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Linus Torvalds apologizes for his behavior, takes time off

lore.kernel.org

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Re: Linus Torvalds apologizes for his behavior, takes time off

#31

Post by wyclif »

As someone familiar with LBT's mailing list rhetoric since the early days, I'm guessing a big part of what's happening here is that LBT hasn't changed the way he communicates but the rest of the world has moved on. And let's face it, the engineering and programming world has gotten a lot more politically correct—I think the main factor driving this is the increasing presence of women in technology.

What I mean is that it's getting less and less acceptable in tech to make excuses for abusing people either verbally or in writing. Back when engineering was almost totally male-dominated, you were excused for using harsh criticism and vituperation at work. Many people, I think, will be glad that sort of culture is going away.

Re: Linus Torvalds apologizes for his behavior, takes time off

#32

Post by kryptiskt »

Nasrudith wrote: post #16

A slowgoing development for him, still I sympathize and wish him the best while wondering ironically if personal issues aside what works best. It brings to mind fundamental organizational and management. Is it better to have a "rude" organization? Calling bullshit early and often instead of polite everything is fine stacks of lies since it would be impolite to point out having O(N!) code just can't work for anything…

If someone reviews your code, it will sting when they point out silly mistakes. The insults that the kernel devs fling about just aren't needed to drive home the point.

Re: Linus Torvalds apologizes for his behavior, takes time off

#33

Post by Nasrudith »

Leszek wrote: post #4

Maybe this will finally end the myth that "you can be rude and insulting as long as you're right" that people seem to attribute to Linus's outbursts

Is that really a myth though? Being surly and right can be workable indefinitely. As opposed to success via being polite and flattering while being wrong. Fundamentally they would be a parasite. Not a dichotomous extreme though in that it is better not to be rude unless it is called for. And rudeness can be very called for in response to evil.

Re: Linus Torvalds apologizes for his behavior, takes time off

#34

Post by tomohawk »

Leszek wrote: post #4

Maybe this will finally end the myth that "you can be rude and insulting as long as you're right" that people seem to attribute to Linus's outbursts

I have to wonder if Linux would even be remembered other than as a footnote at this time without his forceful personality being in the mix.

Many things fail when they get pecked to death by ducks. His forceful personality carried the day on many occasions.

Re: Linus Torvalds apologizes for his behavior, takes time off

#35

Post by smt88 »

solarkraft wrote: post #25

> I need to take a break to get help on how to behave differently and fix some issues in my tooling and workflow. I find it interesting that this is happening now instead years/ decades earlier.

I think it's important to react to people's progress with encouragement rather than, "Why didn't you do this sooner?" We all have issues we should've worked on by now and may not ever work on.

This is, of course, separate from holding him accountable for treating others badly. He can and should have consequences when that happens.

Re: Linus Torvalds apologizes for his behavior, takes time off

#37

Post by GW150914 »

wyclif wrote: post #31

As someone familiar with LBT's mailing list rhetoric since the early days, I'm guessing a big part of what's happening here is that LBT hasn't changed the way he communicates but the rest of the world has moved on. And let's face it, the engineering and programming world has gotten a lot more politically correct—I think the main factor driving this is the increasing presence of women in technology. What I mean is tha…

I don’t think it has anything to do with so-called PC or women, it’s just unprofessional behavior and tech has gone from people in a garage to the leaders on the market in that same time. Tech grew up, became a profession, and perforce people involved have had to grow up too. It has literally nothing to do with the usual culture war bullshit that gets paraded around. It’s sort of tragic that some people have so little experience in the real world beyond the tech bubble that they think basic standards of decorum and professionalism are gendered.

Re: Linus Torvalds apologizes for his behavior, takes time off

#38

Post by branchless »

kryptiskt wrote: post #32
Nasrudith wrote: post #16

A slowgoing development for him, still I sympathize and wish him the best while wondering ironically if personal issues aside what works best. It brings to mind fundamental organizational and management. Is it better to have a "rude" organization? Calling bullshit early and often instead of polite everything is fine stacks of lies since it would be impolite to point out having O(N!) code just can't work for anything…

If someone reviews your code, it will sting when they point out silly mistakes. The insults that the kernel devs fling about just aren't needed to drive home the point.

Agreed. What can be worse than having a comment to the effect of "if x is -1, which is feasible, this will cause undefined behaviour resulting in a crash". For most people this stings more than enough.

Re: Linus Torvalds apologizes for his behavior, takes time off

#39

Post by vertline3 »

I got the feeling reading that, that Torvald is burned out and frustrated.

I know as a kid helping father with a project, sometimes he could be a bit frustrated, maybe I wasn't grabbing the correct size tool, or holding the flashlight in the right place. Maybe Linus feels like that?

Re: Linus Torvalds apologizes for his behavior, takes time off

#40

Post by protomikron »

> This is more like the time I got out of kernel development for a while because I needed to write a little tool called "git". I need to take a break to get help on how to behave differently and fix some issues in my tooling and workflow.

Oh nice, so he's going to write another ground-breaking piece of software that will change how we do software. :)

Kidding aside, I think his comment is well-thought and I wish him all the best. Btw. I don't think his (sometimes heavily criticized) way of communication is that bad, it's more a clash of different kinds of culture - he is Finnish and used to a very direct way of communication and confrontation (which can be good and bad). That doesn't excuse some of his (admittedly uncalled for) rants, but I don't think he wants to sound as harsh as he often comes across ...

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