| To: | "David Grove" <pete [...] petes-place.com> |
| Cc: | "Perl5-Porters [...] Perl. Org" <perl5-porters [...] perl.org> |
| Subject: | Re: Ugly little beastie |
| From: | merlyn [...] stonehenge.com (Randal L. Schwartz) |
| Date: | 04 Apr 2000 05:54:12 -0700 |
Show quoted text
>>>>> "David" == David Grove <pete@petes-place.com> writes:
Show quoted textDavid> Clear: 5.6 was released too soon, with many features unfinished
David> or unstable. Even Tom (intermingled with other, shall we say,
David> somewhat bigotrous statements, and immodest, irrelevant
David> commentary) and Sarathy have said this in clear words. Others
David> have admitted this, and questioned it, as well, but I think the
David> statements of these two are enough.
If this is the basis for your following arguments, you built your
house of cards on a wobbly card-table, which Larry has already walked
by and bumped. Poof.
It can always be said for any release of Open Source software that it
has arguably "many features unfinished or unstable". Wait, strike
that -- let's just say "software". What's important is the ratio
between that list and the list of "finished and stable" features. In
this case, I think you can agree that 5.6.0 fixes and enhances *far
more* than it breaks. A net win.
So just don't use the bleeding edge "experimental" features in
production code. You won't miss them, because they *really* didn't
exist in 5.5.3.
You see conspiracy where none exists. I know Sarathy. Met him on a
few occasions, and he's clearly a straight-up guy. He's also doing
the world a big favor by having been the 5.6.0 pumpking.
You have an "anti-MS" bone to pick, but don't jab it in this direction
because of some money changing hands between MS and AS. I know that
neither Sarathy nor Larry would allow such unethical behavior. I
trust their judgement implicitly (and explicitly) on this point. If
you got to know the two of them, you'd agree. I'm pretty sure that a
man of Sarathy's stature and skillset would quit and go work for
someone else before being pressured to do anything around a public
Perl release.
(Aside: I recognize your irrational zeal about anti-MS, because I've
had the opportunity to watch hundreds of anti-Intel people come out of
the closet around me because of my ongoing legal battles. It's
amazing what someone is willing to disbelieve when they have an
agenda.)
Now all of this may have just informed you that I'm merely a member of
the conspiracy. In that case, you are paranoid and you should know
that your comments are unwelcome here and will probably be discounted
now and in the future. However, I hope that in the calmness of your
own private time, you can begin to understand that 5.6.0 came out when
it did at the appropriate time, and no coersive influence from MS or
AS management had any part in the decision. You may now go find other
windmills at which to tilt.