Shit. An ESR ego dump. Head for the shelters.
Curse Of The Gifted (2000)
21–30 of 371 posts
Re: Curse Of The Gifted (2000)
#22Nothing's quite as destructive as being told over and over that you're a natural at something so it'll be easy for you. It's a shame that well-meaning parents and mentors will sometimes undermine someone's potential by discouraging them from learning necessary skills.
Re: Curse Of The Gifted (2000)
#23I'm not gifted, I'm actually pretty dumb. Can anyone help a stupid normal person relate to this article?
Re: Curse Of The Gifted (2000)
#24It's weird to see Linus on the other side of being disciplined, and a pretty stark contrast to his own slightly more abrasive style.
For example: https://lkml.org/lkml/2012/12/23/75
Re: Curse Of The Gifted (2000)
#25Warning to the unexpecting, this was written by Eric S. Raymond.
I would also like to point out the one of the most clear written libraries is that GPS library that is authored by ESR...
Re: Curse Of The Gifted (2000)
#26So true.
The benefit of recognizing this isn't just avoiding that crunch at the limits of your talents - it's learning to the use the tools, processes and people which will allow your talents to flow most efficiently every day.
The classic example of this for me has been engineers who resist documentation, project management and delegation as if each is wasting away their valuable productive time when it's exactly the opposite.
Re: Curse Of The Gifted (2000)
#27Anyone explain what "splitting a driver" in kernel parlance and code sharing is? Modularization is just breaking large pieces of the program up into small pieces right? Is code sharing just the same thing or are they talking about something different?
Re: Curse Of The Gifted (2000)
#28This is so inadvertently affectionate. It's like a grandparent trying to calm down their overconfident, arrogant child. So eloquent. As a side note, I can't even imagine how Torvalds worked with others without source control. That sounds like absolute hell.
except for the part where he mentions that they all gossip behind Linus' back.
Re: Curse Of The Gifted (2000)
#29I wish I saw the response.
That said, the "curse of the gifted" manifests itself in a lot of ways. One problem is also that "less gifted" see the "gifted" and say, "If they don't have to be disciplined, why do I?"
Re: Curse Of The Gifted (2000)
#30(2000) Not that it isn't relevant, but it is 14 years old and the title should probably reflect that.
yeah seriously this might have been the suggestion that led to bitkeeper that led to git. Which Linus invented and coded up essentially to solve some of the problems brought up here Which (git) today arguably has done more for programming groups than all the new languages and frameworks of the past fourteen years combined. So, it is interesting. But mostly interesting because of how massive Git spawned from it.
s/bitbucket/bitkeeper