Messages in this thread |  | | Date | Sat, 09 Sep 2000 22:13:14 -0600 | From | "Jeff V. Merkey" <> | Subject | Re: Availability of kdb |
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Linus Torvalds wrote:
> > I think you missed the point of my original reply completely. > > The _technical_ side of the tool in question is completely secondary. > > The social engineering side is very real, and immediate. > > It's not whether you can use tools to do the work. > > It's about what kind of people you get. >
Linus,
I think everyone respects your opinion here, but it's the difference between a paintbrush and a spray can. Some artists paint with a camel hair brush, some paint with a spray can (like an air brush artist does) -- graffitti artists are even more crude, and use a spray can and a concrete wall.
Putting in kdb or anything else as a config option for "make config" won't matter one way or the other relative to the development or "weeding out" of kernel developers. After all, you may want someone around who looks up at the sky every once and a while for asteroids heading towards earth.
One thing that will happen if you do this is that Linux kernel evolution will explode, since the debugger will act a lot like ultra-violet radiation, and cause myriad Linux mutations to appear rapidly. Darwinsm relies on two principals to work - random mutations, and environmental pressure. Your analogy describes only one side -- encironmental pressure, while on the other you are limiting the process of mutation.
If you require that all Linux kernel work be "aryan" (not meant to offend anyone in Germany), and all Linux code must have blue eyes and blonde hair, this process will not promote the other side of the equation, since the process of mutation is in essence halted. Breeding with dogs and horses over centuries has proven this. Pure bred dogs suffer from a long list of genetic maladies due to in-breeding and line-breeding, such a abiotrophy, ataxia, and other problems.
:-)
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