Re: Preview: portable dumper

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Karl Fogel <address@hidden>
> Date: Fri, 02 Dec 2016 14:11:23 -0600
> 
> Following up to what John said, with a perspective that may be useful to Eli:

Thanks, but it isn't useful.  Why? because, like John, you don't think
that my opinion about the preferred solution to getting rid of unexec
is right.

What would be useful is a perspective from someone who understands the
issues and agrees with me about the preferred solution.  Because only
such a person can see the dilemma through my eyes, and only that
person can find the right words.

> When I was in a position similar to yours (one of a small group of core 
> co-maintainers, in the Subversion project), there were a few occasions when a 
> major technical decision went in a direction I didn't agree with.  My 
> disagreement was not of the "this will destroy the project" sort, but I did 
> feel the decisions were poor technical choices that could be a long-term drag 
> on the project -- creating extra maintenance work for existing developers, 
> and creating barriers to entry for new developers.  In other words, 
> objections very similar to yours now.

No, they aren't similar.  In cases like the one you describe, I
invariably seek a compromise or give in.  It's what you call "destroy
the project" thing that makes the difference.

> Your value as a maintainer is not lessened if a particular decision doesn't 
> go the way you recommended.  (Of course, if maintainership becomes 
> unenjoyable to you because of the decision, that's a different question, and 
> only you can make that call.)

"Unenjoyable"?  It's intolerable.  It would mean that on my watch
something happened that I believe is detrimental to a project which I
took upon myself to improve, and I saw it happening and didn't prevent
it.  Can you understand my plight?