Re: RFC: Changing the NM system
>>"Andreas" == Andreas Voegele <andreas.voegele@gmx.de> writes:
Andreas> Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org> writes:
>> I am not sure that you understand what the project is. The
>> project is not a company, with a mandated party line; the project is
>> comprised of a multitudfe of people, all with varying agenda's and
>> view points (though there is a large overlap).
>>
>> If Debian is a sum of its members, then it the view points of
>> Debian are also a sum of the views of its members; and one would be
>> doing our users a disservice by artificially suppressing reality.
Andreas> Then why does Adrian Bunk seem to think that some Debian developers
Andreas> aren't able to represent Debian?
Who knows? (well, Adrian Bunk may know). How is it relevant?
Is Adrian Bunk the authority of the day on what Debian really is?
>> > Here's an example from a recent thread in debian-devel called "Woody
>> > Progress": [...]
>> > Manoj Srivastava> "[...] I, personally, work for Debian so that I
>> > can have a high quality Linux distribution. Having it useful to
>> > other people, espescially people I like, is a neat secondary
>> > thing. Am I beholden to the unwashed masses out there? No way."
>> >
>> > I don't think that public statements like these help Debian.
>> Really? I think they do, since they elucidate the motivation
>> of at least one developer, and disabuse some of the users out there
>> about the demands that they can make; the customer is only always
>> right when they are paying customers.
Andreas> You're telling me that a maintainer has few responsibilities but I
Andreas> disagree.
Huh? Where on earth did you get that? I guess english may not
be your primaty language (it is not my mother tongue either), but
this logical disconnect is, umm, amazing.
Andreas> I think that maintainers always ought to listen to their
Andreas> users' suggestions.
You are welcome to your opinion, of course. I am very open to
technical complaints on my packages, but less receptive to
demands. And my motivation is again quite selfish: I lesten to user
complaints cause they may lead me to improve my package, which
benefits me.
Andreas> For example, one thing that really bothers me is the
Andreas> ignorance of many developers when it comes to localization
Andreas> and internationalization.
One can't be an expert in everything.
Andreas> Debian is an international project and before someone
Andreas> decides to maintain a package he or she ought to consider
Andreas> that. Quite often it happens (not only in Debian) that a
Andreas> maintainer postpones l10n and i18n bug reports and patches
Andreas> or even ignores them since he considers them as not
Andreas> important. But a maintainer can't decide that; he may be
Andreas> able to work with the program, but on my systems the program
Andreas> could be unusable.
Umm, I guess everyone would agree that this hypothetical case
(hypothetical, since no details are provided) ought to be considered
a problem.
>> > In fact, these statements don't comply with Debian's Social
>> > Contract which clearly says that "Our Priorities are Our Users and
>> > Free Software. We will be guided by the needs of our users and
>> > the free-software community. We will place their interests first
>> > in our priorities."
>> You are confusing the guiding principle of the project itself
>> with the motivations of individual developers.If you do not
>> understand the distinction, I don't think you understand well enough
>> how we work.
Andreas> How could the whole project comply with the Social Contract
Andreas> if none of the individual developers honored the users'
Andreas> needs?
*Sigh*. Please look up the word ``motivation'' in your nearest
dictinary. There is only a loose corelation in the guiding principle
of the project (or any product, really) and the motivation of the
people working on it.
manoj
--
In the force if Yoda's so strong, construct a sentence with words in
the proper order then why can't he?
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org> <http://www.debian.org/%7Esrivasta/>
1024R/C7261095 print CB D9 F4 12 68 07 E4 05 CC 2D 27 12 1D F5 E8 6E
1024D/BF24424C print 4966 F272 D093 B493 410B 924B 21BA DABB BF24 424C
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