Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2003 18:56:36 -0600 From: Mark Linimon <linimon@lonesome.com> To: freebsd-ports-bugs@freebsd.org Subject: Re: ports/45613: make update doesn't Message-ID: <200304021856.36399.linimon@lonesome.com> In-Reply-To: <CAFE20F2-6569-11D7-91CF-0003935B2C48@pobox.com> References: <CAFE20F2-6569-11D7-91CF-0003935B2C48@pobox.com>
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> What you're saying is that there is someone directly responsible for > maintaining pine (for example) on FreeBSD, but there is nobody > responsible for maintaining /usr/ports? > > I find that notion deplorable. He's saying exactly the following, and no more: that some person (a volunteer) has said that he or she would look after pine; and that no single individual (volunteer) has said that she or he would look after the entirety of /usr/ports. That much, and no more. Of course, even if one single person wanted to do that, they'd find themselves faced with a large task of getting everyone onto the exact same page that they were on. The task would doubtless quickly turn insurmountable (and flameworthy). Any FreeBSD user is able to file Problem Reports (PRs) against specific bugs in the ports system. A small group of individuals (volunteers) has indicated interest in working with these PRs to try to incorporate them into the codebase to fix problems. That's it. There is No Man Behind The Curtain. There is no commercial entity. No one is paid. Yes, there is the occasional exception when a commercial business, a government organization, or some other entity, pays someone to create or maintain code that goes into FreeBSD or this kind of software in general, but it's the exception rather than the rule. To reiterate: FreeBSD is a cooperative anarchy. There is no "They". There are no shadowy figures from the X-Files. You don't need to call in Sherlock Holmes to search for forensic evidence. Executive Summary: There Ain't Nobody Here But Us Chickens. Now, as it turns out, there are several folks who have volunteered to be on the "portmgr" team by expressing an interest in fiddling with the ports system framework. Kris is one of them -- and from personal experience I know he works on a lot of stuff. But he, and they, are no more obligated to work on the framework at any given time, than they are obligated to wear berets and trenchcoats while riding roller coasters and dancing to polka music. The key word is "volunteer". I am consistently puzzled by why this concept seems so elusive. Do you think I'm ragging on you personally? I hope you don't take it that way -- this rant isn't meant to be anything personal. It's just that I see this Assumption Creep happen all the time in Open Source projects and it just makes me go cross-eyed. On FreeBSD, people work on what they wanna work on. That's all there is to it. If it gives them a good warm feeling to take responsibility for some part of the system, more power to them. But that's about all they're guaranteed to get out of it. Mark Linimon
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