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

Linus Torvalds won't do github pull requests

github.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 288 posts

Re: Linus Torvalds won't do github pull requests

#171

Post by philwelch »

freeman478 wrote: post #48
why-el wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It always puzzled me why his commits (and in fact standard commits) ought to start with a verb that is not in its past form. When I started using git four months ago (such a newbie), I would write something like "Fixed this" instead of "Fix this". Anybody with more insights on this? I am just curious.

In my opinion its because your commit log should read like a novel and not like a history book. It's also simpler and promotes less convoluted phrasing.

I haven't read many novels lately, but I always thought they were written in past tense.

Re: Linus Torvalds won't do github pull requests

#172

Post by bitops »

dblock wrote: post #160
trotsky wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's always been like that. Really that was the status quo in open source 10-15+ years ago. People were abrasive, efficiency oriented and most of the communities didn't have very many soft edges. Just off the top of my head I'm thinking of Theo de Raadt, Miguel de Icaza, Richard Stallman - hell if you were a nice guy you didn't make it on usenet back then. In the last 5 or 10 years there has been a strong shift towar…

Well said. Matz is a perfect example of what Linus is not and can never be.

It's not highlighted very much anymore, but the philosophy of the Ruby community used to be: Matz is nice so we are too.

Re: Linus Torvalds won't do github pull requests

#173

Post by methodin »

The one thing I'll have to give credit to Linus for is that even if people continue to post absurd comments after his original lengthy counterpoint, he will delve into a more polite rhetoric and continue to explain his point, over and over. It's quite the opposite, in fact, of many people who write online where typically the end result is simply escalation or continued fervor.

Re: Linus Torvalds won't do github pull requests

#174

Post by mikeash »

Zikes wrote: post #64
alain94040 wrote: post #44

It's 2012 and we're still arguing about line breaks and 80-character lines?

I think 80-character lines are less an issue of the availability of horizontal screen space and more about readability. Much the same way proper sentence and paragraph spacing and structure lend to the readability of long articles or other blocks of text, a properly short line length can lend to the readability of commit logs.

Sure, but computers are much better at word wrapping than I am, so shouldn't they be the ones handling that?

Re: Linus Torvalds won't do github pull requests

#176

Post by spin »

marcamillion wrote: post #97
Karunamon wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linus is kind of infamous for his rants and have been for years (especially on the mailing lists.. I've seen him tear into people for willful ignorance on the kernel dev lists more than once). I've never really seen them as cranky because they're spot on. Cranky old men usually don't have anything other than opinion behind their rantings.. Linus can at least defend his position. Given his contributions to the world o…

Well...this debate always seems to come down to...do we let geniuses just do whatever the hell they want. The answer is...I am not sure. Either way, there are many decisions that people make that comes down to style preference and sure the 'purists' might think it is a watering down of programming....but it makes it more appealing to new developers. I can see Torvalds ranting on Ruby as not a 'real' language....I don…

> do we let geniuses just do whatever the hell they want.

I have to say, I am both bemused and slightly offended by your comment. Are you suggesting that famous people don't have a right to Free Speech?

> The answer is...I am not sure.

Well, I'm glad you've taken it upon yourself make this important decision for them.

Re: Linus Torvalds won't do github pull requests

#177

Post by scythe »

yonester wrote: post #78
marcamillion wrote: post #68

I don't mean to be overly critical, but is it just me or are the 'godfathers' of computer science starting to sound like cranky old men? I mean....ok....this pull request being inferior to the way HE (the creator of Git) imagined it (or implemented it) is a bit petty imho. What's with the complaining? I am sure this is not the first time I have heard him complaining about something on Github or some other 'new techno…

I totally agree. The past few links on HN to comments by Tovald have been full of inflammatory, juvenile language. I'm sure the guy is intelligent and certainly deserves a place in CS hall-of-fame, but I think the way he carries himself in these forums has tarnished his reputation.

Selection bias!

Re: Linus Torvalds won't do github pull requests

#178

Post by generalk »

stcredzero wrote: post #95
gchpaco wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think of the change set as the subject, so the question is 'what does this do?' and the answer is 'fix X' then it makes more sense. Past tense suggests you might be thinking of it as a journal or something that you're not supposed to do with git due to rebase etc.; each commit ought to stand on its own. That said I don't think this is significant enough to add up to a compelling reason either way.

so the question is 'what does this do?' and the answer is 'fix X' then it makes more sense. Better to say "fixes" then, so it's distinguishable from the use in a phrase as an imperative. "We need to fix this."

I've always found it useful to start writing my commit messages as if they begain with "When applied, this commit will..." ex: "Resolve #459." "Fix the PDF rendering issue on older clients." "Revert commit 1234567."

Re: Linus Torvalds won't do github pull requests

#179

Post by tzs »

marcamillion wrote: post #68

I don't mean to be overly critical, but is it just me or are the 'godfathers' of computer science starting to sound like cranky old men? I mean....ok....this pull request being inferior to the way HE (the creator of Git) imagined it (or implemented it) is a bit petty imho. What's with the complaining? I am sure this is not the first time I have heard him complaining about something on Github or some other 'new techno…

I think you misunderstood what Linus is complaining about. He's not saying that everyone should format pull requests to his liking. He is saying that pull requests for things going into the kernel have to follow the formatting rules that project uses.

This is not a cranky old man thing. This is a basic multiprogrammer project collaboration courtesy thing, similar to the reason that, say, if a project uses camel case variable names and one statement per line, you shouldn't submit code using foo_bar naming and putting as many statements as you can on a line.

Post reply on HN