Linus Torvalds Suspends Key Linux Developer

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It looks like Linus is on the warpath again. It's always fun when Torvalds gets pissed. ;)

Torvalds bashed Sievers for lacking responsibility in a mailing list message. “Key[sic], I'm [expletive] tired of the fact that you don't fix problems in the code *you* write, so that the kernel then has to work around the problems you cause,” he wrote. Torvalds went on to state that “this has been going on for *years*,” and said that he will refuse to accept patches from Sievers until Sievers cleans up his act.
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Now all they need to do is ban Lennart Poettering.

KS was a menace who only cared about bloating up GNU/Linux and turning it into a copy of Microsoft Windows.
 
Short version of what happened:

Systemd has a bug filed against systemd where if a user uses the debug kernel command line parameter, the system will fail to boot. This is because systemd reads this parameter, and floods the log files, causing timeouts.

Kay, the author of systemd, closes the issue as not a bug because he doesn't want to fix it. Blames the kernel and wants them to change the kernel to work around his code.

Long version:
https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=76935
 
Open Source: Always Drama

Ego is the only reason Open Source even exist, no one should be surprised by temper tantrums of folks who consider themselves primadonnas.
 
Velox said:
Short version of what happened:

Systemd has a bug filed against systemd where if a user uses the debug kernel command line parameter, the system will fail to boot. This is because systemd reads this parameter, and floods the log files, causing timeouts.

Kay, the author of systemd, closes the issue as not a bug because he doesn't want to fix it. Blames the kernel and wants them to change the kernel to work around his code.

Long version:
https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=76935
Click to expand...

Read the long version. Don't blame Linus as that Kay guy comes off as an ahole.
 
Skripka said:
Yea but being an ahole is something that is only tolerated if you are pretty damn brilliant at what you do...
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Yeah, I think Bobby Fischer was the best example of that ... superb chess player but an AHole of galactic proportions :cool:
 
kbrickley said:
Yeah, I think Bobby Fischer was the best example of that ... superb chess player but an AHole of galactic proportions :cool:
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I give Bobby Fischer a pass because I suspect he was, in the words of the great Tracy Jordan, "straight-up mentally ill."
 
This is why Linux is so interesting. Does Windows have an equivalent of Linus? I don't think so.
 
Snowdog said:
OTOH, we did see some folks shown the door for the botched Win 8 launch.
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OTOH none of those people showed the kind of personality and grasp of deep-level coding that Torvalds has. IMHO.
 
Babbster said:
I give Bobby Fischer a pass because I suspect he was, in the words of the great Tracy Jordan, "straight-up mentally ill."
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Yes. After seeing some of his interviews from the HBO documentary on him he sounded like he had untreated schizophrenia. It is double the shame because even our best "treatment" of today would simply rob him of all his talent with sedatives to suppress the paranoia and delusions.
 
The guy may have deserved it, but Linus Torvald's is a god damned unprofessional tool with no tact what so ever. All of us Linux fans owe him for his kernel work, but at the same time the community would be better off if he just shut the fuck up and retired...
 
Skripka said:
Yea but being an ahole is something that is only tolerated if you are pretty damn brilliant at what you do...
Click to expand...

It doesn't matter how brilliant you are. Being a childish unprofessional asshole is never acceptable. This is why Steve Jobs was kicked out of Apple in the 80's.

It doesn't matter how smart or good you are at what you do, playing well with others is always more important and will yield better results in the end. Organizations that don't fire the likes of Thorvald's or young Jobs are the ones who foster hostile work environments and will never be successful.

For Linux to really succeed it needs to dump Thorvald's and all other abrasive personalities like him, no matter how "good" they are.
 
Long story short:

No one is good enough to get away with being an asshole. No one. No exceptions.
 
Zarathustra[H];1040747465 said:
The guy may have deserved it, but Linus Torvald's is a god damned unprofessional tool with no tact what so ever. All of us Linux fans owe him for his kernel work, but at the same time the community would be better off if he just shut the fuck up and retired...
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A contrary view could be given by David Berlinksi when he says, "This is a country with all too much civility." Torvalds is generally fine until you push him too far. It's not clear to me that the vacillating, weak-kneed leadership that is all too common today is any more valuable than just blunt-force language.

For the record, Torvalds didn't call Sievers an asshole or any other name or insult; but you did call Torvalds an asshole.
 
My favorite is his reaction when they released Gnome 3 / Unity. He was bashing it so much, but all his points made sense.

But yeah I think he needs to calm down, not really the right way to deal with stuff.
 
Zarathustra[H];1040747473 said:
It doesn't matter how brilliant you are. Being a childish unprofessional asshole is never acceptable. This is why Steve Jobs was kicked out of Apple in the 80's.

It doesn't matter how smart or good you are at what you do, playing well with others is always more important and will yield better results in the end. Organizations that don't fire the likes of Thorvald's or young Jobs are the ones who foster hostile work environments and will never be successful.

For Linux to really succeed it needs to dump Thorvald's and all other abrasive personalities like him, no matter how "good" they are.
Click to expand...

Dumping the very brain-trust that makes everything actually work. Great plan. Not.

Then what? Have idiots like Shuttleworth take over?

Zarathustra[H];1040747489 said:
Long story short:

No one is good enough to get away with being an asshole. No one. No exceptions.
Click to expand...

Tell that to Beethoven. Or Henry Ford. Abe Lincoln wasn't that nice a guy either by historical accounts. Chris Columbus was by all accounts (excepting children's stories) an out-and-out-no-holds-barred asshole-son-of-a-bitch who wanted nothing but cheddar...and not having found it enslaved and tortured/killed the locals he accidentally found when he got lost...and he has a national holiday and is credited with "discovering" the "new world".

Sure, there people are good enough to be assholes. But unless you're at the top of your field-there isn't much of a future in being so.
 
Zarathustra[H];1040747473 said:
It doesn't matter how brilliant you are. Being a childish unprofessional asshole is never acceptable. This is why Steve Jobs was kicked out of Apple in the 80's.
Click to expand...

That's not at all why Steve Jobs was kicked out of Apple in the '80s. His behavior didn't help his case, but ultimately it resulted in great products, so that wasn't a factor in his ouster.

The belief that he wasn't ready professionally to be CEO of a large company, and that his continued presence would diminish the role of any hired CEO, meant that the board decided Steve had to go.
 
Skripka said:
Dumping the very brain-trust that makes everything actually work. Great plan. Not.

Then what? Have idiots like Shuttleworth take over?
Click to expand...

The super competent individual is a myth. A team that works well together - despite having lower individual qualifications - will ALWAYS perform better than superstars with huge egos.

Just look at this years Russian Olympic Hockey Team.

Or read this article:
Forbes: Why You Should Never Hire Superstar Talent

Shuttleworth may not be popular among Linux purists, experts and long time users (myself included, I can't stand Unity, for instance) but there is no denying that his organization has done more to bring Desktop Linux to the mainstream than anyone else in linux history.

Pre-Ubuntu Linux:
Carefully select linux compatible hardware, and spend weeks troubleshooting and getting everything to work right, and then rinse and repeat when it all breaks during an upgrade.

Post Ubuntu Linux:
Pop the disk in and choose to either test drive off the disk, or do a guided GUI install, after which all your hardware just works, and you don't NEED to dig into custom config files unless you really want to.

And, if Unity isn't your thing, there are so many Ubuntu derivative distributions that use another default window manager and still benefit from the amazing work the Ubuntu team has done over the last decade on hardware compatibility and ease of install.

We need more Shuttleworths and fewer Linus Torvalds for Linux to ever grow beyond a core enthusiast user base.

The geek rage development environment flows through too much of Linux culture turning away potential software and hardware developers, limiting choice and in the ned making Linux worse off.
 
Terpfen said:
The belief that he wasn't ready professionally to be CEO of a large company, and that his continued presence would diminish the role of any hired CEO, meant that the board decided Steve had to go.
Click to expand...

And why do you think he wasn't deemed ready to be CEO of a large company?

He always had a remarkable vision (even though I never really agreed with it) but what he lacked was the maturity to realize that he didn't have all the answers and to listen to the people he hired. That coupled with his tantrums pretty much assured he wasn't ready.

When he returned to Apple in the mid 90's he was a much humbled man by his experiences in the previous decade, and that is what allowed him to lead the success of the company that was to come.

Yes, the people who ousted Jobs in the mid 80's nearly ran Apple to the ground with their lack of vision, but on the flipside, if Jobs had remained, I'm not convinced there would be an Apple at all today.
 
Zarathustra[H];1040747746 said:
The super competent individual is a myth. A team that works well together - despite having lower individual qualifications - will ALWAYS perform better than superstars with huge egos.

Just look at this years Russian Olympic Hockey Team.

Or read this article:
Forbes: Why You Should Never Hire Superstar Talent

Shuttleworth may not be popular among Linux purists, experts and long time users (myself included, I can't stand Unity, for instance) but there is no denying that his organization has done more to bring Desktop Linux to the mainstream than anyone else in linux history.

Pre-Ubuntu Linux:
Carefully select linux compatible hardware, and spend weeks troubleshooting and getting everything to work right, and then rinse and repeat when it all breaks during an upgrade.

Post Ubuntu Linux:
Pop the disk in and choose to either test drive off the disk, or do a guided GUI install, after which all your hardware just works, and you don't NEED to dig into custom config files unless you really want to.

And, if Unity isn't your thing, there are so many Ubuntu derivative distributions that use another default window manager and still benefit from the amazing work the Ubuntu team has done over the last decade on hardware compatibility and ease of install.

We need more Shuttleworths and fewer Linus Torvalds for Linux to ever grow beyond a core enthusiast user base.

The geek rage development environment flows through too much of Linux culture turning away potential software and hardware developers, limiting choice and in the ned making Linux worse off.
Click to expand...

You need to learn your history.

Shuttleworth wasn't funding or backing Ubuntu from the start (his $10mil backing and creation of the "Ubuntu Foundation" wasn't until 2005 after Warty). As a matter of fact...all the brains that made Ubuntu into what it became left shortly after Shuttleworth started micromanaging things which began in earnest around 2007. AAMOF, most people with long enough memory look fondly back on those pre-Shuttleworth micro-management relesases as the best and best working Linuxes in the distros history....and all those following blow ass in comparison.


Shuttleworth is what is wrong. Bighead CEOs with no clue about technical details forcing everyone else to make their code like theirs or else. His Weyland fiasco is a great example. When I see Shuttleworth I instantly think of the Pointy Haired Boss from Dilbert.
 
Zarathustra[H];1040747750 said:
And why do you think he wasn't deemed ready to be CEO of a large company?
Click to expand...

Ask the board members at the time.
 
Zarathustra[H];1040747746 said:
The super competent individual is a myth.
Click to expand...

That is nonsense. Something I expect from clueless managers that think arrogant self aggrandizing hacker types are "superstars".

I have worked with a wide range of SW developers for nearly 20 years. I have seen these arrogant/hacker "superstars" in their own mind, types. They were never the actual superstars anywhere I was working.

They were usually slightly above average, worked long hours and cut corners to increase their productivity and let other people clean up their messes. You don't want hire these guys, but they aren't superstars. If you can't tell the difference, let someone else vet the talent.

I have seen real superstars, that make real the claim that developer productivity varies by up to 10X. The best I have ever seen was on of the most humble, easy going guys I ever met. He was quickly made an architect, but he still kept turning in more quality code/design work than anyone else, and would help anyone at the drop of a hat.

Some people are just perfectly suited to their role in life, and have extraordinarily above average abilities. The super competent are no myth.

The myth is that everyone is somehow created equal.

You would be a huge idiot to pass up hiring a genuine superstar if you are lucky enough to have the opportunity.
 
Zarathustra[H];1040747465 said:
The guy may have deserved it, but Linus Torvald's is a god damned unprofessional tool with no tact what so ever. All of us Linux fans owe him for his kernel work, but at the same time the community would be better off if he just shut the fuck up and retired...
Click to expand...

He isn't obligated to be professional because he is not a company selling you a product. He is someone who, in his free time, created an operating system kernel that a lot of people like to use.

People think the GNU/Linux community is elitist to newbies but the real problem is that you have too many people who are used to a customer-vendor relationship (ala Microsoft) coming in and thinking that they are obligated to customer service for something that is a volunteer project.

The problems with Kay Sievers and his crowd are not new. There is a small but very influential group of people (mostly Red Hat people) who are trying to force their own ideas into the GNU/Linux ecosystem as a whole; ideas that a lot of people consider bad ideas. They have managed to gain control of a number of crucial base components such as UDev and have been rewriting them to require these new components (chiefly, SystemD) even though there is no reason why they should (since UDev has nothing to do with the init system, it should be agnostic to it). The UNIX philosophy of programming is one program to a task and created big integrated messes (as is so common in the Windows world) is generally frowned upon.

When offered constructive criticism, these people have been dismissive because they simply don't care about what happens outside of what Red Hat wants. This video demonstrates exactly the kind of dismissive attitude that this group of people has; Poetterring won't even let the guy finish his speech and keeps interrupting and bringing in fallacious emotional arguments.
 
Zarathustra[H];1040747473 said:
It doesn't matter how brilliant you are. Being a childish unprofessional asshole is never acceptable. This is why Steve Jobs was kicked out of Apple in the 80's.

It doesn't matter how smart or good you are at what you do, playing well with others is always more important and will yield better results in the end. Organizations that don't fire the likes of Thorvald's or young Jobs are the ones who foster hostile work environments and will never be successful.

For Linux to really succeed it needs to dump Thorvald's and all other abrasive personalities like him, no matter how "good" they are.
Click to expand...

Most computers run Linux, it has already succeeded, and many large companies commit code to it.
 
Zarathustra[H];1040747473 said:
It doesn't matter how brilliant you are. Being a childish unprofessional asshole is never acceptable. This is why Steve Jobs was kicked out of Apple in the 80's.

It doesn't matter how smart or good you are at what you do, playing well with others is always more important and will yield better results in the end. Organizations that don't fire the likes of Thorvald's or young Jobs are the ones who foster hostile work environments and will never be successful.

For Linux to really succeed it needs to dump Thorvald's and all other abrasive personalities like him, no matter how "good" they are.
Click to expand...

Perhaps you don't remember but, during the non-Steve Jobs years, Apple nearly went bankrupt. By the end, the shareholders were begging for him to come back.

I don't like what Apple does as a company and I don't like Steve Jobs ethics but he did get stuff done and turn around Apple.
 
So now the guy can go get paid like 5x as much or more to go work for google or oracle. /thread /life
 
Spazturtle said:
Most computers run Linux, it has already succeeded, and many large companies commit code to it.
Click to expand...

Ding, ding, ding! We have a winner.

It's a problem with systemd and Kay Sievers failed to fix it.

Also you guys talking about Ubuntu... Please use a proper distribution, say Debian, Mint, Gentoo, pretty much anything but Ubuntu. Canonical has dropped the ball, especially with their little spyware pre-installed (last time I read).

Please, think of the children and fuzzy cute animals!
 
ubuntu = google OS,
i wouldn't call it linux, google is a microsoft of open source, it destroys privacy in everything it's evolved in, ubuntu ships with spyware called zeitgeist, and of course people rejected it and would remove it, so they made it unremovable by making it a dependency for unit,
ubuntu should be on your linux shit list
 
Fuck Linus Torvalds and fuck the abomination that is Linux.

He is a disgrace to the *real* open source community.
 
Skripka said:
"real" open source? Like what exactly?
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People who do it to share their code and ideas, and not as a ploy to indoctrinate people to their fascists views on technology and to feed their egos. Linus is an egomaniac of the worst degree.
 
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