ghey 6y agoLinux are have plenty testing machines, but it are not so simple that you seem to think for to test whole kernel. there is not any catching for all these possible cases, so not nice remain importance. and greater part is driver, driver need device for to work, so CI on this is hard.
- eropple 6y agohttps://kernelci.org https://kernelci.org is a Linux Foundation project; there are others, but that's just the main one I know of offhand. The idea that "not being nice" is necessary is plainly ridiculous, but this post is pretty wild--effectively you're implying that they're just amateurs or something and that this is a novel idea nobody's considered, while billions and billions of dollars of business run atop Linux-powered systems. What they don't do is hand over CI resources to randos submitting patches. That's why kernel developers receive and process those patches.
- medium_burrito 6y agoI'm curious what sort of lawsuits might be possible here. I for one would donate $1000 to a non-profit trust formed to find plaintiffs for whatever possible cause and then sue the everloving shit out of the author + advisor + university as many times as possible. EDIT: University is fair game too.
- wyager 6y agoAbsolutely. The derision that people like Linus get for being “mean” to big corpos trying to submit shitty patches is totally misplaced.