Re: [ATTEND] How to act on LKML

Stefano Stabellini
2013-07-16T15:49:27Z

On Mon, 15 Jul 2013, H. Peter Anvin wrote:
> On 07/15/2013 08:06 PM, Steven Rostedt wrote:
> >
> > Linus's point is that he wants to be honest, and cursing is his way of
> > giving you the most direct way to understand how he honestly feels.
> >
>
> What I don't get about anything of this is that I have always found
> Linus' being hyper-obviously over the top sarcastic when he goes on a
> rant. There is usually plenty of context to derive that from, too, even
> if you haven't seen him in person enough to virtually hear the smirk in
> his voice. This is a form of humor more than anything else, and at
> least I find it utterly impossible to be offended by it. As the main
> target of the rant this weekend, I (a) chuckled, and (b) said "I think I
> need to do some damage control".

I agree with Sarah.

I have been hacking in several different Open Source communities during
the last few years, including qemu-devel, xen-devel, linux-arm and the
lkml of course.

The etiquette on the lkml is by far the roughest of them all. It's the
"bad neighborhood with guns" of the Open Source world. You never know
when you are going to get a bullet, but sooner or later you'll get one.

I think that it's hurting Linux and in particular it's hurting
attracting new talents. Not just devs for hire but people passionate
about what they do and eager to become more involved in the project.
I met more than one good ex-Linux hacker that decided to move to do
other things because of this.