Date: Fri, 22 Jul 2011 06:58:26 -0600 From: Chad Perrin <perrin@apotheon.com> To: FreeBSD <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: Lennart Poettering: BSD Isn't Relevant Anymore Message-ID: <20110722125826.GA73065@guilt.hydra> In-Reply-To: <20110722105642.d21067c0.freebsd@edvax.de> References: <4E22DFE9.7050007@pathscale.com> <201107172016.30727.lobo@bsd.com.br> <4E23989F.7010701@gmail.com> <4e242fab.s4vpgxxZEUq0LFDq%perryh@pluto.rain.com> <1311017168.44397.YahooMailRC@web36508.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <13800_1311018255_4E248D0F_13800_81_1_D9B37353831173459FDAA836D3B43499C521864F@WADPMBXV0.waddell.com> <20110718162245.0d426239@scorpio> <20110719032131.GA29635@guilt.hydra> <20110719085529.1671ec7f@scorpio> <20110722105642.d21067c0.freebsd@edvax.de>
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--AqsLC8rIMeq19msA Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable On Fri, Jul 22, 2011 at 10:56:42AM +0200, Polytropon wrote: >=20 > Want it like this? :-) ---> http://xkcd.com/416/ That's exactly what I don't want. That is (an exaggeration of) what NetworkManager is trying to do and, predictably, it fails sometimes, just as MS Windows' automated network configuration stuff fails sometimes. By "fails" I don't mean something like "it won't connect if there isn't a network". I mean that its primary purpose is to try to guess what the user wants based on the developers' mental model of what users want, then tries to make it happen -- and, too often, the developers' mental model of what users want does not match up with the reality. Users, and their circumstances, are not always the same. In fact, these damned automated wireless management tools are so focused on trying to provide what the developers expect people to do that they often interfere with one's ability to tell them "No, I don't want you to do that, do something else." Work-arounds for some cases do exist, but they are often ludicrously wrong in principle (like blacklisting a particular network) so that they create too much fiddly overhead in practice, or inconsistently effective, or otherwise problematic. Automation is great when it takes a back seat to serving the individual's needs/desires, allowing itself to be overridden in simple, obvious ways. When it does not, it sucks. To do the former, all the developers of automated network management tools on Linux-based systems had to do is ensure there was a manually configured, manually operated command line toolset for network management and build automation around that. Instead, these idiots built automated toolsets from the ground up, then tried to add manual override capabilities into these toolsets after the fact as exceptions to the rule. In short, they followed the MS Windows approach, and what they ended up with was tools that not only emulate the "pick a network, any network" default behavior of MS Windows network management, but also emulate its apparently non-deterministic behavior, doing different things at different times for the same evident inputs, and fighting the user's actual needs and desires at times. In fact, the NetworkManager set of network management tools has in some ways outdone the stupidities of MS Windows network management. "Hey, this is stupid, but it's not stupid enough. We can do 'better'." This is the kind of crap I do *not* want to see make its way into FreeBSD from the Linux world, and it's why I said I'm okay with tools like NetworkManager being released under restrictive licensing that makes it less likely to be harvested for ideas by OS projects like FreeBSD. The day some asinine automated network selection line of crap like NetworkManager makes its way into the FreeBSD base system is probably the day I stop using it. --=20 Chad Perrin [ original content licensed OWL: http://owl.apotheon.org ] --AqsLC8rIMeq19msA Content-Type: application/pgp-signature Content-Disposition: inline -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.14 (FreeBSD) iEYEARECAAYFAk4pc/IACgkQ9mn/Pj01uKUnHACgtTyEMI/uWpI2Lm+6Pc6vo40X GHUAn3nGPzwKQsDyatDbe2QhFgejUFlR =tsC/ -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --AqsLC8rIMeq19msA--
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