From owner-freebsd-hackers Tue Oct 15 20:39:51 1996 Return-Path: owner-hackers Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.5/8.7.3) id UAA03309 for hackers-outgoing; Tue, 15 Oct 1996 20:39:51 -0700 (PDT) Received: from genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au [129.127.96.120]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.5/8.7.3) with ESMTP id UAA03303 for ; Tue, 15 Oct 1996 20:39:47 -0700 (PDT) Received: from msmith@localhost by genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (8.6.12/8.6.9) id NAA29329; Wed, 16 Oct 1996 13:09:41 +0930 From: Michael Smith Message-Id: <199610160339.NAA29329@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Subject: Re: IP bugs in FreeBSD 2.1.5 To: jdw@wwwi.com (Jeffrey D. Wheelhouse) Date: Wed, 16 Oct 1996 13:09:40 +0930 (CST) Cc: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org In-Reply-To: <199610160238.TAA12637@wwwi.com> from "Jeffrey D. Wheelhouse" at Oct 15, 96 07:38:08 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-hackers@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Jeffrey D. Wheelhouse stands accused of saying: > > At 10:47 AM 10/16/96 +0930, Michael Smith wrote: > >Does -stable matter to you? Do you or your > >business want to see -stable move forwards? THEN DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. > > It's really hard not to say something dreadfully sarcastic here. > Especially after I specifically addressed this point in my previous > messages. > > It's really nice that you have enough time to work on FreeBSD, but > not all of us are so lucky. The attitude that my (or anyone else's) > opinion is unimportant because I'm "only" a user is counterproductive. MHA for missing your addressing this point; however I feel that it still stands. The impetus for maintaining a "commercial grade" release has to come from the community, and the people most likely to be interested in this are those that need it. I didn't mean the above invective to be addressed specifically at you - that was poor communication on my part. As a user of a community-developed system, the obligation is more on your shoulders than on those of the developers; they are not held at ransom by the commercial model, so it is up to you and others in your position to motivate those who do have the time, in whatever fasion you can. And are you really as strapped for time as you think? Could you spend an hour a week reading commit messages looking for important changes, and trying them out? If ten or fifteen users with your sort of interest could spend that sort of time on the project, you could keep someone like Nate quite busy doing the actual committing. As a bonus, because you were in a position where you were providing the changes, you could prioritise the ones you provided to address your primary concerns. As a result, everyone would benefit. > I wasn't suggesting that 2.1.5 should diverge at all, only that it > may be time to start thinking about the possibly large portion of > the FreeBSD userbase that isn't seeing any of the benefit of all the > hard work you're doing. Understood - this point is clearly apprehended by most people. Unfortunately, so is the principal difficulty facing its resolution. -- ]] Mike Smith, Software Engineer msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au [[ ]] Genesis Software genesis@atrad.adelaide.edu.au [[ ]] High-speed data acquisition and (GSM mobile) 0411-222-496 [[ ]] realtime instrument control (ph/fax) +61-8-267-3039 [[ ]] Collector of old Unix hardware. "Where are your PEZ?" The Tick [[