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> But frankly, this research group should have been mostly apologizing for the way they communicated with the kernel group. ??? They submitted patches to the

> But frankly, this research group should have been mostly apologizing for the way they communicated with the kernel group. ??? They submitted patches to the kernel based on a static analysis tool they were building, and then Greg started accusing them of malice, and banned the entire univirsity - how is it the research group that communicated poorly? Why would they not "do this again" ? They were trying to contribute to the kernel, whether their patches were low quality or not, there was no malice from this group. They haven't used any social pressure - on the contrary, it's Greg who began this inflammatory, overblown reaction to ban an entire university based on previous research done under non university affiliated email addresses. Greg made numerous false accusations against Aditya. edit: Oh and to everyone who I'm sure will just downvote, https://lwn.net/Articles/854319/ https://lwn.net/Articles/854319/ Here's kernel maintainers explaining this mess that Greg made. People are conflating multiple unrelated events because Greg did.

boomboomsubban 5y ago
There's two separate research groups involved in this, and while the one that most recently submitted patches did nothing wrong the one behind the "hypocrite commits" did.
- mewse 5y ago
  "separate" if you ignore that they have the same faculty advisor.
  - staticassertion 5y ago
    So what? Who cares if they do? Static analysis fixes, whether they're good or bad, are harmless and not malicious. Greg attributed malice to them. I'm sure many advisors have tons of students contributing to the Kernel or other projects, every single year.
    - dragonwriter 5y ago
      > So what? For research groups, the faculty advisor is the responsible party; once that party has been shown to act maliciously, extra scrutiny is warranted, unless there is some evidence that durable reform has occurred. (The same might be said less strongly of the institutional source, as well.) > I'm sure many advisors have tons of students contributing to the Kernel or other projects, every single year. And virtually all of them have not been—either advisor or institution—responsible for malicious kernel patches. Actions have consequences.
      - staticassertion 5y ago
        > once that party has been shown to act maliciously, extra scrutiny is warranted It's nonsense that they acted maliciously. The original research was handled terribly, but it was not malicious. They intended to help, not hurt, even if they did so very poorly. Further, that is one advisor, whose name is not being dragged. Aditya's name, however, is, thanks to Greg's slanderous comments. https://twitter.com/trishalynn/status/1385410960278491137 https://twitter.com/trishalynn/status/1385410960278491137 "I am disgusted by the actions of Aditya Pakki" https://twitter.com/hedleyroos/status/1386290204298735617 https://twitter.com/hedleyroos/status/1386290204298735617 "Aditya Pakki is going to have a hard time finding employment." (this one directly retweeted Greg's post) https://twitter.com/_mackal/status/1384910754151866370 https://twitter.com/_mackal/status/1384910754151866370 "The simple fact that Aditya Pakki is so butt hurt proves this wasn't in good faith and their only reason for doing it is to shit out another hit piece. That email you quoted is fucking insane." https://twitter.com/BeardyNotes/status/1384900450059788288 https://twitter.com/BeardyNotes/status/1384900450059788288 "Sleazeballs like Aditya Pakki should be fired and disbarred from doing any "research" anywhere in the world!" https://twitter.com/seakoz/status/1384895697414148096 https://twitter.com/seakoz/status/1384895697414148096 "Aditya Pakki will forever be googleable as the guy who deliberately tried to make Linux insecure." Does that seem right to you? Are these the "consequences" you think are justified, because Aditya was trying to add legitimate patches for a tool he was working on to contribute to the kernel? Greg should publicly apologize to Aditya.
        5y ago
  - boomboomsubban 5y ago
    That faculty advisor has presumably done nothing wrong as part of this group either.
- staticassertion 5y ago
  > and while the one that most recently submitted patches did nothing wrong the one behind the "hypocrite commits" did. The commit that spurred this whole mess was for static analysis research, totally unrelated to the previous commits from quite some time ago related to bugdoors in the kernel. Greg's reaction was to the static analysis commits, and he alleged (in an incredibly insulting and hostile way) that they were made with malice.
  - boomboomsubban 5y ago
    His reaction was that after the previous incident, from a year ago, he couldn't blindly trust something coming from the same source. That group has done no wrong, but they are barely a part of this overall discussion.
    - staticassertion 5y ago
      > he couldn't blindly trust something coming from the same source. This is not the same source! It's the same UNIVERSITY, which has thousands of students every year. And the source of the bugs wasn't even from university addresses, it was from random gmail addresses. Aditya submitted LEGITIMATE patches based on his static analysis tool. He is being slandered because people won't take 5 seconds to learn the facts.
      - boomboomsubban 5y ago
        From what I've been told, UMN aren't active kernel contributors, not making a submission between 2014 and the relevant paper in 2020. >And the source of the bugs wasn't even from university addresses, it was from random gmail addresses. I don't know why this really matters. They could be running a similar experiment this time pretending UMN was compromised. I'm not sure who Pakki is, if he's not part of the first research group at all it is truly unfortunate he is receiving the blame for it. If he was, the internet's reaction is still unwarranted but frankly typical. I don't see how Kroah-Hartman is at fault though.
        5y ago
nuclearnice1 5y ago
I agree with this post. Greg has conflated Aditya Pakki with the hypocrite commits. Aditya wrote a static analysis tool that generated some bad commits and many acceptable commits. Greg accused him of intentionally submitting bad patches. That accusation appears to be false. Greg should apologize to Aditya.
- staticassertion 5y ago
  It's a testament to how damaging Greg's comments are that this factual account of the situation is not what people are talking about. Greg's comments were outright slanderous and incorect - he wrongfully alleged that Aditya was knowingly contributing bugs to the kernel, when he was only reporting results from a static analysis research tool. And then Linux mob mentality took over, and Aditya has been dragged through the mud over it. Again, based on false accusations. Aditya did NOTHING that Greg alleged. Again, NOTHING. But facts will be downvoted because the Linux mob loves grandstanding on mailing lists.
  - xh-dude 5y ago
    Aditya should’ve talked to his advisor before suggesting the gatekeepers were, gasp, gatekeeping
    - staticassertion 5y ago
      The hell are you talking about? Aditya submitted patches, and Greg alleged that they were malicious and insulted him repeatedly, completely crossing the line from any reasonable technical review over to a direct attack. Aditya's reputation has suffered massively as a result of doing research to try to help the Linux kernel. These are the facts of the situation.
      - HarryHirsch 5y ago
        No, Aditya's reputation has suffered because he is associated with the University of Minnesota. This is what happens when someone screws up, then all their associates get tarred with the same broad brush, no matter how much they were involved. I'm familiar with a case where a faculty member engaged in a case of autoplagiarism and submitted the same paper to two high-profile journals. His graduate students had trouble publishing in reputable journals for years after, and he also earned himself a ban from the national funding agency. For that kind of breach of trust retribution is savage, and that's why you don't engage in it to begin with.

boomboomsubban 5y ago

There's two separate research groups involved in this, and while the one that most recently submitted patches did nothing wrong the one behind the "hypocrite commits" did.

mewse 5y ago
"separate" if you ignore that they have the same faculty advisor.
- staticassertion 5y ago
  So what? Who cares if they do? Static analysis fixes, whether they're good or bad, are harmless and not malicious. Greg attributed malice to them. I'm sure many advisors have tons of students contributing to the Kernel or other projects, every single year.
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > So what? For research groups, the faculty advisor is the responsible party; once that party has been shown to act maliciously, extra scrutiny is warranted, unless there is some evidence that durable reform has occurred. (The same might be said less strongly of the institutional source, as well.) > I'm sure many advisors have tons of students contributing to the Kernel or other projects, every single year. And virtually all of them have not been—either advisor or institution—responsible for malicious kernel patches. Actions have consequences.
    - staticassertion 5y ago
      > once that party has been shown to act maliciously, extra scrutiny is warranted It's nonsense that they acted maliciously. The original research was handled terribly, but it was not malicious. They intended to help, not hurt, even if they did so very poorly. Further, that is one advisor, whose name is not being dragged. Aditya's name, however, is, thanks to Greg's slanderous comments. https://twitter.com/trishalynn/status/1385410960278491137 https://twitter.com/trishalynn/status/1385410960278491137 "I am disgusted by the actions of Aditya Pakki" https://twitter.com/hedleyroos/status/1386290204298735617 https://twitter.com/hedleyroos/status/1386290204298735617 "Aditya Pakki is going to have a hard time finding employment." (this one directly retweeted Greg's post) https://twitter.com/_mackal/status/1384910754151866370 https://twitter.com/_mackal/status/1384910754151866370 "The simple fact that Aditya Pakki is so butt hurt proves this wasn't in good faith and their only reason for doing it is to shit out another hit piece. That email you quoted is fucking insane." https://twitter.com/BeardyNotes/status/1384900450059788288 https://twitter.com/BeardyNotes/status/1384900450059788288 "Sleazeballs like Aditya Pakki should be fired and disbarred from doing any "research" anywhere in the world!" https://twitter.com/seakoz/status/1384895697414148096 https://twitter.com/seakoz/status/1384895697414148096 "Aditya Pakki will forever be googleable as the guy who deliberately tried to make Linux insecure." Does that seem right to you? Are these the "consequences" you think are justified, because Aditya was trying to add legitimate patches for a tool he was working on to contribute to the kernel? Greg should publicly apologize to Aditya.
      - 5y ago
- boomboomsubban 5y ago
  That faculty advisor has presumably done nothing wrong as part of this group either.
staticassertion 5y ago
> and while the one that most recently submitted patches did nothing wrong the one behind the "hypocrite commits" did. The commit that spurred this whole mess was for static analysis research, totally unrelated to the previous commits from quite some time ago related to bugdoors in the kernel. Greg's reaction was to the static analysis commits, and he alleged (in an incredibly insulting and hostile way) that they were made with malice.
- boomboomsubban 5y ago
  His reaction was that after the previous incident, from a year ago, he couldn't blindly trust something coming from the same source. That group has done no wrong, but they are barely a part of this overall discussion.
  - staticassertion 5y ago
    > he couldn't blindly trust something coming from the same source. This is not the same source! It's the same UNIVERSITY, which has thousands of students every year. And the source of the bugs wasn't even from university addresses, it was from random gmail addresses. Aditya submitted LEGITIMATE patches based on his static analysis tool. He is being slandered because people won't take 5 seconds to learn the facts.
    - boomboomsubban 5y ago
      From what I've been told, UMN aren't active kernel contributors, not making a submission between 2014 and the relevant paper in 2020. >And the source of the bugs wasn't even from university addresses, it was from random gmail addresses. I don't know why this really matters. They could be running a similar experiment this time pretending UMN was compromised. I'm not sure who Pakki is, if he's not part of the first research group at all it is truly unfortunate he is receiving the blame for it. If he was, the internet's reaction is still unwarranted but frankly typical. I don't see how Kroah-Hartman is at fault though.
      - 5y ago

nuclearnice1 5y ago

I agree with this post. Greg has conflated Aditya Pakki with the hypocrite commits. Aditya wrote a static analysis tool that generated some bad commits and many acceptable commits. Greg accused him of intentionally submitting bad patches. That accusation appears to be false. Greg should apologize to Aditya.

staticassertion 5y ago
It's a testament to how damaging Greg's comments are that this factual account of the situation is not what people are talking about. Greg's comments were outright slanderous and incorect - he wrongfully alleged that Aditya was knowingly contributing bugs to the kernel, when he was only reporting results from a static analysis research tool. And then Linux mob mentality took over, and Aditya has been dragged through the mud over it. Again, based on false accusations. Aditya did NOTHING that Greg alleged. Again, NOTHING. But facts will be downvoted because the Linux mob loves grandstanding on mailing lists.
- xh-dude 5y ago
  Aditya should’ve talked to his advisor before suggesting the gatekeepers were, gasp, gatekeeping
  - staticassertion 5y ago
    The hell are you talking about? Aditya submitted patches, and Greg alleged that they were malicious and insulted him repeatedly, completely crossing the line from any reasonable technical review over to a direct attack. Aditya's reputation has suffered massively as a result of doing research to try to help the Linux kernel. These are the facts of the situation.
    - HarryHirsch 5y ago
      No, Aditya's reputation has suffered because he is associated with the University of Minnesota. This is what happens when someone screws up, then all their associates get tarred with the same broad brush, no matter how much they were involved. I'm familiar with a case where a faculty member engaged in a case of autoplagiarism and submitted the same paper to two high-profile journals. His graduate students had trouble publishing in reputable journals for years after, and he also earned himself a ban from the national funding agency. For that kind of breach of trust retribution is savage, and that's why you don't engage in it to begin with.