At 02:11 PM 10/10/00 -0500, David Grove wrote:
>However what I was responding to was the shutting out of anyone who
>doesn't agree with the politics of the perl elite, and wants to mouth off
>from time to time (me). You sort of have to read between the lines on this
>one, Peter, because this is an old argument. Nobody's actually saying what
>they mean, and I think we prefer it that way.
We don't prefer it that way, honestly. This dancing around the issue is
damned annoying. Let's be blunt here.
Your two big beefs seem to be that WinXX gets shorted in the development
process, and that ActiveState is doing Evil Things. (That ActiveState has
been responsible for 90% of the WinXX code in perl seems to not have made a
difference, but we shan't go there right now)
I don't much care about the latter problem--Larry feels he's resolved it
and I'm fine with that. This is, as far as I'm concerned, his baby.
As for the former.... Y'know what? That's probably not going to change.
Perl lives and grows based entirely on contributions of source from the
world. I don't have a Windows development system, I'm not at all familiar
with developing on Windows, and I'm not *going* to develop on Windows.
Period. You want Windows support? Great. Write the code and send it in.
Don't like the install system? Go build one you do.
I, for one, won't refuse code from anyone for personal reasons--if the
code's solid (or there's no alternative) I'll take it no matter how much I
might dislike someone. (Though it never helps to come across as a paranoid
nutcase) I'll reject it on technical grounds, of course, but that's a
separate matter.
>The problem with this is the assumption. There is _no_ assumption possible
>that the developers will read a free list, or care what it says.
You're being too specific. There is no assumption possible that perl
developers will do *anything*. Ever. This is a volunteer community. Any
other assumption you might make is unfounded. There is no central
authority. There is no guaranteed management control. There is no
*nothing*. Perl is an open source project whose development is currently
run by a group of interested parties. Don't like the way it's run? Fork the
source and go for it.
>Dan, I don't know you. I've never had any problem with you or your leadership.
That's fine. I fully expect that someone (and this is a generic someone
here--I have no names in mind) will by the time this is all done. I'm not
at all thrilled at the prospect, but it's one of the first things I came to
terms with after volunteering.
>I don't believe that you'll head us into a mess, because I've no reason to
>believe it. You are also not technopolitically inclined in the same direction
>as your predecessor.
I should point out two things:
1) Sarathy isn't technopolitically inclined in the way you think
2) My technopolitical leanings are likely not to your (or some other
people's) tastes
>I have no arguments with you. However, the possibility
>still exists, and always will, unless some kind of check/balance system is in
>place.
What you want isn't currently possible. Period. The only way to make it
even remotely possible is to entrust perl development to some sort of
entity akin to the Apache Software Foundation, and if we do that we will
undoubtedly piss of yet another group of people. (And you'll likely be in
that group too)
Dan
--------------------------------------"it's like this"-------------------
Dan Sugalski even samurai
[EMAIL PROTECTED] have teddy bears and even
teddy bears get drunk
