Re: [Ksummit-2013-discuss] [ATTEND] How to act on LKML

Willy Tarreau
2013-07-17T13:10:51Z

On Wed, Jul 17, 2013 at 09:03:35AM -0400, Steven Rostedt wrote:
> On Wed, 2013-07-17 at 13:30 +0100, Ricardo Ferreira wrote:
> > Slashdot is just a cesspool of trolls, not a good comparison.
>
> Point taken.
>
> I posted this privately, and I think I'll repost it here. I need to
> modify it a bit as it wasn't meant to be public.
>
>
> When I started sending patches to LKML it was not the cursing I was
> afraid of, it was the possibility of top notch developers pointing out
> my flaws. Linux is intimidating not because it can be harsh, but because
> its the big league. You are posting code not only to the world but also
> to some of the best programmers on the planet, and frankly, that's
> really scary. And I think that's the real reason people who are shy tend
> not to want to participate. They use the harshness of LKML as an excuse,
> but I think it's really that they may be insecure about their own work
> and how it will compare with the best of the best.
>
> Both my wife and I have done karate for decades. My wife has even won a
> national tournament. She can do demos without a problem, but when she
> has to get up in front of other top black belts, she's a nervous wreck.
> She's her biggest critic, but she tends to know that when performing in
> front of people as good as she is, or better, they can see her flaws as
> much as she can. That is intimidating.
>
> The point I'm making is that we need to find out what is preventing good
> developers from joining the Linux community. Is it really the harshness
> of the project, or is it because we expect you to have the best code,
> and you will not be accepted if you are not that good. And I do not want
> people joining that are not good programmers.
>
> The answer is not to bash Linus into being a nice guy (which seems to be
> what Sarah's trying to do), but we can get mentors or even "scouts" to
> look for people of talent and help them get into the community. What
> those people need is not a nicer LKML that will let mediocre developers
> in, but someone that recognizes their talent and encourages them to
> join, by reinforcing to them how good of a developer they are. I've
> helped people this way. Talented programmers that were unsure of
> themselves, and they have done extremely well in our community.

+1

Willy