5 ms·

What happens when Linus retires (or god forbid dies)? He can't defuse those situations forever, there needs to be some sort of process.

tsimionescu 2y ago
Someone will have to take over Linus' role. There's no way that kernel development can work without a person in charge, at least not in anyway that is remotely similar to today.
- adastra22 2y ago
  Not being remotely similar to today could be a very good thing.
  - robertlagrant 2y ago
    If you can point to a better model of a more successful kernel that would be interesting to read about.
    - adastra22 2y ago
      FreeBSD? But there is nothing fundamentally different in open-source project management between a kernel and any other large open-source project. The linux code base is the largest, but not by a large margin. Chrome, GCC, OpenOffice, Android (excluding the linux part obvs.), and the various BSDs are all comparable in scope, complexity, lines of code, and number of contributors. Only linux is (in)famous for having a toxic and unproductive culture.
  - markhahn 2y ago
    Odd. Linux is by far the most/largest/longest successful project. Or do you have a counterexample?
    - adastra22 2y ago
      I assume we're only comparing to operating systems, as I would say that e.g. Chrome as an open-source project is just as impactful if not more so. But generally speaking the Linux support experience is decidedly worse than *BSD or any proprietary OS. It is much harder to get patches upstreamed, and many hardware have errata that never get fixed. (If you haven't experienced this, it might be because companies like canonical and red hat maintain their own patches to support their customers.)
      - account42 2y ago
        > But generally speaking the Linux support experience is decidedly worse than *BSD or any proprietary OS. Going to have to disagree on that one.
  - account42 2y ago
    Good for who? External parties that want to force their vision of what the project should be?

tsimionescu 2y ago

Someone will have to take over Linus' role. There's no way that kernel development can work without a person in charge, at least not in anyway that is remotely similar to today.

adastra22 2y ago
Not being remotely similar to today could be a very good thing.
- robertlagrant 2y ago
  If you can point to a better model of a more successful kernel that would be interesting to read about.
  - adastra22 2y ago
    FreeBSD? But there is nothing fundamentally different in open-source project management between a kernel and any other large open-source project. The linux code base is the largest, but not by a large margin. Chrome, GCC, OpenOffice, Android (excluding the linux part obvs.), and the various BSDs are all comparable in scope, complexity, lines of code, and number of contributors. Only linux is (in)famous for having a toxic and unproductive culture.
- markhahn 2y ago
  Odd. Linux is by far the most/largest/longest successful project. Or do you have a counterexample?
  - adastra22 2y ago
    I assume we're only comparing to operating systems, as I would say that e.g. Chrome as an open-source project is just as impactful if not more so. But generally speaking the Linux support experience is decidedly worse than *BSD or any proprietary OS. It is much harder to get patches upstreamed, and many hardware have errata that never get fixed. (If you haven't experienced this, it might be because companies like canonical and red hat maintain their own patches to support their customers.)
    - account42 2y ago
      > But generally speaking the Linux support experience is decidedly worse than *BSD or any proprietary OS. Going to have to disagree on that one.
- account42 2y ago
  Good for who? External parties that want to force their vision of what the project should be?