@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

Di4na

@Di4na@hachyderm.io

SRE. Elixir Dev. Learner in Resiliency. French.
All Opinions are my own. And i have a lot.

Co-Founder and President Haruspex.dev

dom. He/him.

Blog: Softwaremaxims.com

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Di4na, to random
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

For everyone that calls for ways to make open source more secure, or for all their magical solutions that will provide money and resources to FOSS maintainers, please read this.

This is a rare account of the reality of maintainers, things that are hard, but also how much knowledge and niche expertise you need for anything in there.

That is why just giving money to experts will not help that much. It is too hard to train experts in this. But we may make it easier

http://rhaas.blogspot.com/2024/05/hacking-on-postgresql-is-really-hard.html

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

Like, whatever your scheme is, it needs to take something like this into account
"There's one particular patch I remember committing - I won't mention which one - where I spent weeks and weeks of time reviewing the patch before committing it, and after committing it, I lost most of the next six to nine months fixing things I hadn't caught during review"

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@Paxxi I mean maybe, but the problem is that once you do the maths on how much money you need to get there, the sustainability become... Surprisingly hard.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@nicemicro I mean possibly, but then are you sure we would keep paying for the 9 months of fixing mistakes?

Also once you do the maths on the amount of money needed to get there, will we still be able to get that money sustainably?

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@stevel and even with lot of really rigorous reviews, it is still massively demanding to stabilize features.

We cannot consider reviews enough, it demands too much of the humans

mahryekuh, to random
@mahryekuh@fosstodon.org avatar

Open source contributors, what did you wish you knew when you started contributing? Or is there something that kept you from contributing for too long?

I am asking for a presentation, which I will give in two weeks.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@mahryekuh That build systems are really that broken. Yes, it is normal to take 5x the time to make the feature to get the build system to work.

That tests are definitely optional, nearly nothing at the low level have them. Don't sweat it, get the things out.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@mahryekuh I mean at least you got time to add some.

I think most people do not realise how painful and engineer-time intensive maintaining a build system for FOSS is.

And tests are then another hell, because they need special support in the build system.

And even worse when you do low level stuff. Testing C is a nightmare.

Di4na, to random
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

If you are on the board of an organization, you accepted a role of leadership. You may not think you did, and that is ok, misunderstanding happen. But when it comes time to do the role you signed up for, at least try to do it.

After the crisis, yes you can abdicate. But starting with abdication, you better accept that no one will ever respect you again.

luis_in_brief, to random
@luis_in_brief@social.coop avatar

This sentiment is such a recurring sentiment for so many people who try to work in good faith with open communities. That sucks.
https://mastodon.social/@migurski/112360700602208937

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@luis_in_brief @grimalkina This is a well-known thing at this point. Openness can cost a lot; the moderation problem is not limited to FB. But we rarely equip our FOSS teams, especially the ones backed by big companies, with moderation teams and support.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@grimalkina @luis_in_brief I do not disagree, but I also think that this is only the visible part of the iceberg.

A frigton of opensource, by far the vast majority of it, is a person doing this a couple hours a month in the middle of nowhere, with a really niche skillset.

And in this situation, it is not "saintly appointed few", it is whoever had enough free time and mental space and privilege and interest in a really "hobbyistic" thing that end up the few.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@grimalkina @luis_in_brief and then that model is reused in vastly different situations, and we get into what you really well describes.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@grimalkina @luis_in_brief like, it is not because I am scared of not being techy that i had problems going against the great man in my domain. It is because noone else than this great man had the privilege to spend time on it. Going against him would have achieved nothing.

And at some point i became the part going against him and the current expected result by everyone is that the tech that seemed able to make things better will disappear.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@grimalkina @luis_in_brief If we want the system to change, and I want to, we need to go deeper than "cultural". There are systemic reasons we end up in these toxic and harmful patterns.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@grimalkina @luis_in_brief (and by moderation, i mostly meant being able to push out the Appointed Few)

mcc, to random
@mcc@mastodon.social avatar

Just opened my ThinkPad and for the second time in three days the act of closing the laptop to sleep it, then opening it again had caused Ubuntu to hardlock. This time I got a very brief small printout about "amd ring 0 error", then it went back to a black screen and I had to hold down the power button again.

I thought getting a ThinkPad, getting AMD cpu/gpu and picking the Linux distro Lenovo lists as supported would mean I got a minimally functioning computer but I guess not.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@mcc tbf. This is not a linux problem. Windows get fucked the same by Modern Standby!

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@mcc I mean, Linux is better than it used to be, so I would argue it was ruined from the start and is slowly unruining itself :D

cstross, to random
@cstross@wandering.shop avatar

My current nightmare is that the Tories will be hammered so hard this Thursday that the back benches will run a leadership challenger against Sunak ...

… And the party rank and file will then vote Liz Truss in again as party leader.

She's had a year to lick her wounds and work out what she did wrong, and in her tiny mind it can only be that she didn't do everything fast enough and hard enough.

So we'll get a Liz Truss equivalent of the US Republicans' Project 2025.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@cstross I mean, would she survive to day3? because "fuck pension funds" sounds ok until that starts to happen....

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@cstross Not wrong, but also the moment your pension fund calls you to tell you, "So you will not get a payment ever anymore", it kinda focuses the mind. And after the last time, I am not sure the funds would not do that.

Also technically, you only need enough MP to panic to block her. It is not like it is a big majority rn....

mcc, to random
@mcc@mastodon.social avatar

Does anyone want to take this moment to convince me that I should use Guix instead of [Nix or a Nix hardfork]? Or otherwise, convince me that I should use [Nix or a Nix hardfork] instead of Guix? It is okay to be a Reply Person about this. I am giving you an invitation.

https://hachyderm.io/@jakehamilton/112355361353931366

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@mcc If you are happy about Scheme, I don't think one is far different from the other. I consider Lisp a really cool idea not great for mass use, but that is personal. So honestly, just use whatever ?

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@mcc I mean that is a fair one. I think it is a strange mix of ML and JSON. But I cannot not like an ML. (do more things like ML other languages please)

It is not bad, but some days I would love to have something a bit better specified (Dhall is a direction that point to interesting things).

But well. Scheme :D

coni2k, to opensource
@coni2k@mastodon.social avatar

Tragedy of the Digital Commons by Chinmayi Sharma 💯

One of the most extensive analyses discussing the issues around the open source ecosystem and why governments should get involved to address them effectively. It places a solid and much-needed emphasis on the prevalent Free-rider problem in providing public goods.

"... interventions that rely on voluntary participation have not and will not succeed." 💯

1/3

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4245266

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@coni2k I will be honest. I understand the moral appeal to the free rider point.

But it is a dangerous and bad idea to bring it as a legitimate problem.

The free rider way is the only way for FOSS infra to work sustainably. Bringing corp in destroy the efficiency of the model at the engineering level. And it destroy the efficiency of the model at the economic level.

And I do not mean that paying devs would be too expensive.

But the work to make it legible to corp would be far too high.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@coni2k what made foss work is that devs at the lowest level of corp can use it without talking to legal or procurement. Reversing that, even a little bit, would make software orders of magnitude more expensive.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@coni2k I do not disagree but I will simply add again. You do not need to invoke the (highly dubious) "free rider problem" for that.

I would also recommend something else than VAT, as VAT is paid mostly by end user and is highly regressive.

But that is a different discussion.

edcrypt, to elixir
@edcrypt@mastodon.coffee avatar

If a long time Pythonista wants to finally dive into , where should they start?

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@corpsmoderne @edcrypt this. Really. They work

NanoRaptor, to random
@NanoRaptor@bitbang.social avatar

As I just posted elsewhere online:

“Oh my fucking god is this how thinking should work?!? What the hell. What the fuck. You all didn’t have this all the time did you? And not tell me?”

First adhd medication dose. This is really, really clear.

Di4na,
@Di4na@hachyderm.io avatar

@NanoRaptor yeaaaaaaah. I went to cry when I realised.

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