Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
* Michael Banck mba...@debian.org [090817 23:42]: Regarding CCs, it was hightlighted that the current list conduct explicitely says (since a short while ago) people should refrain from complaining about CCs on-list and do this privately. Further discussion made clear that most of the people present might consider getting CCed a small nuisance, but consider discussions about this much more disrupting. Furthermore, some people actually like being CCed on things, though maybe more to attract their attention to threads they would otherwise not read (and not as direct replies to them). I think that is not limited CCs: As annoying as some misbehaviour is, having on-list discussion of behaviour of people is usually much more disruptive. Perhaps there is a way to make a list for meta-discussion and discourage all meta-discussion or mentioning of fallacy, ad-hominem or strawman on the other lists. Hochachtungsvoll, Bernhard R. Link -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
Bernhard R. Link brl...@debian.org writes: Perhaps there is a way to […] discourage all meta-discussion or mentioning of fallacy, ad-hominem or strawman on the other lists. Perhaps you have a better way of succinct terms to use when challenging those logical fallacies? Surely you're not saying you want such fallacies to go unchallenged in the forums where they appear? -- \ “You are welcome to visit the cemetery where famous Russian and | `\Soviet composers, artists, and writers are buried daily except | _o__) Thursday.” —Russian orthodox monastery, Moscow | Ben Finney -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 12:44:14PM +0800, Paul Wise wrote: On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 5:41 AM, Michael Banckmba...@debian.org wrote: at Debconf9, there was a BoF about the debian-devel list and how we could possibly make it more attractive. Was this recorded (I can't find it in the initial video release)? Yes, but it is not yet available AFAICT. * Maybe split off WNPP Traffic to a new -wnpp list? ... The other discussed item was about ITPs. It turned out that roughly 20% of the debian-devel list traffic are ITPs and discussions thereof. While it is clear that ITPs should get reviewed, maybe not all of them have to be copied to -devel. It was suggested that for mass-filings (sometimes people file the ITP for a dozen perl libraries needed as Build-Depends/Depends for a package in one go), something less-intrusive could be used, maybe perhaps a summary posting. Another option is that specific teams like the perl or the games teams review ITPs in their field, while only generic ITPs get copied to -devel. The list already exists, but it recieves all traffic from all wnpp bugs and is therefore rather high-traffic: Yes, I know. But due to it getting all the bug traffic, it is not very inviting to people just interested in reviewing ITPs/get notified about ITAs/Os. I should have suggested a different name, or moving the current -wnnp traffic elsewhere first. However, there does not seem to be a lot of consensus on moving most/all WNPP traffic off -devel anyway. Michael -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
Russ Allbery wrote: Michael Banck mba...@debian.org writes: I think the most effective way of tackling this would be if we could somehow reassure people that the loudest voice isn't going to carry the day in discussions of project technical direction. I think the fear that if one doesn't keep rebutting one's position will be steamrolled is what drives much of the repetitive discussion in those large threads. Agreed, but given the fast branching nature of email lists it seems inevitable that arguments will be repeated at different points, perhaps in response to different people joining the discussion, even if the intention isn't to hammer a point to oblivion but instead to genuinely counter a new point. The fact that referencing other emails on the thread isn't ideal (doesn't guarantee full context; demands shift of attention from current thread) also contributes to this problem. I don't presume to know an easy solution to this, but perhaps encouraging a public policy of moving to another format as soon as possible (Wiki?) could help provide a central point of reference and discussion, where all arguments could be arranged and linked in a single place. As a bonus, encouraging anonymous edits to the wiki (or at least leaving the author's name just in the history and not right next to the argument) could help avoid some biased reactions against certain arguments based on author: IMHO reading the From line of emails before the content can affect us in ways we don't even notice. Of course this could all be in vain and all it achieves could be turning petty insistence on a point into petty wiki redacting wars, but might be interesting to try. Cheers -- Leo costela Antunes [insert a witty retort here] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
Hi, Ben Finney wrote: Bernhard R. Link brl...@debian.org writes: Perhaps there is a way to […] discourage all meta-discussion or mentioning of fallacy, ad-hominem or strawman on the other lists. Perhaps you have a better way of succinct terms to use when challenging those logical fallacies? Surely you're not saying you want such fallacies to go unchallenged in the forums where they appear? I believe he meant only that these keywords tend to denote a crossing into the realm of meta-discussion, where the point in question ceases to be discussed, and instead the arguments themselves become points of contention. It doesn't mean the arguments are worthless, but indicates a certain departure from the main point, which could mean this branch of the discussion has started to dilute - so to speak - the thread and therefore could be taken somewhere else, in order to keep the central thread concise. Please note I'm not showing my endorsement for this idea, just clarifying what my interpretation of it was. Cheers -- Leo costela Antunes [insert a witty retort here] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
* Ben Finney ben+deb...@benfinney.id.au [090818 11:28]: Bernhard R. Link brl...@debian.org writes: Perhaps there is a way to [???] discourage all meta-discussion or mentioning of fallacy, ad-hominem or strawman on the other lists. Perhaps you have a better way of succinct terms to use when challenging those logical fallacies? I think succinct terms help not at all here. Once there is a succinct term 90% of their use is name-calling. If people think something is wrong they should say what is wrong and not invoce some name. But I think it would much help if the replies on the lists itself are about the topic, and not diverting into what are valid or invalid forms to produce arguments. And really, if some logical conclusion is so broken that this brokeness has its own name, then everybody should be able to see it. So either someone does it on purpose (then it is just some form of misbehaviour and discussing it only on topic on some mailing list about behviour on mailing lists). Or the writer really missed something. (In this case I cannot imagine shouting strawman will make them understand), but staying with the facts and not entering the meta-level helps more. So calling fallacy #7 has mostly one point: Ridicule somebody by claiming what they do follow a scheme of incompetence of ill-will. It's has the additional advantage that one does not have to mess with the other sides arguments: The reader is supposed to match the scheme with what was said and the person attacked would need to rebut all possible (mis-)interpretations fitting into that scheme, thus being forced to assume guilt to be able to defence. I guess that is a reason why those succinct terms are so often used to throw them againt people like names-calling. And that is why I think they do not belong in any discussion unless you are sure you know everything better. Hochachtungsvoll, Bernhard R. Link -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
On Tue, Aug 18 2009, Leo \costela\ Antunes wrote: Hi, Ben Finney wrote: Bernhard R. Link brl...@debian.org writes: Perhaps there is a way to […] discourage all meta-discussion or mentioning of fallacy, ad-hominem or strawman on the other lists. Perhaps you have a better way of succinct terms to use when challenging those logical fallacies? Surely you're not saying you want such fallacies to go unchallenged in the forums where they appear? I believe he meant only that these keywords tend to denote a crossing into the realm of meta-discussion, where the point in question ceases to be discussed, and instead the arguments themselves become points of contention. It doesn't mean the arguments are worthless, but indicates a certain departure from the main point, which could mean this branch of the discussion has started to dilute - so to speak - the thread and therefore could be taken somewhere else, in order to keep the central thread concise. But really, the divergence from the discussion happened earlier, when the discussion degenerated into name calling (which is what ad hominem attacks are), or strawman attacks, which tend to derail the discussion by standing up irrelevant positions and arging against that, leading to thread bloat. Allowing these logical fallacies to stand, and not refuting them, lead to a discussion that goes nowhere, or floats off into sub optimal directions if not scotched in the bud. Indeed, leaving logical fallacies unchallenged does nore to harm the discussion than pointing them out and trying to bring the thread back to a logical discussion; and leaving ad hominem attacks unchallenged poisons the discussion environment to the point that it detracts from the discussion itself. manoj -- Can't open /usr/games/lib/fortunes.dat. Manoj Srivastava sriva...@debian.org http://www.debian.org/~srivasta/ 1024D/BF24424C print 4966 F272 D093 B493 410B 924B 21BA DABB BF24 424C -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
On Tue, Aug 18 2009, Bernhard R. Link wrote: * Ben Finney ben+deb...@benfinney.id.au [090818 11:28]: Bernhard R. Link brl...@debian.org writes: Perhaps there is a way to [???] discourage all meta-discussion or mentioning of fallacy, ad-hominem or strawman on the other lists. Perhaps you have a better way of succinct terms to use when challenging those logical fallacies? I think succinct terms help not at all here. Once there is a succinct term 90% of their use is name-calling. If people think something is wrong they should say what is wrong and not invoce some name. If you want a full description of the logical fallacy in all replies, sure. The point is that the best refutation of a logical fallacy is to point out it is a logical fallacy, and thus, stop basing the rest of the discussion based on the logical fallacy. And really, if some logical conclusion is so broken that this brokeness has its own name, then everybody should be able to see it. This is a nice theory, but in reality one does see people arging against the person, or their perceived personality, or their traits, or ascribing motives to them all the time. These attacks on people, as opposed to discussion of what they said, is one of the major reasons discussion threads devolve into unproductive chaos. We should be managing to police discussion better, and the first step is identifying that such a post has been made. So either someone does it on purpose (then it is just some form of misbehaviour and discussing it only on topic on some mailing list about behviour on mailing lists). First, that list would be pretty nasty and uninteresting, so not many people would subscribe to it, and this notice would go mostly unnoticed, in the meanwhile, the poisonous email would have derailed the original discussion. Or the writer really missed something. (In this case I cannot imagine shouting strawman will make them understand), but staying with the facts and not entering the meta-level helps more. Just callingit strawman with no justification is suboptimal, I agree. If you call something a strawman, you should also justify why it is so (like, you are argying against point A, which not one ever advocated, and you are ascribing to me positions I never took. This is a strawman). I guess that is a reason why those succinct terms are so often used to throw them againt people like names-calling. And that is why I think they do not belong in any discussion unless you are sure you know everything better. But using the term, while also explaining why the term is valid, seems like a good thing. Without the rationale for using hte term, you are correct, it is just name calling. manoj -- For every bloke who makes his mark, there's half a dozen waiting to rub it out. Andy Capp Manoj Srivastava sriva...@debian.org http://www.debian.org/~srivasta/ 1024D/BF24424C print 4966 F272 D093 B493 410B 924B 21BA DABB BF24 424C -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
Manoj Srivastava wrote: But really, the divergence from the discussion happened earlier, when the discussion degenerated into name calling (which is what ad hominem attacks are), or strawman attacks, which tend to derail the discussion by standing up irrelevant positions and arging against that, leading to thread bloat. Absolutely. The original idea - at least the part with which I agree - is only that the appearance of the terms are a probable indication of digression. It doesn't necessarily attribute the blame of digressing to the one who mentioned the magic meta-words or to the one who provoked them into being uttered. Indeed, leaving logical fallacies unchallenged does nore to harm the discussion than pointing them out and trying to bring the thread back to a logical discussion; and leaving ad hominem attacks unchallenged poisons the discussion environment to the point that it detracts from the discussion itself. That's beyond my (and AFAICT Bernhard's) point. I agree they shouldn't be left unchallenged - at least in most cases - and haven't said they should. The point is only noting the digression and collectively suggesting taking it outside (hopefully not in the knuckle-dragging sense). What to do to practically achieve this after that digression has been collectively noted, OTOH, is a matter to which I don't feel I have any useful solution... I believe I'm not the only one who feels an email saying let's calm down and get back to the point to be pretty much useless, specially after hitting the point of ad-hominem attacks or accusations thereof. Cheers -- Leo costela Antunes [insert a witty retort here] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
Le mardi 18 août 2009 à 15:25 -0500, Manoj Srivastava a écrit : These attacks on people, as opposed to discussion of what they said, is one of the major reasons discussion threads devolve into unproductive chaos. We should be managing to police discussion better, and the first step is identifying that such a post has been made. Although there have been some spectacular cases, I don’t think that’s what is causing debian-devel to be unreadable in the general case. Just have a look at the last 10 big discussions, and try to see if they were made to drift by personal attacks. No, one of the biggest issues currently on the list is that some people are engaging into rhetorical wars and bikeshedding, instead of the technical discussions we expect. Those who reply to dozens of messages in all important threads with several hundreds of lines of nitpicking on points of no interest, or purely rhetorical arguments with no relationship to the technical issues at hand, are just polluting the list. And they can usually do that while remaining polite, which makes them sound like they are constructive. Cheers, -- .''`. Josselin Mouette : :' : `. `' “I recommend you to learn English in hope that you in `- future understand things” -- Jörg Schilling signature.asc Description: Ceci est une partie de message numériquement signée
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The Softer the Topic, the Longer the Debate (was: d-devel b...@debconf9)
On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 10:57:24PM +0200, Josselin Mouette wrote [edited]: No, one of the biggest issues currently on the list is that some people are engaging into rhetorical wars and bikeshedding, instead of the technical discussions we expect. +1 Perhaps we should add pop-up (anti)features in all email clients as described in: http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/getmsg.cgi?fetch=506636+517178+/usr/local/www/db/text/1999/freebsd-hackers/19991003.freebsd-hackers (search for pop-up in the page) :-) (subject stolen from http://producingoss.com/en/common-pitfalls.html#bikeshed) -- debtags-organised WNPP bugs: http://members.hellug.gr/serzan/wnpp -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
Bernhard R. Link brl...@debian.org writes: * Ben Finney ben+deb...@benfinney.id.au [090818 11:28]: Perhaps you have a better way of succinct terms to use when challenging those logical fallacies? I think succinct terms help not at all here. Once there is a succinct term 90% of their use is name-calling. You apparently perceive these terms in a very strange way. These terms refer to *arguments*, or points made within them; an argument is not the person who made it. They're not “name-calling” in any sense except the tautological (they name a thing). If people think something is wrong they should say what is wrong and not invoce some name. Your distinction is lost on me; pointing out that someone has presented a logical fallacy *is* saying what is wrong. That we have succinct labels with well-established meanings serves to more quickly communicate what is wrong, which I would think is pleasing to you. To point out what is wrong *without* using the well-known terms for common fallacies surely leads to more volume of discussion devoted to that, which is what I thought you were trying to avoid. But I think it would much help if the replies on the lists itself are about the topic, and not diverting into what are valid or invalid forms to produce arguments. As Manoj has pointed out (better than I did earlier), to *name* a fallacious argument is merely to point out clearly that the discussion has *already* gone off-topic, and is best interpreted as a request that the off-topic digression be terminated quickly. And really, if some logical conclusion is so broken that this brokeness has its own name, then everybody should be able to see it. Not at all. The fact that these fallacies are so common is intricately linked to the fact that it's usually difficult to recognise them without conscious effort. I guess that is a reason why those succinct terms are so often used to throw them againt people like names-calling. I think your guess is wrong. -- \ “Know what I hate most? Rhetorical questions.” —Henry N. Camp | `\ | _o__) | Ben Finney -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 03:17:55PM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote: Allowing these logical fallacies to stand, and not refuting them, lead to a discussion that goes nowhere, or floats off into sub optimal directions if not scotched in the bud. Indeed, leaving logical fallacies unchallenged does nore to harm the discussion than pointing them out and trying to bring the thread back to a logical discussion; and leaving ad hominem attacks unchallenged poisons the discussion environment to the point that it detracts from the discussion itself. I think people would prefer if those were pointed out in private mail. Michael -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 03:25:30PM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote: And really, if some logical conclusion is so broken that this brokeness has its own name, then everybody should be able to see it. This is a nice theory, but in reality one does see people arging against the person, or their perceived personality, or their traits, or ascribing motives to them all the time. Except that this is *not* the definition of the ad hominem fallacy. The ad hominem fallacy is claiming that a person is bad, *and therefore their arguments are wrong*. Pointing out that someone is being a jerk on the mailing list is *not* an ad hominem fallacy. These attacks on people, as opposed to discussion of what they said, is one of the major reasons discussion threads devolve into unproductive chaos. We should be managing to police discussion better, and the first step is identifying that such a post has been made. Given the sorts of things you've objected to as ad hominem attacks in the past, I definitely don't agree. A number of these have been legitimate complaints about behaviors that distract from or derail technical discussions. Sometimes heated complaints - but no less legitimate for all that. -- Steve Langasek Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS Debian Developer to set it on, and I can move the world. Ubuntu Developerhttp://www.debian.org/ slanga...@ubuntu.com vor...@debian.org -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
On Tue, Aug 18 2009, Michael Banck wrote: On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 03:17:55PM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote: Allowing these logical fallacies to stand, and not refuting them, lead to a discussion that goes nowhere, or floats off into sub optimal directions if not scotched in the bud. Indeed, leaving logical fallacies unchallenged does nore to harm the discussion than pointing them out and trying to bring the thread back to a logical discussion; and leaving ad hominem attacks unchallenged poisons the discussion environment to the point that it detracts from the discussion itself. I think peopluld prefer if those were pointed out in private mail. That assumes the only one you are seeking to give the right impression about the topic at hand is the person making the logical fallacy; but, really, you want to refute the illogical, fallaciour argument in the forum where it was published. Allowing logical fallacies to be widely disseminated, and the refutation to go to private email, is likely to lead to the outcome that the public discussion and archives are fill of unchallenged, unrefuted local fallacies. This seems somehow suboptimal to me. manoj -- There are twenty-five people left in the world, and twenty-seven of them are hamburgers. -- Ed Sanders Manoj Srivastava sriva...@debian.org http://www.debian.org/~srivasta/ 1024D/BF24424C print 4966 F272 D093 B493 410B 924B 21BA DABB BF24 424C -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
Michael Banck mba...@debian.org writes: On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 03:17:55PM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote: Indeed, leaving logical fallacies unchallenged does [more] to harm the discussion than pointing them out and trying to bring the thread back to a logical discussion; and leaving ad hominem attacks unchallenged poisons the discussion environment to the point that it detracts from the discussion itself. I think people would prefer if those were pointed out in private mail. This preference amounts to preferring that fallacies go unchallenged in the forum where they were uttered. -- \ “You've got to think about big things while you're doing small | `\ things, so that all the small things go in the right | _o__) direction.” —Alvin Toffler | Ben Finney -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
Steve Langasek vor...@debian.org writes: On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 03:25:30PM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote: These attacks on people, as opposed to discussion of what they said, is one of the major reasons discussion threads devolve into unproductive chaos. We should be managing to police discussion better, and the first step is identifying that such a post has been made. Given the sorts of things you've objected to as ad hominem attacks in the past, I definitely don't agree. A number of these have been legitimate complaints about behaviors that distract from or derail technical discussions. Sometimes heated complaints - but no less legitimate for all that. This points out a fallacy common to those who like to point out common fallacies: that it's easy to assume everyone else in the discussion wants to stay on exactly the same topic we ourselves are trying to discuss, and that any response should be interpreted as an attempted response to the argument. As you say, that assumption is often unfounded :-) and so many responses that the arguer might think are logical fallacies, are not so, because they're pursuing an entirely different (sometimes legitimate) argument. -- \ “If you can't annoy somebody there is little point in writing.” | `\—Kingsley Amis | _o__) | Ben Finney -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
On Tue, Aug 18 2009, Steve Langasek wrote: On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 03:25:30PM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote: And really, if some logical conclusion is so broken that this brokeness has its own name, then everybody should be able to see it. This is a nice theory, but in reality one does see people arging against the person, or their perceived personality, or their traits, or ascribing motives to them all the time. Except that this is *not* the definition of the ad hominem fallacy. The ad hominem fallacy is claiming that a person is bad, *and therefore their arguments are wrong*. I would say it is attacking the character or motives of a person who has stated an idea, rather than the idea itself. The most obvious example of this fallacy is when one debater maligns the character of another debater (e.g, The members of the opposition are a couple of fascists!), but this is actually not that common. A more typical manifestation of argumentum ad hominem is attacking a source of information -- for example, responding to a quotation from Richard Nixon on the subject of free trade with China by saying, We all know Nixon was a liar and a cheat, so why should we believe anything he says? [0] Pointing out that someone is being a jerk on the mailing list is *not* an ad hominem fallacy. But saying that their message should not be heeded because at some other point in the past they had been jerks is one. Discounting a message because of a (perceived) character trait of the author is also suspect. These attacks on people, as opposed to discussion of what they said, is one of the major reasons discussion threads devolve into unproductive chaos. We should be managing to police discussion better, and the first step is identifying that such a post has been made. Given the sorts of things you've objected to as ad hominem attacks in the past, I definitely don't agree. A number of these have been legitimate complaints about behaviors that distract from or derail technical discussions. So you are saying that I misidentified some mail as an attack on a person. Which is perhaps an argument for my point: we need to identify that such a post has been made. I do not see the basis for your refutation here. Also, if the rationale for the disagreement is that you are say that a trait you say I possess (mistakenly objecting to non attack as an attack) is the reason my message (we should identify and curtail attacks on people) should be discounted -- sound familiar? Hmm. Sometimes heated complaints - but no less legitimate for all that. Complaining about the behaviours of a person might be legitimate, but not if it is put forth as the reason to discount the actual content of the message. It also is probably off topic for the thread. And in no way is it a counter argument. In all of these cases, the relevant question is not who makes the argument, but whether the argument is valid. manoj [0] http://www.csun.edu/~dgw61315/fallacies.html -- All the existing 2.0.x kernels are to buggy for 2.1.x to be the main goal. -- Alan Cox Manoj Srivastava sriva...@debian.org http://www.debian.org/~srivasta/ 1024D/BF24424C print 4966 F272 D093 B493 410B 924B 21BA DABB BF24 424C -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
Manoj Srivastava sriva...@debian.org writes: In all of these cases, the relevant question is not who makes the argument, but whether the argument is valid. Often, there are more-relevant questions: whether the argument belongs at all in the specific forum where it was presented, or whether the form of expression used to make the argument is an overall negative to the forum. I think those questions need to be considered, before pressing “send”, more often than whether the argument is logically valid. Perhaps that's the main point being made by some of the requests here. However, once such an inappropriate message *has* been sent to a forum, it's important that its flaws be countered (or its form be challenged) *in the same forum*, otherwise an observer would be justified in concluding from the silent assent that such messages are considered appropriate. -- \ “The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more | `\ to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a | _o__) sober one.” —George Bernard Shaw | Ben Finney -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
On Tue, Aug 18, 2009 at 5:41 AM, Michael Banckmba...@debian.org wrote: at Debconf9, there was a BoF about the debian-devel list and how we could possibly make it more attractive. ... * Maybe split off WNPP Traffic to a new -wnpp list? ... The other discussed item was about ITPs. It turned out that roughly 20% of the debian-devel list traffic are ITPs and discussions thereof. While it is clear that ITPs should get reviewed, maybe not all of them have to be copied to -devel. It was suggested that for mass-filings (sometimes people file the ITP for a dozen perl libraries needed as Build-Depends/Depends for a package in one go), something less-intrusive could be used, maybe perhaps a summary posting. Another option is that specific teams like the perl or the games teams review ITPs in their field, while only generic ITPs get copied to -devel. Lets start with some low hanging fruit: ITP floods It appears that many folks may not read the developers-reference because it already says the following: If you are packaging so many new packages (10) that notifying the mailing list in seperate messages is too disruptive, do send a summary after filing the bugs to the debian-devel list instead. http://www.debian.org/doc/developers-reference/pkgs.html#newpackage I personally didn't know about this sentence, I'd suggest significant changes to the developers reference be announced in DeveloperNews or similar in future to make recommended practice better known. I would suggest the following sentences instead: If you are packaging multiple related packages, notifying the mailing list in seperate messages is too disruptive, file the ITP bugs and then send a summary to the debian-devel list instead. Likewise, if you are packaging many new packages (10), send a summary of the ITP bugs instead. Perhaps the number should be changed to 5 instead of 10. Also, how about the following addition to the next edition of DeveloperNews? === debian-devel and ITPs === At DebConf9 there was a discussion about making the debian-devel list more useful. Towards that end, here is a quick reminder of the recommendations in the developers reference 5.1[devref51]. Please do not sent ITPs for multiple packages to debian-devel, instead, please file the ITPs and send a summary to debian-devel afterwards. This is especially true for multiple packages that are related in some way. [devref51] http://www.debian.org/doc/developers-reference/pkgs.html#newpackage -- Paul Wise -- bye, pabs http://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: Summary of the debian-devel BoF at Debconf9
]] Michael Banck Hi, | Yes, I know. But due to it getting all the bug traffic, it is not very | inviting to people just interested in reviewing ITPs/get notified about | ITAs/Os. I should have suggested a different name, or moving the | current -wnnp traffic elsewhere first. | | However, there does not seem to be a lot of consensus on moving most/all | WNPP traffic off -devel anyway. you seem to think that moving wnpp traffic off -devel would be useful to make -devel more attractive? Why do you think so? I think moving the traffic off would just mean fewer people would care to review the wnpp mails and we'd be worse off overall. I don't have any numbers to back up that claim though, it's just a gut feeling. -- Tollef Fog Heen UNIX is user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
