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Linus Torvalds: “Somebody is pushing complete garbage for unclear reasons.”

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Re: Linus Torvalds: “Somebody is pushing complete garbage for unclear reasons.”

#211

Post by slii »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #131
mrmondo wrote: post #8

I think we should count ourselves lucky we have someone so good at spotting bullsh*t like this - and isn’t afraid to call it out as they sees it. Intel & friends have absolutely disgusted me lately, it could be all to easy to settle for less based on their standards, but let’s not let them set the standard - they’ve shown they can’t be trusted with quality and when they fail - they can’t be trusted to be transparent…

From what I gather, some of this is cultural. His country of origin is just generally blunt and direct about things. That directness is generally associated with multicultural environments where subtler context-dependent communication simply does not work. Some of the quotes I am seeing here from him are things I think are unnecessarily harsh, but most are not. Discussions about something he has said or written seem…

As a fellow Finn, I agree that our country is probably much more blunt and direct than the impression I get how the US works. That's also the way I like it, and I think you have gone way too far in the US in this politeness thing.

However, Finland is culturally quite homogeneous, so I think the reason behind the bluntness is not what you suggest it may be.

For a Finn, I think Linus is on the blunt side, but he's not an extreme case. In fact, I'd argue he's not an extreme case even among non-Finns; it's just that most people only hear about his rants.

Also, I find that Linus is somewhat quick to judge things, and often his reactions are based on a misunderstanding of the facts.

Re: Linus Torvalds: “Somebody is pushing complete garbage for unclear reasons.”

#213

Post by DoreenMichele »

slii wrote: post #211
DoreenMichele wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I gather, some of this is cultural. His country of origin is just generally blunt and direct about things. That directness is generally associated with multicultural environments where subtler context-dependent communication simply does not work. Some of the quotes I am seeing here from him are things I think are unnecessarily harsh, but most are not. Discussions about something he has said or written seem…

As a fellow Finn, I agree that our country is probably much more blunt and direct than the impression I get how the US works. That's also the way I like it, and I think you have gone way too far in the US in this politeness thing. However, Finland is culturally quite homogeneous, so I think the reason behind the bluntness is not what you suggest it may be. For a Finn, I think Linus is on the blunt side, but he's not…

Thank you. Low context communication is associated with multicultural environments, but not exclusive to it.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-context_and_low-context...

Re: Linus Torvalds: “Somebody is pushing complete garbage for unclear reasons.”

#214

Post by piyush_soni »

icelancer wrote: post #152
ealexhudson wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being able to call out bullshit doesn't mean having to curse it out. All Linus needs to do is say something like "I don't understand why this is here, and I'm not merging it until I do", rather than "They do literally insane things. They do things that do not make sense". The latter is not a technical argument, and it doesn't provide accuracy or clarity about next steps. "So somebody isn't telling the truth here. Som…

>> Being able to call out bullshit doesn't mean having to curse it out. Here we go. >> All Linus needs to do is say something like And all you need to do is be that nice and be as brilliant as Linus is. Oh, it's harder to be that smart than it is to be that nice? Maybe consider that for people as highly gifted as Linus, it actually isn't. What you take for granted as normal behavior isn't always normal to others, esp…

BULLSHIT (I hear you like it). It's about basic etiquette, and treating humans as humans. No amount of gifted skill is a threshold for crossing that behavior barrier.

Re: Linus Torvalds: “Somebody is pushing complete garbage for unclear reasons.”

#215

Post by vanderZwan »

ryanlol wrote: post #76
walterbell wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has a major technology media outlet taken a similar position as Bloomberg and The Economist?

Are there any people who care about what the “technology media” says?

If these media weren't popular or read, there wouldn't be so many magazines still being sold, or tech websites that apparently make enough money to keep going.

The average person is insecure about more advanced details of tech topics, yet still needs to use laptops and smartphones to survive in modern society. That is the vast majority of people, and those are the people you should be the most worried about, because those people decide whether Intel will ultimately get away with this or not.

And honestly, with that in mind your remark looks like a thinly-veiled snobbish remark about how you don't fall for any of that.

Re: Linus Torvalds: “Somebody is pushing complete garbage for unclear reasons.”

#216

Post by shakna »

mmrezaie wrote: post #96
jnordwick wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as we know, there has never been a single attack using either of specter or meltdown issues. No code had been found, nothing. It appears to be very difficult to take advantage of, and the initial idea of a JavaScript exploit seems to not be possible. Part of the reason for all of this might be that the attacker needs to run code on the target machine, and one the attacker can do that, there are far easier ways…

https://github.com/dag-erling/meltdown One of many source codes online and they are actually pretty understandable by me. I am just a mediocre c programmer.

I'm afraid that jnordwick doesn't consider PoCs to be "real" enough for some reason. [0] I think he's waiting for a piece of malware to be found in the wild before he'll consider it a problem.

Re: Linus Torvalds: “Somebody is pushing complete garbage for unclear reasons.”

#217

Post by piyush_soni »

MaxBarraclough wrote: post #196
ealexhudson wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're misreading my comment. The original post was "we need this brashness", my point is, we don't. If a specific individual is unable to communicate without that, that's a totally different matter - being able to accommodate a wide church of people is a crucial diversity matter. Would it have been clearer if I had said "All someone in a project leadership position needs to say ..." ? I'm arguing against tha…

I'm inclined to disagree on all points. As sundvor already pointed out, Linus's cursing works . He uses it for emphasis, to bring attention to bear where it's needed. Being polite would likely be less effective. > If a specific individual is unable to communicate without that, that's a totally different matter - being able to accommodate a wide church of people is a crucial diversity matter. So shouldn't you be OK wi…

Linus' cursing works because he's Linus, not because he is cursing. There is really no evidence that if he uses strong but less abusive language the work won't get done.

Re: Linus Torvalds: “Somebody is pushing complete garbage for unclear reasons.”

#218

Post by kakarot »

So somebody isn't telling the truth here. Somebody is pushing complete garbage for unclear reasons. Sorry for having to point that out.

As it is, the patches are COMPLETE AND UTTER GARBAGE.

They do literally insane things. They do things that do not make sense. That makes all your arguments questionable and suspicious. The patches do things that are not sane.

Is Linus suggesting these patches are so bad that there could possibly be a camouflaged backdoor?

Re: Linus Torvalds: “Somebody is pushing complete garbage for unclear reasons.”

#219

Post by soneil »

eps wrote: post #119
ewi_ wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd like to believe that one of the reasons Linus has that kind of reaction is because of the scope and impact his decisions and this kind of patches can have on people all around the world. This is a very specific situation, in which the advices in Sandya's article may not apply. However, I fail to see how Sandya's observations are BS. A code review is a place to improve code and oneself, and there's a pretty large…

In many cases it's not a patch that is a problem, it's the submitter and their approach/mindlessness/laziness/ethics that led to the patch being of an unacceptable quality. If you are trying to fix a watch and someone comes and suggest to hit it with a hammer, there's really not much place for being "respectful" with an answer.

> If you are trying to fix a watch and someone comes and suggest to hit it with a hammer, there's really not much place for being "respectful" with an answer.

That's actually the opposite of what I see in Linus. He seems to reserve these responses for people who should have known better.

So if I suggest fixing the watch by smashing it with a hammer, it probably wouldn't even merit a sideways glance. I'd be ignored like background noise. (or at most, invited to look for something more in tune with my skillset, perhaps hanging wallclocks).

When Intel show up with a hammer, the hammer is only half of the offence.

Re: Linus Torvalds: “Somebody is pushing complete garbage for unclear reasons.”

#220

Post by brynjolf »

watwut wrote: post #101
teekert wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want something from someone you ask it politely. If you produce BS, you get told you produce BS. I'm guessing it's a cultural thing I'm also guessing you are an American. Americans coming here often tell us we are very direct and it takes getting used to. We often tell Americans we prefer they speak their mind and don't pretend something is great or we are best friends when it isn't the case. I'm from the Neth…

1.) I am not American. I am also not talking about Torwalds, because as far as I know Linus did not explicitly demanded to be spoken to "politely" (afaik). 2.) Talking politely and talking directly are orthogonal categories. You can be impolite while not direct and also polite while being direct. 3.) An environment in which people just speak their minds and is ok with people being impolite when those feel like it is…

Boring. Heard it all before.
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