On Fri, 2008-03-28 at 16:50 -0700, Brandon Davidson wrote:
> William L. Maltby wrote:
> >>><snip>
> >
> > And a good part of that is contributing ideas, pointers, support to
> > others, etc. IMO. Not everyone has time or inclination to contribute in
> > ways that the project might like.
> >
> > And that fits within the spirit of open source, no?
>
> I hate to get involved in this discussion, but it seems to me that the
> last thing that any of the core developers need at this point is more
> people coming in and heaping work on their plate. There are barely
> enough hours in the day for them to accomplish their existing tasks.
Well, not to disagree too strongly, but ...
It is from the success and vitality of the project that encourages folks
to have a positive feeling that requests for additional features may be
well received.
I feel that most folks know the project crew is fully loaded and most
would be/are willing to help as they can. If they can't or, for whatever
personal reason, don't choose to help do the work, does that mean that
they should not request, suggest or participate in discussions?
I think not. The project folks know that not everyone will be
able/willing to help in any way but they still cheerfully (usually)
undertake the effort and do their best.
This is one of the things that make the project successful and will, in
the long run, recruit more folks to help.
As to "heaping work on their plate", their is more than one alternative.
The obvious one - folks contributing more - and a less obvious one. That
is their is so little interest that no one requests anything, no one
helps out, the project ends up bing guided only by only its internal
view of what should be happening, etc.
No one "heaps work on their plate". *They* heap work on their plate in
accordance with their appetite. As we are grateful for their efforts on
our behalf, I believe that they are grateful for the satisfaction they
get from having a large "smorgasbord" from which to fill their plates.
I'm not implying that a "pure user's" contribution is of the same scale
as theirs. But it is a symbiotic relationship, if you will.
As a former long-time designer, developer, implementer, ... I believe
that the team is basically motivated by things similar to what I see/saw
in myself. I could be wrong. As my personal situation changes to permit
it, I plan to try and contribute somewhere down the road. It will likely
be quite minor, as to tangible items, but I will get some satisfaction
from it and I will hope the community receives benefit from it.
>
> If you have something new you'd like to see done, that's great. It's
> always nice to know what's wanted, and how it might be accomplished...
> but unless you're ready to take it on yourself, chances are low that
> someone else on this mailing list is going to pick it up and run with it
> for you.
I'm pretty sure that the long-time subscribers are aware of that. OTOH,
with this project, because of the attitudes and efforts of the crew,
ISTM that likelihood of a request being acted upon is higher than on
some others that I used to follow.
So I disagree - I think chances are *relatively* *high*, if it is a
request that seems to have overall application and meets other criteria
that the project may have.
> About the only thing you *can* expect is Karanbir (or someone
> else) giving you a polite suggestion that you follow it up yourself, and
^^^^^^
I hope no one reads this wrong. "Polite" is relative. There have been
times that various crew members fail *my* definition of this and my
tolerance is probably wider than most (self assessment, may be totally
wrong). When folks are pressed (for time, resources or stressed about
something) they may fail to take the time to add words or phrases that
"soften" the tenor of their reply. Then it may sound undeservedly harsh,
argumentative, aggressive or <pick your own PC descriptor here>.
Adding the inability of electronic communications to easily project your
facial expressions, tone of voice, ... only exacerbates the potential
for an adverse reaction to occur. Add in the *perception* and
personality of the recipients (thin-skinned, thick-skinned, a southern
U.S. genteel upbringing, ...) and the potential climbs even more.
As to Karanbir's response to the poster, it could have been a little
less terse. I could fully understand the OP's response. For the OP's
part, he could have been a little more cognizant of some of the things I
mention above.
I've only seen one CentOS member that I believe engages in habitual
"rudeness" (a subjective assessment - no discussion needed). I've never
felt the need to call him on it, for various reasons related to things I
discuss above.
> come back when you have some work to show.
See above. "The law of unintended consequences" may apply. If there are
no "pure users", what is the value of the effort? From *my* background,
the answer is zero.
That does not mean that help should not be requested. Obviously it
should.
Per Forrest Gump: "That's all I have to say about that". :-)
>
> -Brandon
> <snip sig stuff>
MHO
--
Bill