From owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Mar 15 06:37:27 2004 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 5DC5616A4CE for ; Mon, 15 Mar 2004 06:37:27 -0800 (PST) Received: from smtp3.adl2.internode.on.net (smtp3.adl2.internode.on.net [203.16.214.203]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id BA93B43D2F for ; Mon, 15 Mar 2004 06:37:26 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from smckay@internode.on.net) Received: from dungeon.home (ppp190-27.lns1.bne1.internode.on.net [150.101.190.27])i2FEbLUK038167; Tue, 16 Mar 2004 01:07:22 +1030 (CST) Received: from dungeon.home (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by dungeon.home (8.12.8p2/8.11.6) with ESMTP id i2FEbLew007813; Tue, 16 Mar 2004 00:37:21 +1000 (EST) (envelope-from mckay) Message-Id: <200403151437.i2FEbLew007813@dungeon.home> To: des@des.no (Dag-Erling =?iso-8859-1?q?Sm=F8rgrav?=) References: <200403140716.i2E7GDKa007204@dungeon.home> <20040315000944.GA93356@xor.obsecurity.org> <200403150134.i2F1Y5ew004366@dungeon.home> <200403151348.i2FDmuew007550@dungeon.home> In-Reply-To: 15:11:23 +0100" Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2004 00:37:21 +1000 From: Stephen McKay cc: chat@freebsd.org cc: Stephen McKay Subject: Re: Doing it right X-BeenThere: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: Non technical items related to the community List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 15 Mar 2004 14:37:27 -0000 On Monday, 15th March 2004, Dag-Erling =?iso-8859-1?q?Sm=F8rgrav?= wrote: >Sorry, but you get zero points for criticizing this decision after the >fact when it had already been discussed to death ... Presumably it was discussed to death on the -sparc list that I don't read. It's easy to miss things. You have to ignore 99% of the stuff that goes by if you want to avoid livelock. I responded to the commit of UPDATING.64BTT, which looked alarming to me. Turns out it isn't. I don't believe it is ever too late to do more thinking about a difficult problem. I've seen plenty of bad ideas pushed through because "we're tired of talking about it now" or because someone wanted "action, not words". >Now, if your message had been something like the following, this >thread might have turned out very differently: > > "Are you planning something similar for i386? In that case, I think > we should place more emphasis on backward compatibility..." So you are basically agreeing with my general premise (criticising technical decisions is a contribution), but didn't like the wording of my initial message? If so, fine. I take care when I write to the lists, but I can't get every nuance perfect. I think Garance read it the way it was intended. If you think that only code (or documentation and other concrete things) is a contribution, then I disagree, and will debate this further. Stephen.