Re: People need to say "no"

Jim Nance (jlnance@avanticorp.com)
Sat, 27 Feb 1999 14:47:06 -0500

Hello All,
Larry raised some good points in his post. From a technical viewpoint
I think he is right on the money. I would like to make a few observations
from a non-technical point of view.
As Larry has said in other emails, there is a big difference between saying
"This is a stupid idea" and "You are a stupid person." This is certainly
true. In spite of this, most people feel personally attacked when you attack
their ideas. It is a rare person who has both the technical knowledge to know
what is a bad idea and the ability and desire to express this in a way which
does not offend the person with the idea. If we can find such a person,
they would be an invaluable asset to us, both from the standpoint of having
a better kernel, and making it more fun to work on. The last thing we want
to do is to scare off potential new kernel developers when we criticize their
ideas.
On a sort of related note, I think that Linux has been successful not
because Linus Torvalds is brilliant but because he has a personality that
makes it easy for other people to work with him. Fortunately Alan Cox,
Linus'es heir apparent, also seems to be easy to work with. I think that
will keep Linux development enjoyable for a long time.

Thanks for listening,

Jim

-- 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jim Nance                                                 Avant! Corporation
(919) 941-6655    Do you have sweet iced tea?       jim_nance@avanticorp.com
                  No, but there's sugar on the table.


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