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“I'm basically giving myself a permanent vacation from being BDFL”

mail.python.org

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Re: “I'm basically giving myself a permanent vacation from being BDFL”

#91

Post by ashelmire »

raverbashing wrote: post #66
sjm-lbm wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's PHP and not Python, but every time I read something like this from a major open source figure, I always think of this old PHP mailing list thread: https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=50696

"This is going to cause us MONTHS or fixing code for no real benefit since this behavior change is arbitrary and seemingly, was made for no reason" Yeah, tough. Fix your code That's the attitude some maintainers need in cutting unreasonable requests.

It's hilarious because it's literally a one-liner that Rasmus provided for him.

Re: “I'm basically giving myself a permanent vacation from being BDFL”

#92

Post by _wmd »

VikingCoder wrote: post #83

I've begged GitHub to institute forms of government for repos. For X action to happen, Y percent of the pool of people in the Z list need to approve it. Membership of the Z list is granted when W percent of the T pool approve it. Modifying the rules of government of this repo can only happen when L percent of the R pool approve it. And on and on... I could imagine a city or state government actually having its laws e…

Technology cannot solve social problems

Re: “I'm basically giving myself a permanent vacation from being BDFL”

#93

Post by sametmax »

It's going to be very interesting to see if things like:

- pattern matching

- inline exception catching

- path inclusion in the built in

- more functional tooling

- lazy keywors

That were BDFL-blocked, will go back to be debated in the mailing list in the next months.

And if yes, will the community stands by its root or create a new era ?

The consequences of which we will only really see in 10 years.

Guido as done an incredible job at being the boogie man, keeping the language simple and readable. It's a hard job.

Can we pull it off ?

Re: “I'm basically giving myself a permanent vacation from being BDFL”

#94

Post by Waterluvian »

jcelerier wrote: post #67
Waterluvian wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that having strong opinions on how others should be developing software is how communities become toxic like this. "Shooting yourself in the foot is your fault for not using a linter that detects accidental misuse of assignment!"

> I think that having strong opinions on how others should be developing software is how communities become toxic like this. Depends on what you think the answer to "is programming an art or a science" is. People who build bridges are absolutely subject to "strong opinions" on how to build bridges. I am of the opinion that shipping software to others when under a contract without using all the facilities available to…

You're right. There are times where being right is absolutely imperative.

Maybe it's a know it when you see it kind of thing. When the debate isn't killing people, it's potentially inconvenient extra coding by a developer, and to appreciate the immense social cost those debates can have.

Re: “I'm basically giving myself a permanent vacation from being BDFL”

#95

Post by crdoconnor »

staticassertion wrote: post #45
symmitchry wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a little confused though, by his feelings here. Why did he feel the need to "fight so hard for a PEP" if it was so controversial, and everyone was outraged? I do understand people's points about "the age of outrage" and "internet 2018" but still: the PEP wasn't generally accepted as being a fantastic improvement, so why did he feel the need to fight so hard for it?

Every feature ends up being controversial. Every discussion ends up devolving, somewhere, with some group, into bikeshedding. Ultimately, it's up to certain stakeholders to hear arguments and make calls.

There are always haters but I don't remember any previous PEP being quite as unpopular as this one.

Re: “I'm basically giving myself a permanent vacation from being BDFL”

#97

Post by sametmax »

adamnemecek wrote: post #31

Even though I write python only if it’s going to be like 200 loc tops, it’s insane how gracefully the language has aged. It came out in 91, thus predating for example Java. Fun fact, I believe the very first google scraper was written in it. At the same time I can’t wait for the next language to replace it.

People often don't realize this. We hear a lot that python is moving too fast or too slow. To say that disregard the delicate balance the language had to dance on for 20 years. It's crazy.

Re: “I'm basically giving myself a permanent vacation from being BDFL”

#98

Post by bch »

21 wrote: post #81
sametmax wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the very point of a bdfl : it assumes he knows better than others. Debating is for insight and cortesy, not mandatory.

But the B is for Benevolent. When a huge part of the community is against, does that B still stands?

He gave them a fantastic language for free and shepherded it for years - how much more benevolent does he need to be?

Re: “I'm basically giving myself a permanent vacation from being BDFL”

#99

Post by steveklabnik »

cbhl wrote: post #78
coldtea wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Python 3 breakage and async turned out to be prescient, fantastic decisions. Async maybe. Python 3 breakage? Did you forgot the /s tag?

I think there are people on both sides of this fence. Google is still largely Python 2, but my impression is that Facebook actually managed to make the transition to Python 3 after putting in the right presubmit checks.

For the discussion about Facebook, see here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17417201

It seems Python 3 is now dominant but not total, according to TFA.

Re: “I'm basically giving myself a permanent vacation from being BDFL”

#100

Post by icebraining »

21 wrote: post #81
sametmax wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the very point of a bdfl : it assumes he knows better than others. Debating is for insight and cortesy, not mandatory.

But the B is for Benevolent. When a huge part of the community is against, does that B still stands?

If both kids want to eat candy as dinner, is the father blocking that not benevolent because he's outnumbered?
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