Re: A modest proposal -- We need a patch penguin

Larry McVoy
2002-01-29T06:13:19Z

On Mon, Jan 28, 2002 at 10:00:19PM -0800, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> And more likely, even if you _do_ find ten people who can do everything,
> you don't want them to.

[and other things, in general saying that he wasn't happy with the approach]

What you didn't do, Linus, is paint a picture which allows development
to scale up. Perhaps you don't want it to do so; looking back on Sun's
development process has taught me that a lot of it was just a way to
slow things down enough that the architects could keep up with the many
hacks going on here there and everywhere. If this was Sun, I'd say that
slowing things down is good.

But cast your mind back to your "Linux is evolution" line of reasoning
and ask yourself if that does not mean that allowing the fastest
forward progress is what you want. It would seem so, but at this point,
Linus, it is hard to predict what you think, so I'll pass on guessing.

What would be nice is if you came out with a clear statement, similar
to Rob's written summary, that said what it is that you would like to
see happen to address the issues that have come up over and over again.

The alternative is that sooner or later someone or some group will come
up with a better answer, there will be an ugly fight, and a lot of time
will get wasted when we could have learned how to grow up nicely.
--
---
Larry McVoy lm at bitmover.com http://www.bitmover.com/lm