Re: [UPDATE] NGScan

Hum de dum. Been working on code for five clients, for the last 15 hours, and what's this? An old fashioned flamewar? On Monday, July 9, 2001, at 10:52 AM, Zeev Suraski wrote:

Sascha, As a matter of fact, some of your negative contributions, i.e., having a horrible attitude and a limitless ego, caused PHP's development a great deal of damage.

I have this to say, about that.... I'm a doc guy. Not much social status here. I read C, and write and patch it, but my contributions to the PHP project itself are primarilly about docs, about making php usabe, and viable, for PHP users. You know what would make me really happy? Chucking the code that generates the most bug fixes, the most doc notes, the most complaints and questions. Why? Excessive WTF factors. You want to know where our greatest bug problems are? Look to the supposedly "bogus" bug reports. Want to know what code sucks the most for end users? Look to errata notes, and bug reports. If it's complex to learn and understand, then it's broken. Period. If your code sucks, people will complain. I don't care how skilled or insightful or how elegantly abstract your C is, this isn't C. It's PHP. I don't care how great your "über ideas" about code constructs, or new functions, are, if you *don't* make them easier to use, while adding important value to PHP users, your *code* is the problem, not the user, not the docs. I don't even know (haven't looked) at who wrote it, but the two most damaging contribs in WTF terms have been our OO, and sessions. Both have generated lots of confusion, scorn, derision, errata, and bug reports, for being not-quite-straightforward and sensible. Of course, if neither of these two slams hit you two, why don't you compare numbers on your personal code, and see who has had more bug complaints/doc complaints/etc about your code, as viewed by those who have to work with it on a daily basis. (I have no idea who I just pissed off, but please realize the bug reports and errata are more than just "bitchy users", they are also ratings on how usable the code is.... and both of these fail.)

Perhaps I'll be surprised, but my guess is that most people could live seeing you disappear from the PHP Group and PHP development in general, a few lightyears before they would like to see me disappear from there.

Nobody is irreplaceable. There's thousands of guys waiting to get the same fame, or power, or bragging rights, as you two. Many are as, or more, talented, knoledgeable, skillful, or educated as you both, but weren't in the right places at the right time.

It doesn't mean that neither of us has to step away from this project, but perhaps you should finally take some time to figure out the meaning of the word humility, like our Norwegian friend once suggested.

<cough> The very concept of the star-chamber-like "php-group" has raised some eyebrows. ESR's book highlights both the advantages, and disadvantages, of this process. If this was an open-source project, one of you could just fork off, :-) ....but right now you're having a war in front of the troops.... bad. I suggest you both learn to STFU[1], and listen. Humility is not something you can teach, so much as something you can learn. Others choose not to learn it, and eventually they are ignored for being the always-right-and-insulting-you-for-it individuals they are, which, of course, is exactly this kind of person that *nobody* will listen to. Nobody cares about you if you're right if you're right *all the time*. Since I've suffered ego-driven scorn from both of ya'll over the last year or so, I'd say some general STFU time is needed, so you two can calm down, and ascend to guruhood behavior, rather than fighting like feudal warlords in ancient japan. Maybe you can give the PHP lists wisdom instead of simple flamewars.

At 20:35 9/7/2001, Sascha Schumann wrote:

    Zeev,
    I've given you more than half a year already to add the
    necessary logic to support accepting strings as input and
    exactly nothing happened.

Hey, Sascha, we (as a project) get patches that take *years* to commit. Since I feel like the newbie in this war, I'll put it this way: 1. It doesn't matter if the code "works". 2. It doesn't matter if *you* "really need it". 3. It doesn't matter how long it takes, doing the hasty wrong thing is worse then "doing nothing". I sugest you chill, and watch a few good movies or read a book. (You too, Zeev). I recommend _Gödel, Escher, and Bach, The eternal Golden braid_, and if you've read that, try Joyce's _Ulysses_ or the movies in the Wim Wenders section of your local movie rental store.

And I certainly don't want to burn all

    the dynamic of the PHP project by sitting around and hoping
    that you "may" change your license at some undetermined point
    in the future.  Thanks, but no.

I hate the license too. (Check the archives if ya want...) It's not like it's unchangeable, though..... However, it can't be changed by attacking somebody publicly. That's a really bad way of trying to do something. It _can_ be changed by respecting an author's work, and appealing to their sense of community, their sense of collaboration, their love of code, of the language(s), and by providing them with other channels for income. -Bop [1]STFU=Shut The Fuck Up. --2D426F70|759328624|00101101010000100110111101110000 ron@opus1.com, 520-326-6109, http://www.opus1.com/ron/ The opinions expressed in this email are not necessarily those of myself, my employers, or any of the other little voices in my head.