Date: 09 May 2003 01:42:33 +0100 From: Paul Richards <paul@freebsd-services.com> To: Marcel Moolenaar <marcel@xcllnt.net> Cc: Dag-Erling Smorgrav <des@ofug.org> Subject: Re: `Hiding' libc symbols Message-ID: <1052440952.619.59.camel@cf.freebsd-services.com> In-Reply-To: <20030508233431.GA1461@athlon.pn.xcllnt.net> References: <Pine.BSF.4.21.0305011046140.73226-100000@InterJet.elischer.org> <XFMail.20030501140549.jhb@FreeBSD.org> <20030501182820.GA53641@madman.celabo.org> <20030503201409.GA41554@dragon.nuxi.com> <20030505175428.GA19275@madman.celabo.org> <20030506170919.GD36798@dragon.nuxi.com> <20030506175557.GE79167@madman.celabo.org> <20030508161223.GL1869@survey.codeburst.net> <xzpu1c5unx1.fsf@flood.ping.uio.no> <1052433233.619.27.camel@cf.freebsd-services.com> <20030508233431.GA1461@athlon.pn.xcllnt.net>
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On Fri, 2003-05-09 at 00:34, Marcel Moolenaar wrote: > On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 11:33:54PM +0100, Paul Richards wrote: > > > > [...] > > > > My opinion is that FreeBSD should cater to the people who know their > > > > stuff and let the crap programmers out their be shown the bugs that > > > > exist in their code when they try to use it on FreeBSD. > > > > > > Now I know why people accuse us of elitism... > > > > > > Let's please not favor pedantry over robustness. > > > > This isn't elitism. A professor or teacher is not elitist when they > > correct the mistakes of less experienced pupils. FreeBSD should > > highlight bad habits so people can see that they are making mistakes and > > improve their skills. > > The arrogance and elitism is in the presumption that 1) you can teach > and 2) people want to be taught by you (the universal you). Never assume > the role of teacher merely on the grounds that your believes make you > think you're right and you arrogance has made you believe that people > should know about it. Your desire to enlighten may be nothing more than > a demonstration of blindness in the light of rejection. > > Teach only to people you want to be taught by you. Well, perhaps FreeBSD should be elitist. If I wanted to be part of a crowd that wrote mediocre code and where I was unable to learn, through the experiences of others how to be a good programmer then I'd probably have chosed Linux 10 years ago and not FreeBSD :-) Eliticism can have both a positive and negative connotation. In the context I use it I mean it as a positive thing, where people who write good code uphold high standards and encourage less experienced people to grow in their ability. The negative connotation is one of exclusion. If we remain open to new developers and are patient in developing their code writing skils (or even more experienced people who have developed bad habits) then we're eliticist in the positive sense, just like an elite athlete can be a positive force in helping out less experienced athletes. To get this back in context, we're talking about a decision where a) FreeBSD gets hacked to accomodate bad programmers or b) we show up bad coding practices where they exist in third party ports. I'd much prefer to take the latter path and encourage quality code writing. If that makes us eliticist then I'm happy with that and as long as we don't exclude people who are willing to learn then that's not a bad approach for the project. -- Paul Richards <paul@freebsd-services.com> FreeBSD Services Ltd
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