Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

lkml.iu.edu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

551–560 of 702 posts

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

#551

Post by quotheth »

bradleyjg wrote: post #547
quotheth wrote: post #529

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not complaining. Merely expecting, given that this is not the first time I've posted something similar, and I felt the need to point out the double standard ahead of time this time. Downvote away! I just hope that the hypocrisy is clear. edit: Or there may be a totally non hypocritical reason to downvote me, which I would also encourage.

> given that this is not the first time I've posted something similar Funny, I didn’t see that in your ten day long comment history.

A human being can only have one account on one website. How about this - you delete your post, and I delete my post, and we both contribute to the conversation by removing useless posts!

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

#552

Post by beached_whale »

jessaustin wrote: post #519
beached_whale wrote: post #517

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would hope that it would not be removed if there is a performance difference. Not all systems are multi user, thinking stuff like includeos or systems that can control their interaction such that the risk in very minimal and not worth the cost.

If it were removed, the new processors would simply be worth less than the ones that immediately preceded them. The systems you're thinking about would then cost less. What's the problem? The problem, of course, is that vendors couldn't pretend to sell systems that are worth the prices they would have quoted before all of this awfulness was exposed. That would be a problem for the vendors only. The rest of us would b…

But that penalizes the single process systems, they exist. One already pays a cost of overhead for multiprocess/multiuser systems and this is part of it. Pay for what you use. But have sane defaults(protect the common case).

Then again, I cannot see this costing much in future chips.

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

#553

Post by fermienrico »

xroche wrote: post #491
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 Sometimes this is actually necessary to get heard, and have the issue taken seriously. It helps providing the feedback that something REALLY wrong just happened and needs to be addressed immediately. Imagine a sergeant talking to a trainee. What's the most efficient ? - "Dear soldier, I think the way you handle your weapon is going to get you kille…

Of all replies defending Linus I've read, this one hits home run.

Linus himself admits[1] that his outrageous insults are sort of "jokey" and a hyperbole. That's the surface. The underlying tone is to get attention without getting drowned by political correctness.

[1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZ017D_JOPY

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

#554

Post by up2isomorphism »

I am astonished by how many people here are complaining Linus being impolite while all what he is doing is to ensure we get a proper fix, not some garbage pushed by some large corporations.

Garbage sometimes comes with a nice package, and mostly so nowadays.

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

#555

Post by quotheth »

amazingman wrote: post #546
p0rkbelly wrote: post #542

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not just Google. This is standard in any major tech company. His behavior and abhorrent and there is no excuse. Tech should embrace mentoring, learning, constructive criticism, and learning from failures. Yes, this is hopefully a once in a lifetime situation -- but our values need to transcend that. This is not the first time that Linus has swept decency under the carpet. Linus would be such an HR issue at most compa…

I think the context in which Linus exists professionally is perennially misunderstood. IMO he basically has to be this way, or else the kernel would have been effectively stolen by [insert powerful tech company] at various crucial moments throughout its history. I see his particular position in technology as being truly unique, and that it essentially just requires somewhat exaggerated rhetoric and even superficially…

Can you show me an example where a leader of an OSS project had reasonable discussions with other developers (read: n steps below calling them morons who write garbage code), and as a result their project was "stolen" by a powerful tech company?

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

#557

Post by hailk »

cromwellian wrote: post #516

A lot of people trying to defend being a jerk as necessary in these circumstances. I think Google culture proves the opposite: Googley code and peer reviews, blameless postmortems, and a host of other mechanisms that de-escalate and de-personalize things. The Meltdown work at Google probably didn't begin with a rant about morons. It's possible to construct a culture where people can air grievances and criticize other…

This.

For me, one of the more difficult type of engineers to work with aren't people low in tech skills or other traditional lacking, but engineers who can't deal with failings generated by other people, in a rational and civilised manner.



Anyone building anything of modicum importance is going to fail. Moreover, failures can be institutional, i.e any process or lack of process, which significantly increases the chances of failure. These have to be dealt with at an institutional level. If the failure is personal, I.e caused by traits specific to the person, can it be resolved by having a better feedback loop. Many reasons to be angry but very few to express it in a confrontational manner. I have many brilliant friends I wouldn’t work with for the above reason.

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

#558

Post by davidkuhta »

davidkuhta wrote: post #345
piyush_soni wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

While I believe your perspective to be reasonable, you do realize that your first sentence undermines your credibility to assert there validity.

For random future internet individuals, i know, i know: *there should be their should be its...

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

#559

Post by wahern »

aidenn0 wrote: post #65
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…

Meltdown is almost trivial to take advantage of, as these things go, and it was discovered independently by more than one researcher. That makes it somewhat more likely to have been exploited by a government level attacker. However, just being able to read all of kernelspace is more of a force-multiplier than being useful on its own. You still need to get your code executing in user-space to do anything, ant it's val…

Meltdown also effects hypervisors. The public cloud + patience means you can run your code alongside everybody else's code.

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

#560

Post by amazingman »

quotheth wrote: post #555
amazingman wrote: post #546

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the context in which Linus exists professionally is perennially misunderstood. IMO he basically has to be this way, or else the kernel would have been effectively stolen by [insert powerful tech company] at various crucial moments throughout its history. I see his particular position in technology as being truly unique, and that it essentially just requires somewhat exaggerated rhetoric and even superficially…

Can you show me an example where a leader of an OSS project had reasonable discussions with other developers (read: n steps below calling them morons who write garbage code), and as a result their project was "stolen" by a powerful tech company?

Your question is constructed in just such a way as to make your point for you. Hopefully you’ll see that it’s far too specific of a demand as to truly support your position. Would you provide me with a less specifically bounded question that you think still captures your position on this?
Post reply on HN