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I second this. Its something we can all take a lesson from. Unfortunately I see too FAR many programmers who model their persona's after Kanye West. I had th

by Zelphyr 12y ago

I second this. Its something we can all take a lesson from. Unfortunately I see too FAR many programmers who model their persona's after Kanye West. I had the great fortune of meeting Steve Bourne, inventor of /bin/sh. If ever there was a guy who could accept any and all accolades it would be him. Instead he was most gracious and humble and spent all his time showing interest in our work as well as answering our questions about the invention of the shell and Unix. Speaking of; did you know he was the first alpha tester of Unix? When Ken Thompson and Dennis Richie were writing it they would hand the magnetic tapes over to Steve Bourne and have him test it.

anothermoron 12y ago
> I second this. Its something we can all take a lesson from. Unfortunately I see too FAR many programmers who model their persona's after Kanye West. Most indie dev. are like that, they don't have anything to show but act like they know everything and that everything they say is pure gold.
- Cthulhu_ 12y ago
  That's because they need to raise money before starting on building their game. Hip startup people have similar traits, and inflate their idea in order to get more funding. That's how marketing works, basically.
  - vans 12y ago
    And that why we (developpers, scientists, ...) hate marketing lessons :p
nkozyra 12y ago
Less Kanye West and more Linus. And I'm of the opinion that an attitude and approach like Linus' is fine - if you're Linus. I think it's sort of made its way around as the way to act if you know what you're doing and that's a shame. I know a lot of great devs who are lost in the shuffle for not being boisterous enough.
- bsder 12y ago
  > And I'm of the opinion that an attitude and approach like Linus' is fine - if you're Linus. I'm of the opinion that it's not. And, it provides a really poor example to the younger people in the field. I've known a lot of programmers. Many of them far smarter than Linus. Funnily enough, the better they were; the nicer they were.
  - EpicEng 12y ago
    I don't think you know anything about Linus beyond his widely publicized outbursts (Which also means you have no idea how smart, or not, he is).
    - moomin 12y ago
      OMG is he a 10x engineer? 11??? Seriously, there's no productivity benchmark beyond which you shouldn't treat people with respect. There are broken cultures where you can get away with it, but you'll still be an asshole. Linus is an asshole not because it's some deep essential part of his nature, he's an asshole because people give him a free pass.
      - pyre 12y ago
        Parent post was asking whether your knowledge of how much of an "asshole" Linus is comes from only reading the publicized outbursts, and not interacting on a day to day basis. While it's not preferable, I think that we can be understanding of the fact that people can sometimes have outbursts due to stressors in their life. That said, whenever I've seen people bashing a Linus outburst, I've gone and read said outburst. It's never as bad as the "tech press" make it out to be.
        anon1385 12y ago
        >While it's not preferable, I think that we can be understanding of the fact that people can sometimes have outbursts due to stressors in their life. Sure. The question is, do the rest of us treat those incidents as mistakes where somebody went over the line and behaved poorly, or do we defend the behaviour and even try to argue that it's a sign of good project management that should be emulated because it 'tells it like it is' and keeps away the 'idiots'? Sadly the latter is a common attitude, as seen in other comments in this thread.
gjtorikian 12y ago
I feel absolutely idiotic to not have known that the Bourne shell was actually named after a Mr. Bourne. I just assumed it was an acronym or something.
- ptaipale 12y ago
  You never saw that matryoshka doll book? http://www.amazon.com/System-International-Computer-Science-Series/dp/0201137917 http://www.amazon.com/System-International-Computer-Science-... It was somewhat outdated by late 80's but it was still "the book" for newcomers to Unix environments. Next, look up what AWK stands for...

by Zelphyr 12y ago

anothermoron 12y ago

> I second this. Its something we can all take a lesson from. Unfortunately I see too FAR many programmers who model their persona's after Kanye West. Most indie dev. are like that, they don't have anything to show but act like they know everything and that everything they say is pure gold.

Cthulhu_ 12y ago
That's because they need to raise money before starting on building their game. Hip startup people have similar traits, and inflate their idea in order to get more funding. That's how marketing works, basically.
- vans 12y ago
  And that why we (developpers, scientists, ...) hate marketing lessons :p

nkozyra 12y ago

Less Kanye West and more Linus. And I'm of the opinion that an attitude and approach like Linus' is fine - if you're Linus. I think it's sort of made its way around as the way to act if you know what you're doing and that's a shame. I know a lot of great devs who are lost in the shuffle for not being boisterous enough.

bsder 12y ago
> And I'm of the opinion that an attitude and approach like Linus' is fine - if you're Linus. I'm of the opinion that it's not. And, it provides a really poor example to the younger people in the field. I've known a lot of programmers. Many of them far smarter than Linus. Funnily enough, the better they were; the nicer they were.
- EpicEng 12y ago
  I don't think you know anything about Linus beyond his widely publicized outbursts (Which also means you have no idea how smart, or not, he is).
  - moomin 12y ago
    OMG is he a 10x engineer? 11??? Seriously, there's no productivity benchmark beyond which you shouldn't treat people with respect. There are broken cultures where you can get away with it, but you'll still be an asshole. Linus is an asshole not because it's some deep essential part of his nature, he's an asshole because people give him a free pass.
    - pyre 12y ago
      Parent post was asking whether your knowledge of how much of an "asshole" Linus is comes from only reading the publicized outbursts, and not interacting on a day to day basis. While it's not preferable, I think that we can be understanding of the fact that people can sometimes have outbursts due to stressors in their life. That said, whenever I've seen people bashing a Linus outburst, I've gone and read said outburst. It's never as bad as the "tech press" make it out to be.
      - anon1385 12y ago
        >While it's not preferable, I think that we can be understanding of the fact that people can sometimes have outbursts due to stressors in their life. Sure. The question is, do the rest of us treat those incidents as mistakes where somebody went over the line and behaved poorly, or do we defend the behaviour and even try to argue that it's a sign of good project management that should be emulated because it 'tells it like it is' and keeps away the 'idiots'? Sadly the latter is a common attitude, as seen in other comments in this thread.

gjtorikian 12y ago

I feel absolutely idiotic to not have known that the Bourne shell was actually named after a Mr. Bourne. I just assumed it was an acronym or something.

ptaipale 12y ago
You never saw that matryoshka doll book? http://www.amazon.com/System-International-Computer-Science-Series/dp/0201137917 http://www.amazon.com/System-International-Computer-Science-... It was somewhat outdated by late 80's but it was still "the book" for newcomers to Unix environments. Next, look up what AWK stands for...