A Generation Lost in the Bazaar - Poul-Henning Kamp article

[Giles Orr]

On 21 August 2012 11:38, Andrej Marjan <andrej-igvx78u1SeH3fQ9qLvQP4Q at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> https://lwn.net/Articles/512422/On Tue, Aug 21, 2012 at 10:33 AM, Jamon
> Camisso <jamon.camisso-H217xnMUJC0sA/PxXw9srA at public.gmane.org> wrote:
>>
>> I have tremendous respect and admiration for Poul-Henning Kamp, and his
>> most recent article in the ACM queue has only bolstered it.
>>
>> He discusses some of the failings of the Bazaar software development
>> model championed by the likes of Eric Raymond. Given his background and
>> his lifelong involvement with free software like FreeBSD and Varnish, I
>> think much of what he has to say rings true.
>>
>> For example, he shows an autoconf macro and then explains: "That is the
>> sorry reality of the bazaar Raymond praised in his book: a pile of old
>> festering hacks, endlessly copied and pasted by a clueless generation of
>> IT "professionals" who wouldn't recognize sound IT architecture if you
>> hit them over the head with it."
>>
>> http://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=2349257
>>
>> Worth a read.
>>
>> Jamon
>
>
> Commentary (including criticisms and rebuttals) on LWN is also worth a read:
> https://lwn.net/Articles/512422/

I'm inclined to agree with the first line of that page: "Here's a
troll of sorts by Poul-Henning Kamp ..."  His opening paragraphs
essentially say "99% of the people in IT are a bunch of morons."  I'm
not saying he's necessarily wrong in all his points, but when he
started off by insulting the majority of his readership, I gave up
reading.

He seemed to be asserting that if you can't do portability you're
incompetent.  Portability is good, but a person isn't necessarily a
bad programmer just because they've worked in one environment for
their entire career.  Whether or not non-portable programs written for
one platform should be shared, and the problems that follow if they
are - that's another question.  I realize he's trying to address that
question, but the way he's doing it isn't going to win friends.

-- 
Giles
http://www.gilesorr.com/
gilesorr-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org
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