From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: John Keeping Subject: Re: [PATCH] Documentation/CommunityGuidelines Date: Tue, 11 Jun 2013 20:54:52 +0100 Message-ID: <20130611195452.GO22905@serenity.lan> References: <51B6AA7F.1060505@alum.mit.edu> <7v38sod1kn.fsf@alter.siamese.dyndns.org> <20130611182936.GM22905@serenity.lan> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Cc: Junio C Hamano , Michael Haggerty , Git List , Jonathan Nieder , A Large Angry SCM To: Ramkumar Ramachandra X-From: git-owner@vger.kernel.org Tue Jun 11 21:55:14 2013 Return-path: Envelope-to: gcvg-git-2@plane.gmane.org Received: from vger.kernel.org ([209.132.180.67]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1UmUev-0005th-4G for gcvg-git-2@plane.gmane.org; Tue, 11 Jun 2013 21:55:13 +0200 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1755116Ab3FKTzG (ORCPT ); Tue, 11 Jun 2013 15:55:06 -0400 Received: from jackal.aluminati.org ([72.9.247.210]:35846 "EHLO jackal.aluminati.org" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1751411Ab3FKTzF (ORCPT ); Tue, 11 Jun 2013 15:55:05 -0400 Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by jackal.aluminati.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8B4C2CDA59A; Tue, 11 Jun 2013 20:55:04 +0100 (BST) X-Virus-Scanned: Debian amavisd-new at serval.aluminati.org X-Spam-Flag: NO X-Spam-Score: -2.9 X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-2.9 tagged_above=-9999 required=6.31 tests=[ALL_TRUSTED=-1, BAYES_00=-1.9] autolearn=ham Received: from jackal.aluminati.org ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (jackal.aluminati.org [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id L2suRKDm6RFG; Tue, 11 Jun 2013 20:55:03 +0100 (BST) Received: from serenity.lan (mink.aluminati.org [10.0.7.180]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by jackal.aluminati.org (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id A8DD9CDA2D4; Tue, 11 Jun 2013 20:54:54 +0100 (BST) Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.21 (2010-09-15) Sender: git-owner@vger.kernel.org Precedence: bulk List-ID: X-Mailing-List: git@vger.kernel.org Archived-At: On Wed, Jun 12, 2013 at 12:16:28AM +0530, Ramkumar Ramachandra wrote: > John Keeping wrote: > > Ugh, why this roundabout-passive-past tone? Use imperative tone > > like this: > > > > ... > > > > vs. > > > > We normally use the imperative in commit messages, perhaps like > > this? > > > > ... > > > > As my mother would say, "politeness costs nothing" ;-) > > The review is being honest about her feelings in the first one, and > being artificially diplomatic in the second one. I don't think it is artificially diplomatic, it's an attempt to convey a helpful tone in an email. As has been said elsewhere, it is easy to read an email in the wrong tone (there is an oft-cited statistic about the percentage of communication that is non-verbal, and which cannot be inferred from written text). For this reason I think it is important for reviewers to make an effort to minimise the risk that what they write can be interpreted as being aggressive. > Both of them are > constructive and friendly, in that they provide an example for the > submitter to follow. Both provide the same advice, yes. But I disagree that they are both friendly. The top example reads (to me at least) as an attack on the submitter for not knowing better. It may sometimes be necessary to resort to strong wording if someone appears to be wilfully ignoring sensible advice but we should not expect every submitter to know the expectations of the project; the first message to someone should gently guide them in the right direction. > Either way, I'm not interested in problems that have no solutions. > The only "solution" I see here is to suffocate every contributor until > they are "tactful enough" for the majority's liking, and "remove" the > ones that don't conform. If you do have an alternate solution, please > share it with us. I don't have a solution, only a hope that regular contributors will learn from others how they can phrase review comments less aggressively. I expect different people will read the same statement differently; people are from different cultures and what is considered acceptable in one culture can be considered rude in another. We should aim to cultivate our own culture where we try to minimise the risk that what we write will be misinterpreted by someone with a different cultural background.