> On Sun, 16 Nov 2003, Jeff Trawick wrote: > > Too bad all these supposedly-disenfranchised people aren't around to review 1.3 > > fixes. 1.3 would be healthier if they were. > > And it is the reason for why they are not around that is in question here. > Why wouldn't there be plenty of hackers around for a piece of software > used to widely? Blaming the hackers seems a bit shortsighted. Have a > look at the environment we have given them to operate in and at some of > the responses over the years people have gotten when they suggested new > features for 1.3. >
I am just lurking here really... but a while back I did try to post some patches dealing with QNX support to both Apache and PHP. In my humble opinion, there was a world of difference in attitude that I have encountered in those two projects. The attitude of PHP folks was 'you can commit patches so long as you stand by to fix anything you break right away' (hey Rasmus :). The very atmosphere was rather welcoming. Hell, they even put me onto the credits page at the time and I did not even think myself that I did that much. With the Apache, you don't get to commit. Which is fine too, so long as someone is managing patch submissions. I got one initial reply that objected the patch on the grounds that were arguable. Then I followed up with a refined patch, but never got any more replies, even after posting it 3 times. So, perhaps that patch was not that interesting to the core developers. Understandable, but then almost every minor patch is not so interesting to the majority. If you cut them all for that reason, you get the situation that you have now. Then I should note, situation was not always the same. Years before (that is, before 2.0 branch) I did another patch of that sort and it went in just fine. Again, I can quite understand the desire of core developers to concentrate on the new branch, rather than do gruesome work on that old-hopelessly-obsolete-code-that-you-do-not-like-anymore. The only trouble really is that 2.0 branch has failed to interest that many users. Why is a big question, but I think from end-user perspective one major reason is that it simply does not add much that's really worth moving. Architectural elegance is important to developers (and there is nothing I personally like more) but end users tend to treat it like their cars. Most of them don't ever look under the hood. Feel free to laugh, but if you want users 'pay' (that is take pain of moving) for that new wonderful engine in the 2.0, you need to show them a carrot in form of those heated memory seats, self-dimming mirrors, rainsensitive wipers, et cetera. Or at least it should drive faster, which (last time I checked) it did not. Regards, -- igor
