Distrowatch: "Gentoo in crisis"

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playfool · Post by **playfool** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 1:39 pm

While I greatly enjoyed playing and learning daily creating Love-sources I'm entirely sorry I ever was talked into releasing it upon the world - I've seen nothing by pain, insults and personal attack for it, even years after I stopped working on the project, older and wiser not because of the treatment and guidance of others but in spite of it. I think that kind of behaviour is common in Gentoo, it's often extremely elitist in terms of picking on people who honestly are trying to tinker their way to knowledge, instead of pointing out flaws or politely requesting certain actions like "please don't do so and so" a large number of developers and users alike whip out the guns from the word go.

I have grown to consider my years a Gentoo user wasted and some of the saddest times in my life simply because the community doesn't work, it hasn't for a long time. The wakeup call came long ago and everyone ignored it, today we just accept that things suck and have comitees to figure out who to blame, who to elect to dispense punishment and we wait to see to leaves in anger, frustration and hurt this week - all so we can grasp onto the misty remains of a community that once was.

We have to realise we are hurting each other, ourselves and ultimately the dream that was Gentoo. Is it any wonder Gentoo went from being the fastest growing distribution with the most energic userbase and the most friendly developers to being the laughing stock of the larger Linux community?

aidanjt · Post by **aidanjt** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 1:44 pm

playfool wrote:While I greatly enjoyed playing and learning daily creating Love-sources I'm entirely sorry I ever was talked into releasing it upon the world - I've seen nothing by pain, insults and personal attack for it, even years after I stopped working on the project, older and wiser not because of the treatment and guidance of others but in spite of it. I think that kind of behaviour is common in Gentoo, it's often extremely elitist in terms of picking on people who honestly are trying to tinker their way to knowledge, instead of pointing out flaws or politely requesting certain actions like "please don't do so and so" a large number of developers and users alike whip out the guns from the word go.

I have grown to consider my years a Gentoo user wasted and some of the saddest times in my life simply because the community doesn't work, it hasn't for a long time. The wakeup call came long ago and everyone ignored it, today we just accept that things suck and have comitees to figure out who to blame, who to elect to dispense punishment and we wait to see to leaves in anger, frustration and hurt this week - all so we can grasp onto the misty remains of a community that once was.

We have to realise we are hurting each other, ourselves and ultimately the dream that was Gentoo. Is it any wonder Gentoo went from being the fastest growing distribution with the most energic userbase and the most friendly developers to being the laughing stock of the larger Linux community?

++

The ostrich approach to devrel clearly isn't working, they should be taking action before devs leaving becomes necessary.

gentoo-dev · Post by **gentoo-dev** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 1:47 pm

AidanJT wrote:
gentoo-dev wrote:
AidanJT wrote: Respect is earned, not demanded.
Respect should be granted, no matter what or whom.
You can't 'grant' respect, you either respect someone or something or you don't. You can't respect someone who constantly trolls, and poisons Gentoo to the core even after he's been kicked out regardless of contributions.

Sorry, I meant respect is neither earned nor demanded but given no matter what. You should respect everyone, no matter who they are or what they say, even when they do not respect yourself. If you can't respect them, the only alternative is to ignore them. This applies especially to trolls.

playfool · Post by **playfool** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 2:01 pm

AidanJT wrote:
playfool wrote:While I greatly enjoyed playing and learning daily creating Love-sources I'm entirely sorry I ever was talked into releasing it upon the world - I've seen nothing by pain, insults and personal attack for it, even years after I stopped working on the project, older and wiser not because of the treatment and guidance of others but in spite of it. I think that kind of behaviour is common in Gentoo, it's often extremely elitist in terms of picking on people who honestly are trying to tinker their way to knowledge, instead of pointing out flaws or politely requesting certain actions like "please don't do so and so" a large number of developers and users alike whip out the guns from the word go.

I have grown to consider my years a Gentoo user wasted and some of the saddest times in my life simply because the community doesn't work, it hasn't for a long time. The wakeup call came long ago and everyone ignored it, today we just accept that things suck and have comitees to figure out who to blame, who to elect to dispense punishment and we wait to see to leaves in anger, frustration and hurt this week - all so we can grasp onto the misty remains of a community that once was.

We have to realise we are hurting each other, ourselves and ultimately the dream that was Gentoo. Is it any wonder Gentoo went from being the fastest growing distribution with the most energic userbase and the most friendly developers to being the laughing stock of the larger Linux community?
++

The ostrich approach to devrel clearly isn't working, they should be taking action before devs leaving becomes necessary.

I hope not, in a world were we can make reasonable augmentation on the evidence we wouldn't need to police our own ranks. Your ability is based on arguing your approach and acknowledging when you are wrong even when it's an idea that is close to your heart that has to die because it has been proven wrong or impractical. The place were we can benefit from someone is in breaking up a stalemate of opinions before it turns into a dick meassuring contest filled with the obligatory personal insults, often that is a sign that we need to do more research, get more facts and examine the presented options in depth for a while.

aidanjt · Post by **aidanjt** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 2:11 pm

I think in a world where we need to police our streets is evidence enough that humans generally are not capable of such a thing, the internet is even worse where opinions are thrown around like 10c candy bags.

jonnevers · Post by **jonnevers** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 2:22 pm

playfool wrote:While I greatly enjoyed playing and learning daily creating Love-sources I'm entirely sorry I ever was talked into releasing it upon the world - I've seen nothing by pain, insults and personal attack for it, even years after I stopped working on the project

then let me be the first to say, love-sources will ALWAYS hold a dear spot in my heart. When I bought that new computer way back when, love-sources was the only kernel that had all the necessary bits for it to all work. I was appreciative then and I am still appreciative now. I've been using custom kernels since then, if for no other reason but that I want to support those people making custom kernel patch sets!

Gentoo will carry on, b/c I will continue using it. Yeah maybe the only thing I give back to the distribution is responding to technical questions on these forums... it's still my small part and I take pride in it.

I also think it's pathetic people derive some sort of status from the distro-watch listing.

dhave · Post by **dhave** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 2:46 pm

I'm sorry about the ill feelings among the developers, and I hope there can be some reconciliation. For my part as an end-user, however, Gentoo serves me very well. Occasionally there's a glitch with an ebuild, but that's to be expected, and the problem is always addressed within a few hours.

My only basis for comparison is the two years I spent using Slackware, which remains an excellent distro. Like Gentoo, Slackware appeals to people who want to learn more about what's going on under the hood. Unlike Gentoo, Slackware is much more the province of a single chief developer, though he has added a select group of helpers. Like Gentoo, Slackware users encounter occasional glitches when a new package conflicts with existing configurations, or when there's an oversight on the part of the package builder(s). As with Gentoo, these problems are addressed very quickly.

I think the comparison between Gentoo and Slackware shows that the same sort of glitches will occur regardless of whether a distro is overseen by a single architect, who presumably gets along reasonably well with himself

, or is maintained by a large community of developers who have professional and personal disputes with one another.

In short, I'm very happy with Gentoo, but I don't expect perfection. I hope that the disagreements among the developers can be worked out -- broken human relationships are more serious than a broken distro, in my view -- but I don't sense that the whole project is in crisis.

Kasumi_Ninja · Post by **Kasumi_Ninja** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 3:30 pm

The content of this article worries me. What I found really strange and sad is seeing Daniel Robbins leaving so soon. After all there would be no Gentoo without him. DR leaving this quickly also signals to me that there is something wrong in the internal communications of Gentoo. I don't believe he put in all that effort to become a developer in order to flamer other developers. Bottom line is what are we going to about this? A ruthlessly internal research looks to me the best way to go. Blind denial certainly not. There are three possible outcomes of this investigation:

1 Things are wrong and needs to be changed
2 Things are ok no change is required
3 Things are ok, but improvements are necessary

The results of this investigation should (off course) be made public. My experience with corporate communication learns that if you don't provide an adequate answer soon this will damage Gentoo.

Naib · Post by **Naib** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 3:41 pm

gentoo-dev wrote:
AidanJT wrote:
gentoo-dev wrote:
AidanJT wrote: Respect is earned, not demanded.
Respect should be granted, no matter what or whom.
You can't 'grant' respect, you either respect someone or something or you don't. You can't respect someone who constantly trolls, and poisons Gentoo to the core even after he's been kicked out regardless of contributions.
Sorry, I meant respect is neither earned nor demanded but given no matter what. You should respect everyone, no matter who they are or what they say, even when they do not respect yourself. If you can't respect them, the only alternative is to ignore them. This applies especially to trolls.

you seem to be confusing common-courtesy which should be there no questions ask no matter what or whom.
Respect is something that is personal and can only ever been eant and is very easy to loose and even harder to gain back

"The troll" lost respect a long long time ago but if he ever posts I am courtiest to him... but that only ever lasts one post before he does his usual "no people-skills, inferiority complex so I will belittle this maggot" at which point gloves are off

jonnevers · Post by **jonnevers** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 4:02 pm

Something just occurred to me (again, actually). And I don't mean to step on anyone's toes but "we" are still going on and on about this ex-developer.

has anything changed or begun to change because of this situation? people outside Gentoo are definitely taking notice now... where is the internal attention? We should have already stopped picking on his personality and moved forward to better the development environment.

imo, it appears that he does mean a lot to development as no one can seem to let it go. so where is the positive outcome from this situation?

moesasji · Post by **moesasji** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 4:07 pm

Something is being done according to the last post on planet.gentoo.org
Let's hope that it is not a solution that only works on paper.

bugg_tb · Post by **bugg_tb** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 4:33 pm

Earlier today slashdot noted the article and forums threads about gentoo in crisis. Personally i've used it for years and even when I move away I still end up coming back. It has its problems but so do all distros, ups n downs etc.

Anyway a couple of articles later slashdot carries this article about Open Source Projects Surviving Poisonous People. Perhaps Gentoo Devs could all read it and possibly learn from a few of its notes...

Just a thought

Tom

Conan · Post by **Conan** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 4:52 pm

Hello, my name is conan and I am an [strike]alcoholic[/strike]arm chair general.

dhave · Post by **dhave** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 5:07 pm

Conan wrote:Hello, my name is conan and I am an [strike]alcoholic[/strike]arm chair general.

That's wonderful, Conan. Now on to Step Two:

We came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

GNUtoo · Post by **GNUtoo** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 6:29 pm

Paapaa wrote: In my eyes it looked like Robbins just wanted to shoot Ciaranm/PMS/Paludis down as fast as he could - he also admitted this. Well, apparently he shot his own leg. The difference between Ciaranm and Robbins was that Ciaranm only starts flame wars to address techical issues - Robbins started the war to get rid of another dev.

why did he want to shoot Paludis?
what's wrong about paludis?

The Unknown · Post by **The Unknown** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 6:46 pm

This panic crap is useless,panic spreads panic like disease.People start basing opinions on other peoples opinions its destructive and counter productive.
This often reminds me of the turn of the century,here in the USA it was said that all of the software that businesses use would stop because it only contained dates up to 2000.People and media grabbed a hold of that and there was wide spread panic.People were buying guns and food and bomb shelters and pulling there money from banks and shit, they thought the world was going to collapse on that day!Well guess what happened on 1/1/2000.The sun came up, stores opened banks opened just like any other normal day. The developers and admins knew what had to be done and worked hard on it all year ,maybe 2 I dont` know to prevent that from happening. So really we just need to use are heads and not ears,stick together and stand tall. I cant imagine a large and well established distro dropping of the face of the earth.Has that ever happened? Gentoo has been grouped and ranked with the oldest for as long as I`ve been around. So peace to you all...I`ll see you around

metacircular-evaluator · Mon Mar 12, 2007 6:48 pm

With paludis as far as DR goes ist following wrong:
It is developed by an ex-deveoper and hosted on a non-Gentoo infrastructure
BUT
it is (or will be) a central package in Gentoo (as it is a package manager)
AND
the copyright was not transferred to the Gentoo foundation as Daniel says it should
be for such a central development.

EDIT: The postings of DR regarding a very important package as a package manager should be
developed under Gentoo foundation on Gentoo infrastructure:
1) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 505401&w=2
2) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 103606&w=2
3) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 613220&w=2
4) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 223007&w=2
5) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 017777&w=2
and last post:
6) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 928791&w=2

My opinion: The developers should have followed Daniel fully then these problems would not
occur.
Reading again his postings makes me clear: Daniel was right.

My hope: He is very busy for a fork of this distro. Taking with him good devs to his new development.

moesasji · Post by **moesasji** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 7:07 pm

@Metacircular-evaluator: there is a slight misunderstanding here.

The discussion was not about Paludis, but about PMS. This is a document which describes the functionality that a package-manager should have to be compatible with the tree. As a this functionality is basically what describes the functionality of Gentoo as a distro it is very strange that this document is drafted by somebody who is not a gentoo-dev and does not have the copyright transferred. And that was what Daniel appeared to be pointing at. And that it was not possible to have a look at a draft.

So Paludis itself can very well be developed by anybody outside gentoo. No problem with that.
The confusing part is that the draft of PMS appears to be written by the same person as who develops Paludis.
(even though multiple persons appear to be involved)

peka · Post by **peka** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 7:42 pm

kimczuba wrote:[...] It would be nice to see some kind of statement about the future direction of Gentoo in an upcoming GWN. [...]

Second!

Something is going on with Gentoo. Call it a crisis or not.
IMO It is the Gentoo Project Leads' responsibility to response not only to the author of the Distrowatch article but to Gentoo Users as well.

aidanjt · Post by **aidanjt** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 7:44 pm

metacircular-evaluator wrote:With paludis as far as DR goes ist following wrong:
It is developed by an ex-deveoper and hosted on a non-Gentoo infrastructure
BUT
it is (or will be) a central package in Gentoo (as it is a package manager)
AND
the copyright was not transferred to the Gentoo foundation as Daniel says it should
be for such a central development.

EDIT: The postings of DR regarding a very important package as a package manager should be
developed under Gentoo foundation on Gentoo infrastructure:
1) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 505401&w=2
2) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 103606&w=2
3) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 613220&w=2
4) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 223007&w=2
5) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 017777&w=2
and last post:
6) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 928791&w=2

My opinion: The developers should have followed Daniel fully then these problems would not
occur.
Reading again his postings makes me clear: Daniel was right.

My hope: He is very busy for a fork of this distro. Taking with him good devs to his new development.

*shrug* just yet another Ciaran led flamefest. It's getting to the point where it's almost counter productive even talking about it because you just inflate his already oversized ego.

wah · Post by **wah** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 8:12 pm

AidanJT wrote:*shrug* just yet another Ciaran led flamefest. It's getting to the point where it's almost counter productive even talking about it because you just inflate his already oversized ego.

What's funny is that I see a common link in all these threads...and all the slashdot/distrowatch crap...and the mailing list threads...etc..

Methinks AidanJT is right - when you feed the beast, it becomes more powerful and therefore deflects your attention from what is important (in this case, getting Gentoo back on track). However, scandal and FUD seem to captivate the public, so go figure...

metwo · Post by **metwo** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 8:58 pm

metacircular-evaluator wrote: EDIT: The postings of DR regarding a very important package as a package manager should be
developed under Gentoo foundation on Gentoo infrastructure:
1) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 505401&w=2
2) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 103606&w=2
3) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 613220&w=2
4) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 223007&w=2
5) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 017777&w=2
and last post:
6) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 928791&w=2

My opinion: The developers should have followed Daniel fully then these problems would not
occur.
Reading again his postings makes me clear: Daniel was right.

My hope: He is very busy for a fork of this distro. Taking with him good devs to his new development.

Despite the fact that that thread was not about Paludis, but PMS, those posts don't give a clear view of both sides of the discussion and miss the wider context. It seems to me that it was DR who stated attacking ciaranm, and seems to be suggesting the ciaranm shouldn't be allowed to contribute to gentoo development at all because he is no longer an official dev. I could post a load of links from that thread from other devs asking DR to stop the pointless flames.

Naib · Post by **Naib** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 9:39 pm

metwo wrote:
metacircular-evaluator wrote: EDIT: The postings of DR regarding a very important package as a package manager should be
developed under Gentoo foundation on Gentoo infrastructure:
1) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 505401&w=2
2) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 103606&w=2
3) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 613220&w=2
4) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 223007&w=2
5) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 017777&w=2
and last post:
6) http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=gentoo- ... 928791&w=2

My opinion: The developers should have followed Daniel fully then these problems would not
occur.
Reading again his postings makes me clear: Daniel was right.

My hope: He is very busy for a fork of this distro. Taking with him good devs to his new development.
Despite the fact that that thread was not about Paludis, but PMS, those posts don't give a clear view of both sides of the discussion and miss the wider context. It seems to me that it was DR who stated attacking ciaranm, and seems to be suggesting the ciaranm shouldn't be allowed to contribute to gentoo development at all because he is no longer an official dev. I could post a load of links from that thread from other devs asking DR to stop the pointless flames.

funny that, that is EXACTLY how ciaranm argues, argues around the point on non-specifics that result... get you no where fast

minskpower · Post by **minskpower** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 10:28 pm

Naib, dude, you didn't read the whole thread did you? Daniel went for a little crusade against the ex-dev whose name is better not spoken and in the process was proven wrong with respect to current gentoo policies (ie the guy wasn't quite up to speed with it) by a couple of devs who also disagreed with other stuff Daniel said. After that, he decided to quit.
So you see, it wasn't just one man that burned him at stake while slowly chopping with the axe. There were more

As for the deep crisis of Gentoo, naaah. One early spring flame does not a war make. Too much noise over nothing, politics disputes come and go, Gentoo is still here.

ohc · Post by **ohc** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 10:31 pm

I had just finished watching a Google talk by some devs from subversion and then saw the Distrowatch article. There are several lessons that the subversion guys learnt that can be applied here. So here it is, watch it and you'll see what i mean, though I think the title is a little insensitive ;)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 1522818645
It's 54 minutes long and occasionly entertaining, but there is a serious message that applies here.

Just for clarification, I'm a keen user & lurker, but not a developer. I have been using Gentoo for a number of years and would hate to see it go the way of the dodo, maybe enough that I'll get off my backside and join in.

Cheers all

ohc

Distrowatch: "Gentoo in crisis"

Re: Distrowatch: "Gentoo in crisis"