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Leaving Mozilla

robert.ocallahan.org

31–40 of 116 posts

Re: Leaving Mozilla

#31

"Christian" ... Since when has it become fashionable to define oneself by religion? I mean especially in professional circles like software development. I don't expect to see "Jew" or "Moozlim" (sic) or "Amoral Atheist" used to define people. Lots of respect for his work but I it does turn me off because of what it might imply As far as personal biases.

I always found it odd, especially because he lives in NZ which is a very secular country. For instance no serious politicians will ever admit to their religiosity or lack thereof. Therefore it's a very unfashionable thing to announce in the context of where he lives.

Although an Atheist I kind of have to admire the fact that he believes so much as to put it out there and have it define him, especially when it is so unfashionable here.

I also find it interesting when clearly rational and intelligent people have faith. It's kind of something that you would expect from people who lack in education, as it is a crutch. But I guess that's why it's called faith, it defies logic at least by my way of thinking.

Not meaning to offend anyone with the above, so sorry if I did.

Re: Leaving Mozilla

#33
post #8

From reddit to answer the question some might pose ("who?"): > One of Mozilla's most senior engineers who has worked on Mozilla projects as a contributor and employee for well over a decade particularly working in the graphics code and helping make native audio and video in the browser a reality. http://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/48ix55/robert_ocall...

Great! Now how about the next question:

"Why?"

I suppose it's nice to know that he is a big deal but as someone who doesn't follow mozilla religiously a little more background is always appreciated.

Re: Leaving Mozilla

#34
post #4

I've never heard about rr http://rr-project.org/ ), his tool to record program execution and debug it afterwards. The alleged 1.2x slowdown in execution is negligible. The ability to reverse in time is almost a nirvana. I'm sad I didn't have it when I used to program C++. Hope he succeeds in his new endeavor. We'd all win big. Does anyone knows of similar tools for Python and in-browser Javascript?

For Python my coworker (and friend) Tom has a great project called timetravelpdb: http://everythingsysadmin.com/2014/04/time-travel-pdb.html explains a bit on it, the repo is https://github.com/TomOnTime/timetravelpdb

Basically it's an extension of pdb that allows you to jump back and forth in time.

Re: Leaving Mozilla

#35
post #8

From reddit to answer the question some might pose ("who?"): > One of Mozilla's most senior engineers who has worked on Mozilla projects as a contributor and employee for well over a decade particularly working in the graphics code and helping make native audio and video in the browser a reality. http://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/48ix55/robert_ocall...

Great! Now how about the next question: "Why?" I suppose it's nice to know that he is a big deal but as someone who doesn't follow mozilla religiously a little more background is always appreciated.

Why is he leaving? That's covered in the OP: he wants to devote his full-time attention to working on rr, a reversible debugger for native code that imposes impressively low overhead, and possibly spin it into a startup.

Re: Leaving Mozilla

#36
post #21

"Christian" ... Since when has it become fashionable to define oneself by religion? I mean especially in professional circles like software development. I don't expect to see "Jew" or "Moozlim" (sic) or "Amoral Atheist" used to define people. Lots of respect for his work but I it does turn me off because of what it might imply As far as personal biases.

Christians of all denominations actively proselytise - it's a core part of being a Christian, spreading the 'good news'. This distinguishes the Christian ethos from most other mainstream religions which have a weak or non-existent missionary instinct. So no, it's not unusual at all for a Christian to highlight the fact. From the point of view of a Christian in an increasingly secular world it probably feels more nece…

To be clear, only some strains of Christianity are active proselytizing. There are strains that do none at all.

Re: Leaving Mozilla

#37

"Christian" ... Since when has it become fashionable to define oneself by religion? I mean especially in professional circles like software development. I don't expect to see "Jew" or "Moozlim" (sic) or "Amoral Atheist" used to define people. Lots of respect for his work but I it does turn me off because of what it might imply As far as personal biases.

Is it different from calling oneself an abstract impressionist? Or a functional programmer? Christian teachings can absolutely be applied in software. I mean, look no further than the Temple operating system. Christianity is not a "skin" on that project, it's intrinsic to its design.

>I mean, look no further than the Temple operating system.

Ughh. One would hope you would pick a better example than workings of a confirmed schizophrenic with an anger management issue who "talks to God".

If I were to pick an example it would be something like Larry Wall's Perl treatises.

Re: Leaving Mozilla

#38

"Christian" ... Since when has it become fashionable to define oneself by religion? I mean especially in professional circles like software development. I don't expect to see "Jew" or "Moozlim" (sic) or "Amoral Atheist" used to define people. Lots of respect for his work but I it does turn me off because of what it might imply As far as personal biases.

I always found it odd, especially because he lives in NZ which is a very secular country. For instance no serious politicians will ever admit to their religiosity or lack thereof. Therefore it's a very unfashionable thing to announce in the context of where he lives. Although an Atheist I kind of have to admire the fact that he believes so much as to put it out there and have it define him, especially when it is so u…

I'm not entirely sure what you think isn't offensive about your comment.

1. You are responding to the comment "Since when has it become fashionable to define oneself by religion?" (aside: the answer is since forever) in the affirmative

2. You find it "interesting" that "clearly rational and intelligent people have faith", by which you say that most people who have faith (and by association, Christians) are irrational and stupid.

3. You say that you believe that you expect those who have faith must be seriously uneducated.

4. You say that people who have faith use it as a crutch.

Hope this helps.

Re: Leaving Mozilla

#39
post #27

"Christian" ... Since when has it become fashionable to define oneself by religion? I mean especially in professional circles like software development. I don't expect to see "Jew" or "Moozlim" (sic) or "Amoral Atheist" used to define people. Lots of respect for his work but I it does turn me off because of what it might imply As far as personal biases.

Then you see it's Hillsong, and it all begins to make sense. If you don't know what Hillsong is... well.. Wikipedia. :)

[deleted]

Re: Leaving Mozilla

#40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always found it odd, especially because he lives in NZ which is a very secular country. For instance no serious politicians will ever admit to their religiosity or lack thereof. Therefore it's a very unfashionable thing to announce in the context of where he lives. Although an Atheist I kind of have to admire the fact that he believes so much as to put it out there and have it define him, especially when it is so u…

I'm not entirely sure what you think isn't offensive about your comment. 1. You are responding to the comment "Since when has it become fashionable to define oneself by religion?" (aside: the answer is since forever) in the affirmative 2. You find it "interesting" that "clearly rational and intelligent people have faith", by which you say that most people who have faith (and by association, Christians) are irrational…

Thanks. I forget how seriously people take religion (despite all the evidence out there).

I just wanted to share my observations but not push an agenda. Obviously topics are sensitive which makes rational discussions impossible.

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