Re: The <whatever> developer syndrome

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On Monday 06 October 2003 10:32, James Richard Tyrer wrote:
> > I'm not going to have a war of words here, pick a word or three which
> > means "something one does in their spare time for fun" and I will be
> > happy :-)
>
> And the attitude is the difference here.  If you have a professional
> attitude, then the term "fun" would probably not apply.  And, I hope that
> contributors to the project are interested in more than having "fun".

you've never known a professional who had fun doing what they did? to me fun 
is not a swear word, nor the epitome of waste; it is (for me) a necessary 
part of a sane life and the true creative experience. it may be otherwise to 
you, and that's totally fine (not that it requires my permission, of 
course ;). i would not demand that you have fun; i also desire for you to not 
request that i relinquish my enjoyment so as to make *my* experience fit 
*your* expectations. furthermore, my path (with which you may disagree with) 
may end up leading to the exact destination you are striving for (and vice 
versa). 

there is more than your one answer to the question of life.

> > Whilst most open source developers have their own agendas as to why they
> > are developing the things that they are, I think the overwhelming
> > majority would not do it if it was not pleasurable.
>
> Yes, I agree.  They wouldn't do it unless they enjoyed it.  But, this
> (enjoy) may mean very different things to different people

indeed...

> >>as for people[1] who feel compelled to needlessly criticize others
> >>regularly, openly and without providing constructive, realistic
> >>solutions/thoughts, they are one of the sorts of people i prefer to
> >> simply avoid in life: the sort who will tear down any structure no
> >> matter how beautiful simply to satisfy their own insecurity.
>
> To state the obvious: what this means is greatly dependent on his
> definition of 'needlessly' and 'criticize'.  People have a tendency to fail
> to understand the actual meaning of 'criticize'.

actually, you failed to note the important part of the sentence that outlines 
the intended definitions within this context: "regularly, openly and without 
providing constructive, realistic solutions/thoughts". i think that's pretty 
clear and definitive?

> > To be fair, I think that there is a catergory of people who simply do not
> > quite understand what is and isn't accepted behaviour in open source
> > development, the usual breach of etiquette being to try and impose their
> > own personal view of the project on everyone else in the project. And
> > when they find that people do not take kindly to this, they vent their
> > frustrations in colorful ways.
>
> I think that I understand you to understand that Aaron is doing the exact
> same thing that he accuses me of: "impose" his "personal view of the
> project on everyone else" -- the only difference being that his view of the
> project is different than mine.

not at all; you are free to experience KDE as you wish and i would not wish to 
try and change that. at the same time i won't accept bullshit aimed in my 
direction, and that includes repeatedly hearing about the supposed low level 
of professionalism from someone who themselves, IMO, lacks professional 
respect. if you doubt that judgement of yourself, i ask you to find someone 
who has started or engaged in more flamewars on KDE lists. 

i think it's great that you are contributing to Free Software, but that's a 
completely orthoganal set of feelings. =)

> I think that my professional attitude means that the enjoyment I get from
> programing is different -- it is certainly different from having "fun".  It
> is the self satisfaction obtained from doing the job well.

this is where i find a disconnect with you. note that the term "disconnect" 
does not mean "you are bad" or "i'm better than you", it just means that 
there is a failure to connect. let me elucidate:

when you say your "professional attitude" (which is a positive self-judgement) 
means you get a different enjoyment and that it is the self-satisfaction 
obtained from doing the job well (which is another positive self-judgement), 
you imply that those you are contrasting yourself with either don't get 
satisfaction from a job well done (masochists? poor self image? 
unsatisfiable?), or just simply don't do the job well. you frame it so as to 
say that your experience is different than those having "fun", and that those 
who are having "fun" aren't doing their job well.

i happen to know a lot of the people in Free Software, and KDE in particular, 
who have fun doing what they do and manage to do a damn fine (and 
professional) job of it _simultaneously_.

this makes me feel that while you may have a good grasp on what makes you 
tick, you don't have an equal grasp on what makes others tick. which is fine 
with me, so long as you don't go pointing your misaligned personality 
crucible anywhere in my general direction.

on the flip side, perhaps this is not what you mean to get across at all. 
perhaps you are trying to say something profound and profoundly different 
than what i'm hearing. in which case trying to communicate it differently 
would be helpful, because i think it's fairly evident that if everyone is 
misunderstanding you, that your current choice of words simply isn't working 
for you. i'm not sure i am misunderstanding you, however.

- -- 
Aaron J. Seigo
GPG Fingerprint: 8B8B 2209 0C6F 7C47 B1EA  EE75 D6B7 2EB1 A7F1 DB43
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