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Zen and the Art of Apache Maintenance
SilentBob4 writes "Apache recently held a week-end "infrathon" to sweep the dust out of the corners, squash a few old bugs, drink a wee bit of ale (maybe a wee bit more than a wee bit) and get their hands dirty with the Zen of maintaining their infrastructure. MadPenguin.org crashed the party in search of the secrets of getting into the "zone" while peeking into the grittiest of the nitty gritty with one of the darling projects of open source, Apache." From the article: "The guys that I interviewed were among some of the brightest minds in open source; Brian Behlendorf; Upayavira; Greg Stein; and Roy Fielding, all of whom are well known and regarded (or deserve to be). These guys have the skills to be Microsoft millionaires, but instead flew thousands of miles to sit slouching on couches and squatting on cushions hacking infrastructure maintenance for free, primarily just to hang out with each other, even though they could have done the same thing on line."
...like Lego toilets.
Really fascinating stuff, but I couldn't help mysef:
From the interview with Brian Behlendorf:
MP: What's the most important thing about this event?
BB: I'm not sure this is an event worthy of Slashdot [laughing]
Heh, you must be new here.
grammar-lesson free since 1999. (rescinded - 2005)
BB: I'm not sure this is an event worthy of Slashdot [laughing].
/. Your event stands a good chance of being posted two or three times over the next month.
Don't you worry yourself about what's worthy of
Wer mit Ungeheuern kämpft, mag zusehn, dass er nicht dabei zum Ungeheuer wird. --Nietzsche
"Subversion trees"
Like a Phone tree, right, only they're subversives!
(yes, sub-version, I know)
You're looking for quotes? See my journal.
IMHO, this is what sets OSS above/apart from The Microsoft Way. These guys got together over a weekend to do maintenance and fix bugs on a project they truly care about. The guys at MS only started fixing bugs when it became obvious that their ineptitude might cost them some of The Almighty Dollar.
...the fellows that keep the PostgreSQL server farm up and running. It seems like there's always something coming up - new releases, web page tweaks, PGFoundry activity, and all that. Props to Marc Fournier, Dave Page, Andrew Dunstan, and the other fellows who make things run smoothly!
The Army reading list
Maybe Chairman Bill doesn't "get" it because he's too busy answering press calls about his generosity in donating his billions to them poor brown people over there.
What is this elitist, racist bullshit? I can't even read the rest of the article now. Yes, let's flame someone for donating to poor people. He should put all of his money in a vault and go swimming Uncle Scrooge style and laugh at "them poor brown people" in his spare time. What. The. Fuck.
These guys have the skills to be Microsoft millionaires
Skills isn't the hard part. It's the timing.
Real journalism doesn't contain stupid shit like this: "Maybe Chairman Bill doesn't "get" it because he's too busy answering press calls about his generosity in donating his billions to them poor brown people over there."
There you go, simultaneously racist, stupid, and ignorant.
I think Bill's promise to give away 90+% of his net worth is more noble than anything any slashdotter will ever accomplish.
The OSS "community" has a bad reputation precisely because of ignorant stupid bullshit statements like that one.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Zen and the art of Motorcycle maintenance really has nothing to do with motorcycle maintenance. It's about Quality with a capital Q.
So can we please have fewer of these "Zen and the art of blahblahblah" books?
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.