'Pure technical contributions aren’t enough'.... Intel commits to code of conduct for open-source projects Chip maker Intel has embraced guidelines to make its open-source software projects more open-minded and inviting. Citing the company's commitment to creating inclusive communities, Imad Sousou, corporate veep and general manager of the Intel Open Source Technology Center, on Thursday said the center is adopting the Contributor …
"Chipzilla joins strangely controversial movement to encourage civility, inclusion"
It's controversial because CoC's are licenses to kill your opponents - the one's you already hate.
I haven't looked at the "Contributor Covenant" yet, it may read just wonderful.
I ask simply this, how many times has it been used like blasphemy accusations in Pakistan, as a lethal weapon?
"I ask simply this, how many times has it been used like blasphemy accusations in Pakistan, as a lethal weapon?"
Well, the contributor covenant has no clause requiring the use of the death penalty. Even if it did, in most of the jurisdictions in which it is used, this would be considered to be a unfair contract and therefore not enforceable.
So, in simple answer to your question, it's never been used as a lethal weapon.
> Pure technical contributions aren’t enough – we need interpersonal skills as well
rather discriminatory against those who lack interpersonal skills? if you're contributing purely technically, then you're not breaking the code of conduct, surely. not every developer who wants to contribute wants to engage interpersonally with the kinds of people who write contributor convenants, nor contravene such a convenant. you can do neither.
those who lack interpersonal skills
... are capable of learning them and deploying them when they're required. Noone is "contributing purely technically" - the world is not yet run by robots, noone has been assimilated, contributors have colleagues and the contribution is supposed in the end to result in some form of human benefit. The definition of "contribution" implies co-operation towards a larger goal. If you don't want to engage with other people, that's fine, but don't expect them to engage with you and accept your generous "contirbutions" or offer you any form of remuneration for them.
Likewise those with interpersonal skills are capable of learning technical skills but fail to do so...
Occasionally I would like a manager or a HR droid to actually understand what it is we are talking about and perhaps, just maybe, they should take some time to understand us rather than just complaining that engineers are blunt, and unthinking. NO we just don't lie to you when we tell you something that is inconvenient to your sensibilities
@ Warm Braw
"those who lack interpersonal skills
... are capable of learning them and deploying them when they're required."
Easier said than done when you have Aspergers, or exit somewhere else on the autism spectrum. You might learn the skills that everyone else demands you learn, rather than they offering to adapt a little to meet in the middle. Perhaps someone who is wheelchair bound can be demanded to fix it somehow so that they can climb multiple flights of stairs to save your annoyance in having to provide a lift or ramps.
Myself, I get totally drained having to fake who I am only to save neurotypicals from having to deal with the REAL ME. The real me bashes his head against a mental cage wanting to get out and simply relax.
He isnt a horrible person, just fed up of having to constantly think 10 steps ahead to try and decode neurotypicals hidden useless languages and signs they throw at each other. Constantly reminded that he exists on what feels like an alien planet he finds great relief in being very open and verbose on the internet, trying to avoid bringing emotion into the text unless he wants to share a laugh. Yes, he likes a laugh with people.
Watch the Imitation Game. Its message can apply to more than just A.I pretending to be human and humans pretending to not be homosexual. I play it every day.
Take this code of conduct out of what should be an open a free internet. Just ask people to be decent and nice as much as possible and leave it at that. Those who are not decent and nice all the time can be ignored or the listener can grow a thicker skin and deal with it whatever makes more sense at the time.
Well, "not being a douchebag" is an "interpersonal skill". You don't need to learn anything new... unless you are a douchebag. And then you need to learn how not to be a douchebag.
You don't need to meaningfully interact with anyone at all beyond your technical contributions. You don't need to learn the horror that is small talk. You don't need to follow sports. You don't need to learn how to "bond" with people on a "profound emotional and spirital level". Ain't nobody got time for dat.
All that is required is that technical contributions are submitted in a civil, calm, respectful way. Winning!
"Well, "not being a douchebag" is an "interpersonal skill". You don't need to learn anything new... unless you are a douchebag. And then you need to learn how not to be a douchebag."
Yeah, absolutely. While you're at it, you can stop being gay as well, right? You need to learn how not to be gay, that's all.
It's almost as if the last few decades of awareness of mental illness didn't happen.
>It's almost as if the last few decades of awareness of mental illness didn't happen.
Don't equate 'being a douchebag' with mental illness. A few douchebags may be suffering from mental illness, but most are just douchebags - while most sufferers of mental illness can be delightful.
"Don't equate 'being a douchebag' with mental illness. A few douchebags may be suffering from mental illness, but most are just douchebags - while most sufferers of mental illness can be delightful."
I'm not. But unless you have a lot of experience with mental illness (and given our current understanding, probably not even then), you probably cannot tell the two apart.
So, in other words, a way to eliminate competition for wrongthink and thought-police everyone else. Lovely.
While you shouldn't act like a dick or ask others to put up with someone being a dick, these things are just a way for people fluent in HR-speak and manglementese to eliminate people they feel are a threat to their agenda using the banner of inclusion and diversity. Can't have precious feelings getting hurt now can we? Unless you happen to be white, a man, or heterosexual, then you're the unholy trinity and can go fuck yourself.
There's something I've learned from working in the real world, rarely does a place that actually gives a shit about diversity and inclusion have to shout about it unless someone's using it as a way to get rid of threats to their position. I don't see AMD going "full SJW" (I hate the term but if the shoe fits) and they're run by a middle aged Asian woman.
And its cute that Intel's doing this. Go to any of their Fabs and take a look at just who's working there. All the empty virtue signaling in the world doesn't change the fact that they ran a lot of women out in the past couple of years while keeping a CEO around who had been fucking one of the female techs that they laid off.
“Chip maker Intel has embraced guidelines to make its open-source software projects more open-minded and inviting .. The move follows a series of conflicts within open source projects”
Such conflicts being concocted by interlopers from the feminazi movement, which will end up driving away top developers fed up with issues of diversity. Such accusations of misbehavior being a cynical ploy by the sisters to have representatives of the patriarchy removed from positions of influence and replace with those subscribing to similar ideological bent. What happened to Bret Weinstein and his wife* Heather Heying being a prime example. The controversy being that, in a private email he opposed a compulsory white 'day of absence' proposed by the students. This was leaked by the recipient and eventually ended up with a mini-riot and Weinstein being hunted through the grounds of Evergreen by the so-called students. The gutless head of the facility called off the police and congratulated the students for their contribution. Weinstein and his wife were eventually forced out. All this over expressing an opinion in a *private* email. You engage with the diversity crowd at your peril.
* Wife .. sorry that should of course be partner, wife being a signifier of the historical oppression of women by the patriarchy bla bla bla ..
"the feminazi movement"
You kinda destroy any point you make by using this sort of language, like something straight out of a tragic 4chan manual. It makes you sound bitter and nonconstructive - basically, someone others wouldn't want to work with, anyway.
"will end up driving away top developers"
Yeah, nah. No it won't. CoCs lay out what is and isn't acceptable behavior in a project team. The only folks, in my view, getting really upset with them are the types of people who'll regularly break the CoC by being an arse to others.
C.
> The only folks, in my view, getting really upset with them are the types of people who'll regularly break the CoC by being an arse to others.
No the type of people who get upset about CoC's are those who realise that the definition of 'being an arse' is entirely subjective, and someone somewhere can claim, anonymously, that I'm 'being an arse'. I would have no recourse other than to accept guilt, even if I don't believe I am guilty, or prepare to be doxxed and have my career probably ruined.
There's an assumption in, at least the CoC adopted by Linux, that people are native English speakers (ever conversed with a Russian in English? they can be quite blunt; not because they're rude or 'being an arse' but because that's how Russian is), have spent some time in San Francisco, and are actually capable of what is considered 'normal' conversation (it's not very friendly to people with autism or other communication difficulties).
This is a document that demands inclusivity yet its own rules will likely exclude those very people who are drawn to writing computer software.
"the definition of 'being an arse' is entirely subjective"
Well, it's not too subjective - it's about not excluding someone unfairly, and treating each other with civility, etc. I dunno if you've noticed but the laws of the land are also subjective in places.
Where or when does defamation begin? Threatening behavior? Disorderly conduct? Assault? Life isn't black and white; programmers love seeing things in black and white, and, well, there's the rub.
C.
> CoCs lay out what is and isn't acceptable behavior in a project team.
Used to, some still do. For instance my company's code of conduct says you conduct yourself with professionalism, courtesy, honour and respect. It says we do not take nor offer bribes, we protect our customers' secrets, data and reputation, and it says you will not be blamed for fuck-ups (save malice or gross negligence).
What it doesn't say is what anyone should or should not think, vote, or like.
In my line of work we have Russian orthodox people working side by side with Dutch homosexuals in Saudi Arabia and it is very simple: everyone respects everyone else. Regardless of what else they may be, they are your colleagues first.
The subject of this article is not a code of conduct, it is a political manifesto, and as someone else said above, organisations coming up with these are usually the ones that have an inherently intolerant culture that they want to preserve. See Mozilla and Brendan Eich for instance, and show me where are Mozilla's Russian orthodoxes or Nigerian Christians¹ and how many homosexuals they have working in Saudi Arabia.
¹ We also have them. Pain in the arse when they start singing religious songs, but they're good at what they do.
"Yeah, nah. No it won't. CoCs lay out what is and isn't acceptable behavior in a project team. The only folks, in my view, getting really upset with them are the types of people who'll regularly break the CoC by being an arse to others."
I take offence at you describing people with varieties of autism and therefore unable to easily read social cues as 'being an arse'. Pursuant to the CoC that El Reg clearly doesn't have, based on the conversations that happen here, you should be fired.
CoCs are the modern-day Cardinal Richelieu.
I went and read the thing, and when you strip out the bla bla you're left with :
* Using welcoming and inclusive language
* Being respectful of differing viewpoints and experiences
* Gracefully accepting constructive criticism
* Focusing on what is best for the community
* Showing empathy towards other community members
As far as I can tell, there's nothing there to get all in arms about. In fact, I'm already respecting this covenant at the workplace. So I see no problem, it's just about writing down how a basic human being should behave.
Thae problem is as follows:
"Using welcoming and inclusive language"
As defined by whom? Here's a guess: whoever hates you and wants you gone.
"Gracefully accepting constructive criticism"
Only applies to you, not to anyone with power who wants you gone.
And so on. Codes of conduct are nearly always put there as a method of forcing out undesirables. The definition of undesirable is whoever in power does not want to be around.
"As defined by whom?"
Normally a committee, consisting of a number of members of the community. It a similar process that would apply to censure of a developer who routinely submitted poor documentation for their work. Or, indeed, poor code. It's hard to make an objective judgement about either of these things either.
"The definition of undesirable is whoever in power does not want to be around."
Actually, the intention of a CoC is the opposite of this. It's to put forward an explicit definition of what an undesirable is. How successful they are at achieving this, I don't know. If you have any data beyond the anecdotal about this, it would be interesting to see.
"There is no such thing as 'poor code' in the post-meritocracy world."
The idea behind the "post-meritocracy" is that we should get passed the point where we can use spurious or ill-defined notions of "merit" to justify what ever kind of injustice or nastiness we want.
The way that "meritocracy" is used is pretty close to the "divine right of kings". Good code, bad code, of course, still exists. I write both, and sometimes unable to distinguish between the two. That makes me pretty normal I guess.
No, the idea of meritocracy is very simple: it doesn't matter who you are, does your contribution do what it is meant to do with as little cruft and structural weakness as possible? If yes, it passes. If no, go back and do it again.
Post-meritocracy is an attempt to force consideration of identity when assessing a contribution. The fact that you are a black trans otherkin means you are considered more oppressed, therefore underrepresented, and therefore your contribution should not be held to the same standard as others so you get a "fair" outcome, even if your contribution is shit.
"No, the idea of meritocracy is very simple: it doesn't matter who you are, does your contribution do what it is meant to do with as little cruft and structural weakness as possible? If yes, it passes. If no, go back and do it again."
None of which is objectively measurable -- if it were, we could write a program to measure it. If we could do that, we could replace the programmer with a random code generator. So, all of these things require using judgement.
And, of course, you seem to have the slightly strange idea that only code function counts. What about someone who is capable of producing a clear and coherent API? With great documentation? Or someone with the vision to understand that you had the wrong idea about "what it is meant to do" all along and that really, you should do something else.
Developing a good piece of software is not just programming, any more than programming is typing.
>None of which is objectively measurable -- if it were, we could write a program to measure it.
They're called unit tests.
> If we could do that, we could replace the programmer with a random code generator. So, all of these things require using judgement.
... and here we see someone who evidently doesn't understand how software development works.
"They're called unit tests."
And how do we write these? And how do we judge the quality of our unit tests?
"we see someone who evidently doesn't understand how software development works."
That's fine. Feel free to dismiss my position if you want. If you really think that "my unit tests are working" is equivalent to "good code", then I will probably not convince you otherwise.
quote: The way that "meritocracy" is used is pretty close to the "divine right of kings".
Utter drivel, can you read a dictionary: "meritocracy": a society governed by people selected according to merit.
Completely the fucking opposite to "devine right of kings", a king is a king even if hes a fucking idiot (see pretty much all of them), just like a "president" is elected even if hes a fucking idiot (please see bush/trump).
Are you sure you write both?
"meritocracy": a society governed by people selected according to merit.
Where "merit" is defined in what way?
"divine right of kings"
Where "merit" is defined as the person most wanted by God.
The circularity in the argument of "meritocracy" happens because we don't have a clear definition for merit. As a result, we can look at most environments and say "well, this environment is very unrepresentative selection of the population, but that's because it's a meritocracy".
You're being a deliberately obtuse pseudo-intellectual. Merit in this case is derived from creating code that meets the requirements of the software, be it in being bug-free, speed of production, speed of execution, use of resources, quality of documentation or extensibility/maintainability (or any combination of the above).
"Merit in this case is derived from creating code that meets the requirements of the software"
Determining what the requirements actually are by interacting with users of the code. Being an advocate for any systems that are produced. Training down stream users. Interacting with other stake holders to demonstrate the value of the system. Providing calm and rapid management of the system when it has and outage. Ensuring that any UI (or API) is clean, clear and highly usable. Operating within a regulatory framework. Ensuring that all members of a team can work well with each other. Providing a support environment for incoming contributors.
All of these are relevant to the success of a project. This is why "meritocracy" is a low value term. Everyone can have their own ideas about what merit is. You have told me what your notion of merit is; that's okay but it seems a bit narrow to me. So, we can move beyond this: you are arguing that ability to code is the most or only important contribution to a software project; I am arguing that it is not.
> Good code, bad code, of course, still exists. I write both, and sometimes unable to distinguish between the two.
Great, but some who does point out your bad code is pretty much putting their career on the line if you should choose to take 'offence' to having it pointed out.
"Normally a committee, consisting of a number of members of the community. It a similar process that would apply to censure of a developer who routinely submitted poor documentation for their work. Or, indeed, poor code. It's hard to make an objective judgement about either of these things either"
The problem is the sort of person who wants to volunteer for that sort of committee is always the same - PC, anti-free speech, anti-differing opinions, unable to understand anything from outside their own culture so leaves no room for anyone different from themselves.
"The problem is the sort of person who wants to volunteer for that sort of committee is always the same"
Well, then, it looks like the problem is at least in part the people who do not volunteer.
"so leaves no room for anyone different from themselves"
Could be a problem. And if that happens, we may end up with tech being dominated by a group of people who are extremely poorly representative of the population at large. Who knows where that would lead?
When you strip out the bla bla you ignore the most important and nefarious part of the contributor convenant: the "our responsibilities" section
Project maintainers have the right and responsibility to remove, edit, or reject comments, commits, code, wiki edits, issues, and other contributions that are not aligned to this Code of Conduct, or to ban temporarily or permanently any contributor for other behaviours that they deem inappropriate, threatening, offensive, or harmful.
This right here gives the enforcers of this covenant the self-declared right to remove people from a project for private, personal behaviours and opinions. The subsequent "scope" section appears to limit this to public behaviour, but even that gives itself enough wiggle-room for redefinition, and the "responsibilities" section pretty much allows that to be overridden anyway.
Given the creator of the contributor covenant has explicitly declared it to be a political document, and has gleefully exclaimed her hatred of white males whilst gloating that they're all going to be driven out of the projects that adopt her covenant, and considers contribution based on merit to be a myth, there is a great deal to dislike about both the motivation and application of this contributor covenant in any open source project.
> Project maintainers have the right and responsibility to remove, edit, or reject comments, commits, code, wiki edits, issues, and other contributions that are not aligned to this Code of Conduct
Interesting sentence. It openly states they take on the power to edit comments from others. Deleting or hiding is one thing but editing what others have written because of a perceived inappropriateness lands in the middle of the land of Orwell's 1984.
>I went and read the thing, and when you strip out the bla bla you're left with :
And I provide translation
>* Using welcoming and inclusive language
... to us
>* Being respectful of differing viewpoints and experiences
... as long as the viewpoints are approved by us and us alone.
>* Gracefully accepting constructive criticism
... always from us.
>* Focusing on what is best for the community
... specifically our community.
>* Showing empathy towards other community members
... that is, our members.
The power lies in reality with those that has the power over the definitions.
The post says "I went and read the thing, and when you strip out the bla bla you're left with :" and then
lists are series of innocuous requirements. the problem is this is not all the covenant says. It starts with
This is after an introuction page stating that the goal is to increase diversity defined as more women and people of colour and that meritocracy is a problem that needs to be overcome.
The covenant itself then says:
"In the interest of fostering an open and welcoming environment, we as contributors and maintainers pledge to making participation in our project and our community a harassment-free experience for everyone, regardless of age, body size, disability, ethnicity, sex characteristics, gender identity and expression, level of experience, education, socio-economic status, nationality, personal appearance, race, religion, or sexual identity and orientation."
It obviously depends on what constitutes harassment is but you can see how thsi is going to be used.
the selelction of experienced well educated developers for leadership roles will be objected to on th grounds of race or sex. Contributions from allegedly oppressed groups rejected on the grounds of being badly written or poorly designed will be identified as exampes of harassment.
Clearly this is a document designed to facilitate and encourage racist and sexist discrimination. Everybody should be treated with respect and encouraged and all decisions on who performs what roles should be on the basis of merit alone.
It is staggering that when most interaction is via the internet and sex and race is unknown this sort of blatantly discriminatory code of conduct is considered necessary. Intel should be ashamed.
* Using welcoming and inclusive language - This seems to suggest that I must meet and greet them offering sweets and cups of tea, rather than getting to the point and moving on. Sure I agree swearing may be not a very good thing to do but I respectfully wont bend over backwards to welcome them into my virtual home/office and offer a virtual biscuit, chit chat about the weather, then talk about why their module needs to be updated to use the patched version of a library.
* Being respectful of differing viewpoints and experiences - That can never be expected to work every time. I may be right, they may be wrong and are stubborn enough to act like an ostrich when you tell them. I know, I was the ostrich and its an instinct, not a choice, but I grew out of it. You may also be talking to someone who literally annoys you just because of the way they eat their lunch while talking. Does this CoC also demand you dont eat with your mouth full? My family did, so dont expect me to be very respectful after a point of you spurting chewed sandwich at me for too long a time.
* Gracefully accepting constructive criticism - This is a nice idea but unfortunately you cant just demand it. This seems to assume that after getting constructive criticism that you are making a deliberate decision to not accept it. Many people simply cant handle it so the person giving the criticism should consider an alternative such as dropping hints that something is up in the code here and its doing this rather than that and could they have a good look and see if they can figure it out.
* Focusing on what is best for the community - This is fine but dont oust those who try to tell the community its going in totally the wrong direction.
* Showing empathy towards other community members - Again, nice I suppose but you cant make the mistake of thinking that empathy is a universal thing.
I'm a bloody good programmer and gay and sick and tired of macho white heterosexuals offending everyone and everything that doesn't conform to their norm. I'm sick and tired of being dismissed because of being gay. So if a coc is going to drive out those stone-age macho white heteroaexuals I say bring on the f-ing coc's. And a big thank you to those neanderthals who quit their job because of them, the world is a much better place without you!
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