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Linus Torvalds on aliasing

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Re: Linus Torvalds on aliasing

#221

Post by bjconlan »

rdsubhas wrote: post #171
ralfn wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When it comes to being oversensitive needy little things there is no true Scottsman. As a northern European I find it not only comfortable that Linus runs Linux, but I would be less comfortable if it was another American smile in face pretend to be your friend but be shady as fuck attitude that you guys seem to confuse for 'professionalism'. So let's chalk this to cultural differences. We wouldn't hire someone like y…

While Linus may be right, why is it that we always find only "Linus ranting out against people" threads that trend? In a positive way, why don't we have "Linus gets ranted against" posts? Is it because Linus is always right? Or is it because nobody speaks up against Linus? Or is it because Linus isn't actively coding much since git days? Or is it just because it happens but doesn't get as much visibility? I'm just as…

This is a very good question. I wonder if we're just rubbernecking the train wreck that is Linus' management style. All his responses come from A "care personally" perspective but I'm still not sure if this is what you would call "radical candor". Either way stay tuned. I really hope we don't loose Linus to burnout on things like this but some days I wish he was more tactful with his responses (particularly to people that look to be trying to "fix" a problem which is seemingly inline with standards even if said person doesn't realise the real world implications)

Re: Linus Torvalds on aliasing

#222

Post by angry_octet »

alexkrycek wrote: post #196
AsyncAwait wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not aimed at you specifically, but I find this decorum policing off punting. Like the U.S. military may be able to control what they say, but some of the things it has actually done are less than nice. I don't care that Linus swears, he hasn't invaded anyone or harmed anyone as far as I know. I don't care that Trump swears, I care about the stupid stuff he actually does . Linus may swear, but he also protects…

I didn't bring the military up to say that it's an authority on proper conduct. Rather, I'm saying that EVEN in the military, with some of the most insensitive people around, swearing indicates lack of self-control and situational awareness.

You haven't spent much time with the military have you? Swearing is a delicate and beautiful art form, more expressive and nuanced that the dry words of HN.

Re: Linus Torvalds on aliasing

#223

Post by [deleted] »

boomlinde wrote: post #215
minipci1321 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> is perfectly kosher Aren't exact-bitwidth integer types optional even with C99 (let alone preceding versions of standard)?

They are optional, but only in the sense that if you can't exactly represent e.g. uint64_t, there can't be a uint64_t type. So the example above is kosher in the sense that it's standards compliant, even if it isn't perfectly portable (for reasons unrelated to memset type punning; that you're using uint64_t in the first place). If an implementation can't represent uint64_t exactly, it can still have a uint_least64_t…

[deleted]

Re: Linus Torvalds on aliasing

#224

Post by minipci1321 »

boomlinde wrote: post #215
minipci1321 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> is perfectly kosher Aren't exact-bitwidth integer types optional even with C99 (let alone preceding versions of standard)?

They are optional, but only in the sense that if you can't exactly represent e.g. uint64_t, there can't be a uint64_t type. So the example above is kosher in the sense that it's standards compliant, even if it isn't perfectly portable (for reasons unrelated to memset type punning; that you're using uint64_t in the first place). If an implementation can't represent uint64_t exactly, it can still have a uint_least64_t…

I certainly agree with what you said as you said it. However, as usual, it is the implementation that kills it.

a) I believe sizeof (double) * 8 == 64 is not enforced by the standard either. One could argue that it is hard to find anything else these days, but (for a contrived example) I believe nothing prevents you from making your own port of GCC for some purpose, and make 'double' be 'float'. (From my memories, it is even far enough from rocket science.)

b) It already happened to me personally, to work with code where people have implemented their own uintXX types (because of the lack of the standard ones), and then over time these became narrower/vider.

So if we would like to have it portable, I think, nothing beats:

union { double d; char cc [sizeof (double)]; };

and there we are, back to what is in the standard.

Re: Linus Torvalds on aliasing

#225

Post by pjmlp »

broodbucket wrote: post #100
pjmlp wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not unfair, because the majority of "developers contributing to it" are on those company payrolls, 8h a day during a full week. It would be just another BSD or Minix if it would be only university students and weekend coders working on it, and we would all keep using Solaris, Aix, HP-UX, Tru64, Ultrix.... As for security issues, it helps that Linus is against disclosing security bugs as such.

> It is not unfair, because the majority of "developers contributing to it" are on those company payrolls, 8h a day during a full week. This is overwhelmingly true now, but it wasn't always.

Which is the reason why Linux moved beyond yet another UNIX clone hobby project.

I still remember how it was when I was getting distributions via Walnut Creek CDROMs.

As per Wikipedia, IBM, Compaq and Oracle started contributing in some form around 1998.

I guess we could look at commits history to see when IBM and friends actually started to provide features.

Re: Linus Torvalds on aliasing

#226

Post by mosselman »

ralfn wrote: post #180
mosselman wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What nonsense. I am Dutch and live in the Netherlands, we are very direct and take little to no heed to hierarchy. I never said that Linus should be fake friendly. I am saying that swearing does damage to moral and the power of his arguments. Also, Steve Jobs was a notorious asshole and he is revered in the US despite this. There are countless other examples of CEOs and managers who are more than unfriendly in the US…

Swearing doesn't damage morale. Many soccer coaches and inspiring pep talks contain swear words. It's a style figure. Tact can be very usefull in small teams where trust and coordination is important. For large projects, with thousands of stake holders the bar to participate in a conversation should be high. As we both say in Holland: we are not made of sugar. But go read Linus rant now and ask yourself: would this r…

I didn't say people can't confront each other or even swear at each other. My point is that Linus is swearing at someone who made a contribution to a project. What sense is there in saying the following to people other than signifying that you don't respect them:

"...when you are a f*cking moron" "Andy, what is the background for trying to push this idiocy?"

Note that I only called the other swearing in his text childish and not damaging to morale. Also note that in verbal discussions I wouldn't myself shy away from swearing or graphic metaphors. I just think that when replying to pull-requests there should be some emotional self-control... something which children have less of.

> Something with the pot and the kettle.

As I said, confronting people isn't on some list of don'ts that I keep and replying to comments filled with false assumptions and accusations is not the same as replying to a pull-request.

>would this really classify as an inappropriate rant in Holland?

If I were to call my colleagues fucking morons and call their contributions idiocies I would probably at least receive some negative feedback from my boss. So yes. I find it hard to believe that calling people 'fucking morons' is an accepted practice at your job.

> And our directness is often referred to as rude. It would look better on you to not blindly follow in that judgement when it concerns others.

But blindly following some judgement of Americans being two-faced liars does look good on you? Something with pots and kettles?

Re: Linus Torvalds on aliasing

#227

Post by trumped »

mosselman wrote: post #119

I would go out of my way to avoid people who communicate like this with me. People put time and energy in making software better, at least in their own eyes, for others and then they get textually abused like this by someone who has his fame to protect himself with. He also does no service to his own arguments by peppering them with childish swearing because things like "So standards are not some kind of holy book th…

Linus T. would probably be shadow banned if he commented here under a pseudonym... HN's moderation is a little extreme.

Re: Linus Torvalds on aliasing

#228

Post by richmarr »

zwischenzug wrote: post #209
richmarr wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Torvalds is trying to engender a culture by being the only one swearing then I'd be very curious where he learned that technique and how he was measuring its success over the many years he's exhibited that behaviour. Occam's Razor suggests that the more likely cause is that he's just an angry man who can't (or doesn't want to) moderate his behaviour. I don't want to assume too much about your wife's job or persona…

I was explicitly not talking about the therapy, but the management of the therapy. That's a key distinction here.

In what way? Sorry, not sure what point you're making here.

Re: Linus Torvalds on aliasing

#229

Post by nikofeyn »

jpttsn wrote: post #82
nikofeyn wrote: post #64

i really wish a person many software engineers idolize or at least obviously respect and pay attention to, myself being excluded from these camps, didn’t communicate like a child. it’s an embarrassment for the field.

Children communicate like that?

yes.

Re: Linus Torvalds on aliasing

#230

Post by richmarr »

zwischenzug wrote: post #207
richmarr wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Torvalds is trying to engender a culture by being the only one swearing then I'd be very curious where he learned that technique and how he was measuring its success over the many years he's exhibited that behaviour. Occam's Razor suggests that the more likely cause is that he's just an angry man who can't (or doesn't want to) moderate his behaviour. I don't want to assume too much about your wife's job or persona…

Can the maintenance of the Linux kernel be considered a success?

Your implication, that this aspect of Torvalds' interpersonal style is vindicated by Linux' success, is a classic Halo effect. Post hoc ergo propter hoc.
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