5 ms·

This is akin to filing a bug report, and then taking responsibility for the fix committed by someone else.

dewey 4y ago
> Undoubtedly, as Markdown became more popular, someone else would have pointed out this problem. Gruber himself would have been annoyed by it if he ever needed to write a code block with backslashes in it. But I was there first. And you’re welcome. I don't see how he's taking responsibility for fixing the bug. To me it just sounds like he's sharing an anecdote and this is not entirely serious.
sophacles 4y ago
Some credit as the motivator of the fix is deserved. The author very clearly states: Undoubtedly, as Markdown became more popular, someone else would have pointed out this problem. Gruber himself would have been annoyed by it if he ever needed to write a code block with backslashes in it. But I was there first. And you’re welcome. I don't think they are trying to take more credit than is due.
- dathanb82 4y ago
  But also > You can paste source code directly into your Markdown document without any changes, and it will appear as expected in the rendered HTML. That’s my doing. In that sentence, it kinda does sound like they're trying to take credit for it.
  - water-your-self 4y ago
    Its upon the reader to ascribe malintent. Ill choose not to.
    - sophacles 4y ago
      Generally I don't like to point out typos, but in the context of malintent: Ill vs I'll is pretty amusing :D
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
  - sophacles 4y ago
    It is their doing - they started the series of events. It's other people's doings ALSO. This sentence doesn't imply exclusivity, it just doesn't say others did stuff. Fortunately the entire rest of the document, particularly the part I highlighted above, makes it very clear: 1. what their doing is in more specific detail 2. what others' doings are in more specific detail I'm going to assume that the author included all that additional detail in the document on purpose, and with the intent of clarifying what "That's my doing" entails. It seems pretty unlikely that your hypothesis of "the person is claiming the whole thing is their doing and accidentally wrote a whole bunch of words undermining that simple sentence" is the right one.
  - IncRnd 4y ago
    There is an entire article. There doesn't need to be just one sentence plucked out of context. "I pointed this out in the Markdown mailing list, and Gruber agreed that it should be changed. In the next Markdown release—which was, I believe, his last—he made the change, and all the text in code blocks has been treated literally ever since." What's wrong with that? He said what he did, said who fixed the issue, and stated the result.
  - kergonath 4y ago
    Or maybe the reader can do better than isolate a sentence out of context and assume bad intent. It’s obvious this is not to be taken seriously. It’s a few paragraphs on a blog, FFS.
redditor98654 4y ago
It is still a contribution, which is what the title is. It did not say "my feature implementation in Markdown". A good feature suggestion which is thoughtful and genuinely improves a product not just for that one user but for everyone is a great contribution.
- remram 4y ago
  The exact phrasing: > That’s my doing. Come on now.
  - actuallyalys 4y ago
    I interpreted it as a joke, but I'm familiar with the author and hyperbole doesn't always translate, so I can see why it rubbed people the wrong way.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - kergonath 4y ago
    There is even worse than that. He also wrote: > I Which clearly means that he takes full credit for the whole Markdown implementation. What a scandal!
- klez 4y ago
  Right. That's why I can claim that my biggest contribution to Firefox is suggesting indicating the estimated reading time at the top of an article in reader mode. I'm the one who made the feature request [0]. It took some time, but they finally implemented it and I felt (and still feel) very good about it :) [0] https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1265304 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1265304
  - capableweb 4y ago
    I think the claim "that's my biggest contribution to X" is fine, if you feel like that was what you think is the biggest contribution you made to X. Where it starts to feel wrong, would be if you somehow started claiming "I suggested it first. It's because of me it's there. You're welcome", when you merely suggested the feature, not implemented or drove it to be implemented.
actuallyalys 4y ago
I help maintain some open source projects, and I totally disagree. Filing bugs (or thoughtful feature requests) is absolutely a contribution, and I wish more users would do so. Edit: In fairness, I think some of the ways the author describes it are grandiose ("my extremely important contribution"), but I interpreted them as hyperbole.
- capableweb 4y ago
  I think this is the part that itches me: > . You can paste source code directly into your Markdown document without any changes, and it will appear as expected in the rendered HTML. That’s my doing. It makes it sound like the author of this blogpost actually did the change, while in reality they suggested the change. Of course it's good to suggest something, and even nicer when whoever you suggest it to implements it. But I'd never claim "that's my doing" after suggesting any features/fixes. A bit like writing an email to Apple suggesting something, then they do that thing and I wrote a blogpost saying "That's my doing, I was there first. And you’re welcome.". It just doesn't taste well.
  - btown 4y ago
    If a candidate were to say “that’s my doing” when describing the outcome of a prior team project, and language barriers weren’t a mitigating factor, I would consider that a significant red flag for ego. Not a crime, and a reasonable exaggeration in many circumstances. But I wouldn’t want someone communicating that way in a professional capacity on an engineering team.
    - filmgirlcw 4y ago
      Well it’s a good thing drdrang was just posting a missive on his blog and not in a job interview with you. But I guess if he does ever interview with you, you’ll remember his tongue-in-cheek missive and be dismissive, even if if never comes up in conversation. That’ll show ‘em! Never write tongue-in-cheek blogs or else random weirdos who will never meet you will write you off as a candidate for an engineering team that doesn’t exist and that you don’t want to join in the first place.
svnpenn 4y ago
The whole post is pretty obnoxious. Its literally "you made this? I made this": https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/079/173/ed2.png https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/079/173/ed2...
tshaddox 4y ago
I personally read it as a tongue-in-cheek boast where the author's intent was to clearly indicate that their contribution was minimal and they just happened to be the first person to point something out to the developers of the library.
- hisnameisjimmy 4y ago
  Agree completely. This is just a fun little anecdote.
jancsika 4y ago
Don't know about responsibility, but there are cases where I'd certainly take the credit. For example: 1. Finding the bug was difficult, while fixing the bug was trivial 2. My own proposed patches seem to sit for years, while emailing bug reports directly to the committer results in them committing fixes within days.
Veen 4y ago
It's not that. It's tongue in cheek, as anyone who has followed Gruber and Dr. Drang for a while will understand.
mort96 4y ago
I've made a few languages in my time, both programming languages and markup languages. One of the most valuable kinds of contributions is spotting design mistakes, suggesting good changes, and being a discussion partner about design-related stuff. I'd bet that in this case, the change to the parser code would be trivial; the hard part is getting the design right.

> Undoubtedly, as Markdown became more popular, someone else would have pointed out this problem. Gruber himself would have been annoyed by it if he ever needed to write a code block with backslashes in it. But I was there first. And you’re welcome. I don't see how he's taking responsibility for fixing the bug. To me it just sounds like he's sharing an anecdote and this is not entirely serious.

sophacles 4y ago

Some credit as the motivator of the fix is deserved. The author very clearly states: Undoubtedly, as Markdown became more popular, someone else would have pointed out this problem. Gruber himself would have been annoyed by it if he ever needed to write a code block with backslashes in it. But I was there first. And you’re welcome. I don't think they are trying to take more credit than is due.

dathanb82 4y ago
But also > You can paste source code directly into your Markdown document without any changes, and it will appear as expected in the rendered HTML. That’s my doing. In that sentence, it kinda does sound like they're trying to take credit for it.
- water-your-self 4y ago
  Its upon the reader to ascribe malintent. Ill choose not to.
  - sophacles 4y ago
    Generally I don't like to point out typos, but in the context of malintent: Ill vs I'll is pretty amusing :D
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
- sophacles 4y ago
  It is their doing - they started the series of events. It's other people's doings ALSO. This sentence doesn't imply exclusivity, it just doesn't say others did stuff. Fortunately the entire rest of the document, particularly the part I highlighted above, makes it very clear: 1. what their doing is in more specific detail 2. what others' doings are in more specific detail I'm going to assume that the author included all that additional detail in the document on purpose, and with the intent of clarifying what "That's my doing" entails. It seems pretty unlikely that your hypothesis of "the person is claiming the whole thing is their doing and accidentally wrote a whole bunch of words undermining that simple sentence" is the right one.
- IncRnd 4y ago
  There is an entire article. There doesn't need to be just one sentence plucked out of context. "I pointed this out in the Markdown mailing list, and Gruber agreed that it should be changed. In the next Markdown release—which was, I believe, his last—he made the change, and all the text in code blocks has been treated literally ever since." What's wrong with that? He said what he did, said who fixed the issue, and stated the result.
- kergonath 4y ago
  Or maybe the reader can do better than isolate a sentence out of context and assume bad intent. It’s obvious this is not to be taken seriously. It’s a few paragraphs on a blog, FFS.

redditor98654 4y ago

It is still a contribution, which is what the title is. It did not say "my feature implementation in Markdown". A good feature suggestion which is thoughtful and genuinely improves a product not just for that one user but for everyone is a great contribution.

remram 4y ago
The exact phrasing: > That’s my doing. Come on now.
- actuallyalys 4y ago
  I interpreted it as a joke, but I'm familiar with the author and hyperbole doesn't always translate, so I can see why it rubbed people the wrong way.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- kergonath 4y ago
  There is even worse than that. He also wrote: > I Which clearly means that he takes full credit for the whole Markdown implementation. What a scandal!
klez 4y ago
Right. That's why I can claim that my biggest contribution to Firefox is suggesting indicating the estimated reading time at the top of an article in reader mode. I'm the one who made the feature request [0]. It took some time, but they finally implemented it and I felt (and still feel) very good about it :) [0] https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1265304 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1265304
- capableweb 4y ago
  I think the claim "that's my biggest contribution to X" is fine, if you feel like that was what you think is the biggest contribution you made to X. Where it starts to feel wrong, would be if you somehow started claiming "I suggested it first. It's because of me it's there. You're welcome", when you merely suggested the feature, not implemented or drove it to be implemented.

actuallyalys 4y ago

I help maintain some open source projects, and I totally disagree. Filing bugs (or thoughtful feature requests) is absolutely a contribution, and I wish more users would do so. Edit: In fairness, I think some of the ways the author describes it are grandiose ("my extremely important contribution"), but I interpreted them as hyperbole.

capableweb 4y ago
I think this is the part that itches me: > . You can paste source code directly into your Markdown document without any changes, and it will appear as expected in the rendered HTML. That’s my doing. It makes it sound like the author of this blogpost actually did the change, while in reality they suggested the change. Of course it's good to suggest something, and even nicer when whoever you suggest it to implements it. But I'd never claim "that's my doing" after suggesting any features/fixes. A bit like writing an email to Apple suggesting something, then they do that thing and I wrote a blogpost saying "That's my doing, I was there first. And you’re welcome.". It just doesn't taste well.
- btown 4y ago
  If a candidate were to say “that’s my doing” when describing the outcome of a prior team project, and language barriers weren’t a mitigating factor, I would consider that a significant red flag for ego. Not a crime, and a reasonable exaggeration in many circumstances. But I wouldn’t want someone communicating that way in a professional capacity on an engineering team.
  - filmgirlcw 4y ago
    Well it’s a good thing drdrang was just posting a missive on his blog and not in a job interview with you. But I guess if he does ever interview with you, you’ll remember his tongue-in-cheek missive and be dismissive, even if if never comes up in conversation. That’ll show ‘em! Never write tongue-in-cheek blogs or else random weirdos who will never meet you will write you off as a candidate for an engineering team that doesn’t exist and that you don’t want to join in the first place.

svnpenn 4y ago

The whole post is pretty obnoxious. Its literally "you made this? I made this": https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/079/173/ed2.png https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/079/173/ed2...

tshaddox 4y ago

I personally read it as a tongue-in-cheek boast where the author's intent was to clearly indicate that their contribution was minimal and they just happened to be the first person to point something out to the developers of the library.

hisnameisjimmy 4y ago
Agree completely. This is just a fun little anecdote.

jancsika 4y ago

Don't know about responsibility, but there are cases where I'd certainly take the credit. For example: 1. Finding the bug was difficult, while fixing the bug was trivial 2. My own proposed patches seem to sit for years, while emailing bug reports directly to the committer results in them committing fixes within days.

Veen 4y ago

It's not that. It's tongue in cheek, as anyone who has followed Gruber and Dr. Drang for a while will understand.

mort96 4y ago

I've made a few languages in my time, both programming languages and markup languages. One of the most valuable kinds of contributions is spotting design mistakes, suggesting good changes, and being a discussion partner about design-related stuff. I'd bet that in this case, the change to the parser code would be trivial; the hard part is getting the design right.