Re: branching

[Mike Solomon]

On Dec 11, 2013, at 11:36 AM, David Kastrup <address@hidden> wrote:

> Mike Solomon <address@hidden> writes:
> 
>> I had coffee with a developer a year or so ago who told me that he
>> dropped out of the project because of commutation problems with David.
>> Last night I wrote to him to share some of these frustrations and he
>> wrote back: “as long as David is leading up the team, it’s a lost
>> cause, nothing has changed and his way of acting is too problematic,
>> independently of his technical excellence.”  I tend to conceive of
>> problems in terms of one, two, or many.  The problem here has reached
>> the “many" level and I think we need to find a solution that goes
>> beyond the individual.  List-etiquette policies, branching policies -
>> I’m open to trying anything.
> 
> [...]
> 
>> What I’d like to see is a situation where David can blow off steam
>> however he needs to, he doesn’t feel like people are ignoring him,
> 
> You are aware that the above are mutually exclusive?  If people consider
> any negative feedback as "blowing off steam", that exactly implies
> suggesting to ignore it.
> 
> If you take a look at the communications with you that escalated, the
> escalation happened _exactly_ because you did not take seriously what
> I said.  So I stated my point more strongly.

Your e-mail merits a thorough response, but I should state immediately a 
corollary to this.

I get negative feedback all the time from the community (we all do).  What I 
mean is that there is the component not to ignore (the content) and the 
component to ignore (any abrasiveness used in the transmission of the content). 
 Blowing off steam refers to the latter.  That said, the more abrasive 
communication gets, the more difficult it is to determine its content.

I always take what you say seriously - as seriously as any other developer.  I 
certainly don’t claim to always get it, and sometimes you may need to restate 
things because I don’t get them.  This restating may be frustrating for you, 
but it does not ever necessitate communication that would make people want to 
leave the project.

More to come after I read through your e-mail.

Cheers,
MS