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I don't mean to be overly critical, but is it just me or are the 'godfathers' of computer science starting to sound like cranky old men? I mean....ok....this p

I don't mean to be overly critical, but is it just me or are the 'godfathers' of computer science starting to sound like cranky old men? I mean....ok....this pull request being inferior to the way HE (the creator of Git) imagined it (or implemented it) is a bit petty imho. What's with the complaining? I am sure this is not the first time I have heard him complaining about something on Github or some other 'new technology'. The same goes with Crockford and his semi-colon. Edit: Although, I must confess that it is annoying when the creators of a service that you use totally blow off your suggestions (esp. when that service is built on your own creation).....so I am torn on this one. Still has the 'annoying old man complaining feel' to it though.

TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
Crockford is heavily opinionated, and it's reflected in his work. JSLint is like a virtual Crockford, that yells at you for misplacing whitespace, semicolons, using functions with the word 'Sync' in them, bitwise operators, switch statements, and more. If Linus wrote a lint for C, I really wonder what it would be like.
- ori_b 14y ago
  You don't need to wonder: https://sparse.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Main_Page https://sparse.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Main_Page
ricardobeat 14y ago
The fact that his comment is capped at 74/80 characters and signed only corroborate your feelings.
- JonahBraun 14y ago
  Looks like he replied through email rather than the github interface. His mail client would have formated the email and signature.
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
yonester 14y ago
I totally agree. The past few links on HN to comments by Tovald have been full of inflammatory, juvenile language. I'm sure the guy is intelligent and certainly deserves a place in CS hall-of-fame, but I think the way he carries himself in these forums has tarnished his reputation.
- 1qaz2wsx3edc 14y ago
  I feel like Tovald should watch DHH's railsconf talk on progress & the 'old' mentality. This feels alarmist, but he like any other githubber gets to choose what gets accepted or rejected.
  - nupark2 14y ago
    The fact that you're setting up DHH as a foil to Linus is exactly why the old men are cranky; when it comes to technology, Linus has more qualifications in his pinky than DHH has all put together.
    - glogla 14y ago
      Then again, are we talking about technical expertise, or about Linus' inability to act like a reasonable human being?
  - marcamillion 14y ago
    Funnily enough...DHH's talk is EXACTLY the first thing that came to mind when I saw Torvald's comment. Who cares if Torvalds has 'more' technical chops than DHH...DHH might be more abrasive, but it is a good abrasive. He is always pushing the community forward and encouraging Rails developers to be a little better. He is not afraid to embrace new technologies and give credit where its due. Can't tell when last I have seen these older guys do the same.
    - Karunamon 14y ago
      You can't see how the head Linux kernel dev has been pushing the community foward? Okay then.
Karunamon 14y ago
Linus is kind of infamous for his rants and have been for years (especially on the mailing lists.. I've seen him tear into people for willful ignorance on the kernel dev lists more than once). I've never really seen them as cranky because they're spot on. Cranky old men usually don't have anything other than opinion behind their rantings.. Linus can at least defend his position. Given his contributions to the world of technology, I'm more than willing to let the acerbic attitude slide.
- marcamillion 14y ago
  Well...this debate always seems to come down to...do we let geniuses just do whatever the hell they want. The answer is...I am not sure. Either way, there are many decisions that people make that comes down to style preference and sure the 'purists' might think it is a watering down of programming....but it makes it more appealing to new developers. I can see Torvalds ranting on Ruby as not a 'real' language....I don't know if he has done so...but I wouldn't be surprised if he did.
  - bmelton 14y ago
    In this particular case, nobody's coddling him because he's a genius, but because it's his repository that he's talking about whether or not to accept pull requests for. Simply put, he has a rigid standard for pull requests, and GitHub isn't capable of adhering to it, so he can't (without making an exception) accept pull requests using the tool. The rest of his ranting is mostly subjective, but I do find it amusing that pull requests in the number 1 git hosting service don't meet the creator's muster, and I'd love to know the reasoning behind their implementation. For what it's worth, I didn't know of the in-built git pull request and I'm an avid Github user (though not submitting Linux kernel patches,) so in the spirit of optimism, airing this rant was informative to at least me, and probably many others.
  - ori_b 14y ago
    > Well...this debate always seems to come down to...do we let geniuses just do whatever the hell they want. The answer is...I am not sure. Feel free to try stopping them. I can't imagine that they'd care much, and you'd find yourself ignored rather quickly.
nupark2 14y ago
> I don't mean to be overly critical, but is it just me or are the 'godfathers' of computer science starting to sound like cranky old men? I think it's a response to the relatively recent over-abundance of attention and coverage given to wheel re-invention and uninformed opinion. I personally tie it to a particular subset of startup culture that relies heavily on convincing young developers to serve as grist for the startup mill by appealing to their ego.
nirvdrum 14y ago
It's weird because it kinda goes the other way too. Why in the world does GitHub truncate my commit messages now? The 80 char thing is a guideline. If git is willing to dutifully accept longer commit messages and my team and I are willing to read and write them, what's the point of forcing us to click to see them in the Web UI? If a project really wants an 80 char limit, that should be a project prerogative, not forced on everyone. Mini rant aside, it's a bit confusing. Because as Linus notes, there's no indication of the 80 char limit when authoring in the Web UI -- you're only penalized for it later. It seems there are competing sets of best practices.
cedsav 14y ago
Maybe you're missing the importance of proper commit messages and the fact that github doesn't seem to steer users toward good habits. Given the size of his projects and the number of contributors, I find it reasonable to demand well documented and informative logs. As a developer, you have to be considerate of the time of people who have to decipher your work and intent. Obviously, it'd be better if the UI was prompting you to do so, so you don't have to suffer the wrath of the "opinionated" project owner ;-)
- dclowd9901 14y ago
  And with distributed development, there needs to be accountability, arguably a greater standard of it. I, too, would rather err on the side of a conservative approach, especially since it pertains to the Linux kernel.
  - sophacles 14y ago
    To add to dclowd9901's point -- for a full understanding of what can happen to a giant project if accountability is not strictly kept and logged, see the SCO case (and its related firestorm). Linus and many others went through a lot of crap and are understandably a bit strict about preventing that from happening again.
webcowboy 14y ago
"The truth shouldn't be sugarcoated." Okay, fine. The way he handled this particular issue seems like a dick move. Being one of the godfathers of computer science isn't a license to act like a jerk. There's no question he's right, but there's nice-right and jerk-right. This sort of response seems like it only inhibits people's desire to get involved.
- jenius 14y ago
  Yeah this is exactly what I thought when I read this. There's no excuse to act like a dick, and he totally is in this thread - name calling and being super angry when nobody else is. I'm a little disappointed.
- el_presidente 14y ago
  > This sort of response seems like it only inhibits people's desire to get involved. How many projects have had as many people involved as the kernel? Not just software, any project. With people coming and going and working on whatever they want. For 20 years.
- josephglanville 14y ago
  It's hard to fully articulate how wrong this and so many other comments in this thread are. People have the right to be offended, they however DON'T have the right to not be offended. Linus is a nice guy, he works well with others and has built some of the most amazing software in the world today. I work on the kernel and other system code on a day to day basis and have participated in threads with Linus before. When you are wrong he tells you so, in a very clear manner that outlines exactly WHY you are wrong. Sure, he isn't always concise and succinct but that isn't really the point. If he wants to interject a few choice "swear words" to describe how badly you did something that's fine by me. As long has he describes exactly what is wrong and how to fix it. People need to get a lot less wrapped up in HOW something is said and focus on WHAT is said. The essence of Linus's comments on this pull request can be summarized easily. GitHub's pull/request features are inadequate for kernel goverernance - and as the creator of git and designer of the inbuilt pull-request functionality he thinks this is subjectively retarded. If you read past any of that and start saying crap like "he could have been more polite" to him then you have obviously missed the point. It's not his (or anyones) job to cater to peoples inability to grow a skin.
CodeMage 14y ago
Okay, have you been following closely Linus or Crockford? I know I haven't, which is why I always start from the position of "I don't have the full context." My initial assumption is: Linus/Crockford/whoever-else-is-coming-across-as-a-cranky-old-person has seen whatever-he-is-berating or something very similar before, not just once but ridiculously often. That makes the reaction quite understandable and justified. Plus, let's face it, we all want to be free to react like that when it's deserved ;)
- marcamillion 14y ago
  You know....you may be right...about 'we all want to be free to react like that when it's deserved'. I guess it was off-putting to me because of the ephemeral effects of him being who he is. Anybody could (and probably would) complain about the way Github has implemented various features - but they wouldn't get the attention that he has gotten. Maybe that's why I perceive it as him being 'cranky'. So maybe my criticism was unfair because I wouldn't have criticized DHH for doing the same thing - or who knows, maybe I would. Not sure, but now I see what you mean.
krschultz 14y ago
I don't see where he is being unreasonable. He made git with his specific method of managing the Linux source repository in mind. Now someone wants him to ignore part of his tool for their connivence and he said no. He's not saying "we should all boycott GitHub because of it". He's not saying "they're idiots for doing this". He's saying 'The Linux project works one way, GitHub doesn't support that way, so we're not using it, and they' won't change it'. That's it.
- primatology 14y ago
  > He's not saying "they're idiots for doing this". Well... "github is a total ghetto of crap" "make a real pull request, not the braindamaged crap that github does"
  - pwpwp 14y ago
    I view that as Linus' rhetorical technique for conveying that he really means what he says.
  - antrix 14y ago
    Full quote: "github is a total ghetto of crap commit messages and unreadable and unusable pull requests" Conveniently left out the part most salient to Linus' argument? Linus repeatedly stresses that he thinks Github is great as a hosting service. It is the pull/commit functionality which he finds lacking.
    - algorias 14y ago
      His argument isn't under question here, his civility is. The original quote was a perfect example in that regard.
    - primatology 14y ago
      Yes, and he calls GH's pull/commit functionality "braindamaged crap." That's implying that "they're idiots for doing this." I apologize for the misquote; again, that was unintentional.
  - 14y ago
bithive123 14y ago
It's all about context. To someone who only knows PHP the opinions of most polyglot programmers seem cruel and elitist. Put me in a room full of Moodle developers and everyone will come away thinking of me as "that cynical guy who is always trashing everything we do". Are people so averse to acknowledging the bounds of their own experience that they discount other views over a hint of emotion? Does every cantankerous remark need to be taken so personally? Why is it so important to be inoffensive? Does all advice need to be delivered as positive encouragement?
- buddycasino 14y ago
  This. So very much this.
- marcamillion 14y ago
  I think it is subjective - unfortunately. With a bigger microphone comes greater responsibility. I am not taking Github's side on this particular issue - but this issue struck a bigger tone (for me)...where I have seen those with a larger microphone (by virtue of who they are) seem to be complaining louder (publicly) in recent history. It could just be that their microphone has gotten louder - but if it has, to a large extent they have a responsibility to be more conscious. Imagine if Obama complained about the food at a bakery down the street that he went to - that would effectively kill that establishment. As a patron, does he have a right to complain about disgusting food? Absolutely...as someone with the largest pulpit in the world? Definitely not. There are other means he could use to get his message across. Then again, I am not comparing Obama's pulpit to that of Torvalds, but I think it makes the point sufficiently.
  - bithive123 14y ago
    Yes. Opinions, passionately delivered, will correctly be perceived by some as inflammatory or unfair. Each observer can decide if the remark is appropriate or not. We are more likely to forgive Linus on his "home turf" than Obama singling out a particular business. This highlights the problem, not everyone thinks critically about context so you end up with people writing off good practices because the advocate was mean and/or avoiding a bakery because the president complained.
aerique 14y ago
I think it has to do with time and how Linus wants to spend his resources. If you've got small OS project you would be happy with every feature or bug fix and probably wouldn't complain about the format of a pull request. However Linus is heading a huge project and besides that he is famous as well. Everybody wants his time, if only to show an e-mail in which he flamed them to death or to brag they got a commit into the Linux kernel tree. So it is basically a matter of respecting his very limited resources.
rapind 14y ago
They're perfectionists and super attentive to detail. If you look around at some of the hugely successful software companies today I think you'll notice it's a pretty common trait. Screw coddling. shakes fist in general direction
trotsky 14y ago
He's always been like that. Really that was the status quo in open source 10-15+ years ago. People were abrasive, efficiency oriented and most of the communities didn't have very many soft edges. Just off the top of my head I'm thinking of Theo de Raadt, Miguel de Icaza, Richard Stallman - hell if you were a nice guy you didn't make it on usenet back then. In the last 5 or 10 years there has been a strong shift towards emphasizing civility and positivity even if it gets in the way of getting things right or expediency. I can certainly see the appeal in it, after all lots more people are drawn to programming now with a wider variety of personalities and motivations. I won't say it doesn't make sense to be more inclusive, but it certainly didn't used to be the norm. Rails core homes on github right? What is it that they do when they don't like a pull request? Write a long blog post about how stupid people like you are a net drag on the open source world and keep awesome people like us from helping you even more and and rss it out to everyone. Shrug.
- dblock 14y ago
  Well said. Matz is a perfect example of what Linus is not and can never be.
  - bitops 14y ago
    It's not highlighted very much anymore, but the philosophy of the Ruby community used to be: Matz is nice so we are too.
  - nknight 14y ago
    I don't have a lot of first-hand context for Matz's behavior, not being a Ruby developer, but it's entirely possible, even likely, that in the context of Japanese culture, Matz's niceness would not be seen as especially remarkable. Pitting one person's "niceness" against another when they are products of vastly different cultures is questionable at best. To most westerners, the average Japanese person is extremely polite, if not bordering on the absurd, while to most Japanese, the average westerner is, to say the least, unrefined, and Torvalds is probably downright horrifying. Such things must be taken in their cultural context, or you can't really understand people's behavior at all.
tzs 14y ago
I think you misunderstood what Linus is complaining about. He's not saying that everyone should format pull requests to his liking. He is saying that pull requests for things going into the kernel have to follow the formatting rules that project uses. This is not a cranky old man thing. This is a basic multiprogrammer project collaboration courtesy thing, similar to the reason that, say, if a project uses camel case variable names and one statement per line, you shouldn't submit code using foo_bar naming and putting as many statements as you can on a line.
mst 14y ago
Given one of the github guys commented that he had helped develop the first version of pull requests and considered all of his complaints valid and hated the code too. No, it wasn't petty. It was useful, constructive criticism that the github developers appreciated. It isn't just you, but I think you are being overly critical :)
mkramlich 14y ago
When you reach 30's, 40's, 50's and after you've seen What Works and What Will Not Work happen over and over again, you just might find yourself turning into that cranky old man too. Also, practices which are acceptable with a single coder or a small number, or on a non-mission critical piece of software may not be acceptable in the other kind of situations. A bit like how having no tests is The Right Thing for a one-off task shell script. Whereas not having any tests will be Dangerously Stupid for say rocket control software. When a developer goes from writing a little me-too CRUD web app to then wanting to commit something into the Linux kernel, somewhere in there you cross that kind of threshold.

TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago

Crockford is heavily opinionated, and it's reflected in his work. JSLint is like a virtual Crockford, that yells at you for misplacing whitespace, semicolons, using functions with the word 'Sync' in them, bitwise operators, switch statements, and more. If Linus wrote a lint for C, I really wonder what it would be like.

ori_b 14y ago
You don't need to wonder: https://sparse.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Main_Page https://sparse.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/Main_Page

ricardobeat 14y ago

The fact that his comment is capped at 74/80 characters and signed only corroborate your feelings.

JonahBraun 14y ago
Looks like he replied through email rather than the github interface. His mail client would have formated the email and signature.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]

yonester 14y ago

I totally agree. The past few links on HN to comments by Tovald have been full of inflammatory, juvenile language. I'm sure the guy is intelligent and certainly deserves a place in CS hall-of-fame, but I think the way he carries himself in these forums has tarnished his reputation.

1qaz2wsx3edc 14y ago
I feel like Tovald should watch DHH's railsconf talk on progress & the 'old' mentality. This feels alarmist, but he like any other githubber gets to choose what gets accepted or rejected.
- nupark2 14y ago
  The fact that you're setting up DHH as a foil to Linus is exactly why the old men are cranky; when it comes to technology, Linus has more qualifications in his pinky than DHH has all put together.
  - glogla 14y ago
    Then again, are we talking about technical expertise, or about Linus' inability to act like a reasonable human being?
- marcamillion 14y ago
  Funnily enough...DHH's talk is EXACTLY the first thing that came to mind when I saw Torvald's comment. Who cares if Torvalds has 'more' technical chops than DHH...DHH might be more abrasive, but it is a good abrasive. He is always pushing the community forward and encouraging Rails developers to be a little better. He is not afraid to embrace new technologies and give credit where its due. Can't tell when last I have seen these older guys do the same.
  - Karunamon 14y ago
    You can't see how the head Linux kernel dev has been pushing the community foward? Okay then.

Karunamon 14y ago

Linus is kind of infamous for his rants and have been for years (especially on the mailing lists.. I've seen him tear into people for willful ignorance on the kernel dev lists more than once). I've never really seen them as cranky because they're spot on. Cranky old men usually don't have anything other than opinion behind their rantings.. Linus can at least defend his position. Given his contributions to the world of technology, I'm more than willing to let the acerbic attitude slide.

marcamillion 14y ago
Well...this debate always seems to come down to...do we let geniuses just do whatever the hell they want. The answer is...I am not sure. Either way, there are many decisions that people make that comes down to style preference and sure the 'purists' might think it is a watering down of programming....but it makes it more appealing to new developers. I can see Torvalds ranting on Ruby as not a 'real' language....I don't know if he has done so...but I wouldn't be surprised if he did.
- bmelton 14y ago
  In this particular case, nobody's coddling him because he's a genius, but because it's his repository that he's talking about whether or not to accept pull requests for. Simply put, he has a rigid standard for pull requests, and GitHub isn't capable of adhering to it, so he can't (without making an exception) accept pull requests using the tool. The rest of his ranting is mostly subjective, but I do find it amusing that pull requests in the number 1 git hosting service don't meet the creator's muster, and I'd love to know the reasoning behind their implementation. For what it's worth, I didn't know of the in-built git pull request and I'm an avid Github user (though not submitting Linux kernel patches,) so in the spirit of optimism, airing this rant was informative to at least me, and probably many others.
- ori_b 14y ago
  > Well...this debate always seems to come down to...do we let geniuses just do whatever the hell they want. The answer is...I am not sure. Feel free to try stopping them. I can't imagine that they'd care much, and you'd find yourself ignored rather quickly.

nupark2 14y ago

> I don't mean to be overly critical, but is it just me or are the 'godfathers' of computer science starting to sound like cranky old men? I think it's a response to the relatively recent over-abundance of attention and coverage given to wheel re-invention and uninformed opinion. I personally tie it to a particular subset of startup culture that relies heavily on convincing young developers to serve as grist for the startup mill by appealing to their ego.

nirvdrum 14y ago

It's weird because it kinda goes the other way too. Why in the world does GitHub truncate my commit messages now? The 80 char thing is a guideline. If git is willing to dutifully accept longer commit messages and my team and I are willing to read and write them, what's the point of forcing us to click to see them in the Web UI? If a project really wants an 80 char limit, that should be a project prerogative, not forced on everyone. Mini rant aside, it's a bit confusing. Because as Linus notes, there's no indication of the 80 char limit when authoring in the Web UI -- you're only penalized for it later. It seems there are competing sets of best practices.

cedsav 14y ago

Maybe you're missing the importance of proper commit messages and the fact that github doesn't seem to steer users toward good habits. Given the size of his projects and the number of contributors, I find it reasonable to demand well documented and informative logs. As a developer, you have to be considerate of the time of people who have to decipher your work and intent. Obviously, it'd be better if the UI was prompting you to do so, so you don't have to suffer the wrath of the "opinionated" project owner ;-)

dclowd9901 14y ago
And with distributed development, there needs to be accountability, arguably a greater standard of it. I, too, would rather err on the side of a conservative approach, especially since it pertains to the Linux kernel.
- sophacles 14y ago
  To add to dclowd9901's point -- for a full understanding of what can happen to a giant project if accountability is not strictly kept and logged, see the SCO case (and its related firestorm). Linus and many others went through a lot of crap and are understandably a bit strict about preventing that from happening again.

webcowboy 14y ago

"The truth shouldn't be sugarcoated." Okay, fine. The way he handled this particular issue seems like a dick move. Being one of the godfathers of computer science isn't a license to act like a jerk. There's no question he's right, but there's nice-right and jerk-right. This sort of response seems like it only inhibits people's desire to get involved.

jenius 14y ago
Yeah this is exactly what I thought when I read this. There's no excuse to act like a dick, and he totally is in this thread - name calling and being super angry when nobody else is. I'm a little disappointed.
el_presidente 14y ago
> This sort of response seems like it only inhibits people's desire to get involved. How many projects have had as many people involved as the kernel? Not just software, any project. With people coming and going and working on whatever they want. For 20 years.
josephglanville 14y ago
It's hard to fully articulate how wrong this and so many other comments in this thread are. People have the right to be offended, they however DON'T have the right to not be offended. Linus is a nice guy, he works well with others and has built some of the most amazing software in the world today. I work on the kernel and other system code on a day to day basis and have participated in threads with Linus before. When you are wrong he tells you so, in a very clear manner that outlines exactly WHY you are wrong. Sure, he isn't always concise and succinct but that isn't really the point. If he wants to interject a few choice "swear words" to describe how badly you did something that's fine by me. As long has he describes exactly what is wrong and how to fix it. People need to get a lot less wrapped up in HOW something is said and focus on WHAT is said. The essence of Linus's comments on this pull request can be summarized easily. GitHub's pull/request features are inadequate for kernel goverernance - and as the creator of git and designer of the inbuilt pull-request functionality he thinks this is subjectively retarded. If you read past any of that and start saying crap like "he could have been more polite" to him then you have obviously missed the point. It's not his (or anyones) job to cater to peoples inability to grow a skin.

CodeMage 14y ago

Okay, have you been following closely Linus or Crockford? I know I haven't, which is why I always start from the position of "I don't have the full context." My initial assumption is: Linus/Crockford/whoever-else-is-coming-across-as-a-cranky-old-person has seen whatever-he-is-berating or something very similar before, not just once but ridiculously often. That makes the reaction quite understandable and justified. Plus, let's face it, we all want to be free to react like that when it's deserved ;)

marcamillion 14y ago
You know....you may be right...about 'we all want to be free to react like that when it's deserved'. I guess it was off-putting to me because of the ephemeral effects of him being who he is. Anybody could (and probably would) complain about the way Github has implemented various features - but they wouldn't get the attention that he has gotten. Maybe that's why I perceive it as him being 'cranky'. So maybe my criticism was unfair because I wouldn't have criticized DHH for doing the same thing - or who knows, maybe I would. Not sure, but now I see what you mean.

krschultz 14y ago

I don't see where he is being unreasonable. He made git with his specific method of managing the Linux source repository in mind. Now someone wants him to ignore part of his tool for their connivence and he said no. He's not saying "we should all boycott GitHub because of it". He's not saying "they're idiots for doing this". He's saying 'The Linux project works one way, GitHub doesn't support that way, so we're not using it, and they' won't change it'. That's it.

primatology 14y ago
> He's not saying "they're idiots for doing this". Well... "github is a total ghetto of crap" "make a real pull request, not the braindamaged crap that github does"
- pwpwp 14y ago
  I view that as Linus' rhetorical technique for conveying that he really means what he says.
- antrix 14y ago
  Full quote: "github is a total ghetto of crap commit messages and unreadable and unusable pull requests" Conveniently left out the part most salient to Linus' argument? Linus repeatedly stresses that he thinks Github is great as a hosting service. It is the pull/commit functionality which he finds lacking.
  - algorias 14y ago
    His argument isn't under question here, his civility is. The original quote was a perfect example in that regard.
  - primatology 14y ago
    Yes, and he calls GH's pull/commit functionality "braindamaged crap." That's implying that "they're idiots for doing this." I apologize for the misquote; again, that was unintentional.
- 14y ago

bithive123 14y ago

It's all about context. To someone who only knows PHP the opinions of most polyglot programmers seem cruel and elitist. Put me in a room full of Moodle developers and everyone will come away thinking of me as "that cynical guy who is always trashing everything we do". Are people so averse to acknowledging the bounds of their own experience that they discount other views over a hint of emotion? Does every cantankerous remark need to be taken so personally? Why is it so important to be inoffensive? Does all advice need to be delivered as positive encouragement?

buddycasino 14y ago
This. So very much this.
marcamillion 14y ago
I think it is subjective - unfortunately. With a bigger microphone comes greater responsibility. I am not taking Github's side on this particular issue - but this issue struck a bigger tone (for me)...where I have seen those with a larger microphone (by virtue of who they are) seem to be complaining louder (publicly) in recent history. It could just be that their microphone has gotten louder - but if it has, to a large extent they have a responsibility to be more conscious. Imagine if Obama complained about the food at a bakery down the street that he went to - that would effectively kill that establishment. As a patron, does he have a right to complain about disgusting food? Absolutely...as someone with the largest pulpit in the world? Definitely not. There are other means he could use to get his message across. Then again, I am not comparing Obama's pulpit to that of Torvalds, but I think it makes the point sufficiently.
- bithive123 14y ago
  Yes. Opinions, passionately delivered, will correctly be perceived by some as inflammatory or unfair. Each observer can decide if the remark is appropriate or not. We are more likely to forgive Linus on his "home turf" than Obama singling out a particular business. This highlights the problem, not everyone thinks critically about context so you end up with people writing off good practices because the advocate was mean and/or avoiding a bakery because the president complained.

aerique 14y ago

I think it has to do with time and how Linus wants to spend his resources. If you've got small OS project you would be happy with every feature or bug fix and probably wouldn't complain about the format of a pull request. However Linus is heading a huge project and besides that he is famous as well. Everybody wants his time, if only to show an e-mail in which he flamed them to death or to brag they got a commit into the Linux kernel tree. So it is basically a matter of respecting his very limited resources.

rapind 14y ago

They're perfectionists and super attentive to detail. If you look around at some of the hugely successful software companies today I think you'll notice it's a pretty common trait. Screw coddling. shakes fist in general direction

trotsky 14y ago

He's always been like that. Really that was the status quo in open source 10-15+ years ago. People were abrasive, efficiency oriented and most of the communities didn't have very many soft edges. Just off the top of my head I'm thinking of Theo de Raadt, Miguel de Icaza, Richard Stallman - hell if you were a nice guy you didn't make it on usenet back then. In the last 5 or 10 years there has been a strong shift towards emphasizing civility and positivity even if it gets in the way of getting things right or expediency. I can certainly see the appeal in it, after all lots more people are drawn to programming now with a wider variety of personalities and motivations. I won't say it doesn't make sense to be more inclusive, but it certainly didn't used to be the norm. Rails core homes on github right? What is it that they do when they don't like a pull request? Write a long blog post about how stupid people like you are a net drag on the open source world and keep awesome people like us from helping you even more and and rss it out to everyone. Shrug.

dblock 14y ago
Well said. Matz is a perfect example of what Linus is not and can never be.
- bitops 14y ago
  It's not highlighted very much anymore, but the philosophy of the Ruby community used to be: Matz is nice so we are too.
- nknight 14y ago
  I don't have a lot of first-hand context for Matz's behavior, not being a Ruby developer, but it's entirely possible, even likely, that in the context of Japanese culture, Matz's niceness would not be seen as especially remarkable. Pitting one person's "niceness" against another when they are products of vastly different cultures is questionable at best. To most westerners, the average Japanese person is extremely polite, if not bordering on the absurd, while to most Japanese, the average westerner is, to say the least, unrefined, and Torvalds is probably downright horrifying. Such things must be taken in their cultural context, or you can't really understand people's behavior at all.

tzs 14y ago

I think you misunderstood what Linus is complaining about. He's not saying that everyone should format pull requests to his liking. He is saying that pull requests for things going into the kernel have to follow the formatting rules that project uses. This is not a cranky old man thing. This is a basic multiprogrammer project collaboration courtesy thing, similar to the reason that, say, if a project uses camel case variable names and one statement per line, you shouldn't submit code using foo_bar naming and putting as many statements as you can on a line.

mst 14y ago

Given one of the github guys commented that he had helped develop the first version of pull requests and considered all of his complaints valid and hated the code too. No, it wasn't petty. It was useful, constructive criticism that the github developers appreciated. It isn't just you, but I think you are being overly critical :)

mkramlich 14y ago

When you reach 30's, 40's, 50's and after you've seen What Works and What Will Not Work happen over and over again, you just might find yourself turning into that cranky old man too. Also, practices which are acceptable with a single coder or a small number, or on a non-mission critical piece of software may not be acceptable in the other kind of situations. A bit like how having no tests is The Right Thing for a one-off task shell script. Whereas not having any tests will be Dangerously Stupid for say rocket control software. When a developer goes from writing a little me-too CRUD web app to then wanting to commit something into the Linux kernel, somewhere in there you cross that kind of threshold.