6 ms·

No, it's rather "If you don't like it, fork it."

sz4kerto 13y ago
That's a very hypocritical approach I believe. A few years' ago our ex-prime minister said that if you don't like what's going on in the country, you're free to leave. It doesn't work like that.
- brk 13y ago
  Not good comparison. A country is essentially a fixed physical plot of land, with people, resources, climate, etc. If you leave a country you have to leave all of those things (and more) behind. Forking code essentially gives you the ability to take everything, and then move it in your own new direction. You leave behind only the parts you thought were "bad" or unprofessional or whatever.
  - shawabawa3 13y ago
    > Not good comparison. A country is essentially a fixed physical plot of land, with people, resources, climate, etc. If you leave a country you have to leave all of those things (and more) behind. Yes it is. Saying you can just fork it is like saying you can just move yourself and all your family and friends to another country. You might be able to move yourself but moving any significant amount of developers is in practise impossible.
    - phryk 13y ago
      You might be able to move yourself but moving any significant amount of developers is in practise impossible. So it's better to force that significant amount of developers to do your bidding? That sounds just a just a weee bit unreasonable, IMHO.
    - criley2 13y ago
      Right but the analogy breaks down in the sense that: Linus is responsible for the developers who won't move. They're his team. You're basically saying that you want the fruits of Linus's labor without Linus there to do it?
    - 3am 13y ago
      After you fork, you know you can just pull from the original project? That's why they call it the upstream. Perhaps you're saying that you can't take the community with you? That doesn't seem like a reasonable expectation. You can fork, and you can continue to pull from upstream, but you can't force people to use it.
  - vinceguidry 13y ago
    A better comparison is "If you don't like your job, get another one." A few people will be poised to exercise such a strategy, most won't.
- 67726e 13y ago
  That's a bit of a an apples-to-oranges comparison. An open-source project isn't exactly a democratic government. It's not about protecting the people, it's about getting shit done and getting it done right.
inopinatus 13y ago
For several years I did maintain a private kernel fork for my then-employer. I was not interested in contributing any of our work (mostly netfilter related) back to the core precisely because I have better things to do with my emotional energy than engage with the aggressively toxic personalities of LKML. That's one of the joys of open source, of course, doing your own thing. In contrast I had a much better experience contributing to Postfix and Dovecot, where the benevolent dictators did not feel the urge to spew pages of vitriol in response to a blunder when a neutrally worded admonishment would do.
- mcv 13y ago
  Exactly. Friendly communities attract more people. Linus gets away with it because there's tons of people who want to work on his projects, and he can afford to alienate some talent. Others don't have that luxury. I've heard of plenty of people who prefer one language over another because of the nicer community. Eventually that should mean that projects with friendly communities are more successful.
theorique 13y ago
Don't you remember donglegate? You can't say fork any more. ;)

That's a very hypocritical approach I believe. A few years' ago our ex-prime minister said that if you don't like what's going on in the country, you're free to leave. It doesn't work like that.

brk 13y ago
Not good comparison. A country is essentially a fixed physical plot of land, with people, resources, climate, etc. If you leave a country you have to leave all of those things (and more) behind. Forking code essentially gives you the ability to take everything, and then move it in your own new direction. You leave behind only the parts you thought were "bad" or unprofessional or whatever.
- shawabawa3 13y ago
  > Not good comparison. A country is essentially a fixed physical plot of land, with people, resources, climate, etc. If you leave a country you have to leave all of those things (and more) behind. Yes it is. Saying you can just fork it is like saying you can just move yourself and all your family and friends to another country. You might be able to move yourself but moving any significant amount of developers is in practise impossible.
  - phryk 13y ago
    You might be able to move yourself but moving any significant amount of developers is in practise impossible. So it's better to force that significant amount of developers to do your bidding? That sounds just a just a weee bit unreasonable, IMHO.
  - criley2 13y ago
    Right but the analogy breaks down in the sense that: Linus is responsible for the developers who won't move. They're his team. You're basically saying that you want the fruits of Linus's labor without Linus there to do it?
  - 3am 13y ago
    After you fork, you know you can just pull from the original project? That's why they call it the upstream. Perhaps you're saying that you can't take the community with you? That doesn't seem like a reasonable expectation. You can fork, and you can continue to pull from upstream, but you can't force people to use it.
- vinceguidry 13y ago
  A better comparison is "If you don't like your job, get another one." A few people will be poised to exercise such a strategy, most won't.
67726e 13y ago
That's a bit of a an apples-to-oranges comparison. An open-source project isn't exactly a democratic government. It's not about protecting the people, it's about getting shit done and getting it done right.

inopinatus 13y ago

For several years I did maintain a private kernel fork for my then-employer. I was not interested in contributing any of our work (mostly netfilter related) back to the core precisely because I have better things to do with my emotional energy than engage with the aggressively toxic personalities of LKML. That's one of the joys of open source, of course, doing your own thing. In contrast I had a much better experience contributing to Postfix and Dovecot, where the benevolent dictators did not feel the urge to spew pages of vitriol in response to a blunder when a neutrally worded admonishment would do.

mcv 13y ago
Exactly. Friendly communities attract more people. Linus gets away with it because there's tons of people who want to work on his projects, and he can afford to alienate some talent. Others don't have that luxury. I've heard of plenty of people who prefer one language over another because of the nicer community. Eventually that should mean that projects with friendly communities are more successful.

theorique 13y ago

Don't you remember donglegate? You can't say fork any more. ;)