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Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.misc Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!news.mira.net.au!news.netspace.net.au!serval.net.wsu.edu!netnews.nwnet.net!oracle.pnl.gov!osi-east2.es.net!lll-winken.llnl.gov!uwm.edu!math.ohio-state.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!pipex!uknet!cf-cm!isl.cf.ac.uk!paul From: paul@isl.cf.ac.uk (Paul Richards) Subject: Re: BSD CD-ROM : Walnet Creek or Infomagic ? Message-ID: <1995Jan16.150059.28252@cm.cf.ac.uk> Sender: paul@isl.cf.ac.uk (Paul Richards) Nntp-Posting-Host: isl-gate.elsy.cf.ac.uk Organization: ELSYM, University of Wales, College of Cardiff, UK. References: <3e8t0q$gnp@vishnu.jussieu.fr> <3etolp$2qr6@tiger2.ocs.lsu.edu> <D27p37.1E9@bonkers.taronga.com> <3ev742$52f@ivory.lm.com> Date: Mon, 16 Jan 1995 15:00:58 +0000 Lines: 54 In article <3ev742$52f@ivory.lm.com>, Peter Berger <peterb@telerama.lm.com> wrote: >In article <D27p37.1E9@bonkers.taronga.com>, >Peter da Silva <peter@bonkers.taronga.com> wrote: >>In article <3etolp$2qr6@tiger2.ocs.lsu.edu>, >>Matthew N. Dodd <mdodd@tiger.lsu.edu> wrote: >>>Wait a second! What reason is there to merge NetBSd and FreeBSD? >> >>Cynical but utterly realistic marketing considerations based on the impact >>on the distribution of both operating systems when they're perceived to >>be in frivolous competition. > >Greed. I want to be able to reap the benefit of the labors of -all- of the >Really Smart People (tm) who work on both of these projects. If they've >fragmented their efforts for no good reason, I can't. > Hmm, I'm wary of even replying to this thread but anyway, here's a few thoughts. The above popular belief is actually a misconception. Merging the two groups would NOT result in twice the manpower working on a single project. The reason being, personal differences apart, is that they are *volunteer* projects i.e. we do this for fun. Now when you think about things with that in mind you realise that people only work on the bits they're interested in and if someone else is already busily hacking on their favourite area of the system then really there's not much they can do. There are no overall managers of either group that say, well, you're favourite area is covered by someone else at the moment so go and work on this and there never will be because it's not possible to order people around in a volunteer project. A merger would undoubtedly have been a good thing at one point but merging now would just mean that quite a batch of contributers from both sides would likely drop out as the current guru from the other team takes over a particular area of the system and I suspect that along the way there'd be considerable animosity as the guru's from each side fought to take responsibility for their favourite bit of the system in the merged group. I can already here some people saying, well can't people work together on the same area of code? Up to a point, yes, but both teams are now well established and there'd simply be too many people working on some parts of the system. Think about this a while. I suspect that having two groups is probably drawing in more contributions from the BSD world at large than a single one would. -- Paul Richards, FreeBSD core team member. Phone: +44 1222 874000 x6646 (work), +44 1222 457651 (home) Dept. Mechanical Engineering, University of Wales, College Cardiff. Internet: paul@FreeBSD.org, JANET(UK): RICHARDSDP@CARDIFF.AC.UK