[LEDE-DEV] openwrt and lede - remerge proposal

Thu May 11 04:10:19 PDT 2017

Of course you only see you numbered your notes the wrong way *after* you 
send your e-mail...

The second [3] and [4] should have been [5] and [6] (see inline).

Stijn Segers schreef op 2017-05-11 12:53:
> Hey guys,
> 
> This might be a bit lengthy, but I should get this off my chest. I
> feel people are mostly looking at the upside and glossing over the
> negatives, which is a time bomb, and both projects do not deserve
> this. Paul's e-mail [0] already touches a lot of the relevant points,
> and it motivated me to add my own insights to what so far seems to
> have been a 'good news show' as we say in Dutch.
> 
> While, like most people, I'm happy progress has been made towards a
> re-merge, there still seems quite some passive-agressive behaviour
> present coming from certain people championing OpenWrt [1] - which,
> from where I stand, seemed one of the reasons for starting LEDE.
> Stifling 'free' speech (recently, even to the point of removing
> messages about the pending re-merge on the OpenWrt forums) was another
> one; clearly, that one is still very much present as well. One could
> say old habits die hard, but it still feels like par for the course.
> What's up with that? You want to remerge with the LEDE project, yet
> you cannot tolerate any discussion about the actual process on the
> OpenWrt forums? That's some fine duplicity right there.
> 
> I can't help but feel very uneasy about this. I'm not implying people
> who stuck with OpenWrt don't want the best for the project and
> community (most do), but we all know LEDE was created to remedy
> exactly these (and other) shortcomings, which made OpenWrt languish to
> the point it had come to a standstill. Not only did LEDE try to tackle
> these problems; it has succeeded beyond expectation. Developers are
> more accessible, you can actually talk to people instead of getting
> your head bit off, contributions are booming, and the atmosphere
> overall is friendly and helpful. Discussion is encouraged, not
> repressed Soviet-style.
> 
> Some of the OpenWrt veterans come across as if they want the re-merge
> to be rushed, ignoring the actual issues that caused the fork in the
> first place. In itself, the desire to re-merge might a noble intent,
> if it didn't taste so much like driven by ulterior, more selfish
> motives. At the same time, while OpenWrt have little to offer beyond
> the OpenWrt name and legacy (which, at this point, feels more and more
> rotten to me, despite all the good things that once came from it),
> they field some pretty hard nos - very astonishing, given the position
> they are in: no to abandoning the OpenWrt name, no to abandoning the
> OpenWrt 'house style' [1]. Luckily, not everyone shares that same
> attitude [2], but it leaves a very bad taste. Almost like some people
> haven't learnt from the whole ordeal, and went back to their old ways
> pretty quickly.
> 
> It feels pushy, and seems to boil down to 'it's all fine and dandy
> what you did, but it's still OpenWrt; don't get any illusions, you're
> not running the show'. This is very toxic, even more so when you
> realise that an overwhelming majority of active (!) OpenWrt developers
> either started or joined the LEDE project. Some of the vocal veterans
> sticking with OpenWrt hardly contribute any code anymore, and haven't
> done so in a while, or other valuable input, but they were most vocal
> when the split happened, pointing fingers and accusing people
> (ironically, people who *did* contribute code, actively maintained
> infrastructure, and had the interests of the project and community at
> heart). Again, they are yelling the hardest now, and waving that
> OpenWrt flag like there's no tomorrow. Imre nothing short of ignores
> the whole LEDE effort by stating explicitly that LEDE 17.01 (which
> Hauke put forward as an official OpenWrt 15.01 successor in an initial
> communication draft about the merge [3]) was NOT its successor [4].
> Combined with his push for the OpenWrt name and keeping pretty much
> everything else OpenWrt (the dysfunctional homepage, the forums), it
> reeks of a coverup: LEDE was a hiccup, an anomaly, a gene malfunction,
> something that needs to be corrected and removed from the 'history
> books' as soon as possible, so it can all feel hunky dory again - and
> mostly, so it looks and smells like OpenWrt. By now, that smell has
> turned into quite a stench though. Luckily, the industry and a lot of
> end users seem to be impervious to it...
> 
> For me, the OpenWrt name and project by now feels tainted. For months
> on end, you could browse the OpenWrt forums, or hang in #openwrt and
> never catch a dev or someone who knew what was (or wasn't) going on.
> Backends went down, sites disappeared, and it doesn't help to keep
> pointing to the OpenWrt name 'because the industry only knows
> OpenWrt', or 'because end users still don't know about LEDE'. Linux
> has been around for two decades now, and a lot of people with a
> computer still haven't heard of it. Before Mozilla, the internet only
> knew IE. Before Linux, sysadmins only knew Unices. Anyway, plenty of
> comparisons at hand - you get the gist. OpenWrt has served its
> purpose. It is time to part ways.
> 

Note references below fixed.

> It looks like some people have resigned to adopting the name again for
> the greater good, because they want this mess to be over with
> (understandably). The last vote tally I found [5] was a tie on the
> most contentious issue - the name. A week ago [6], Hauke states there
> is a majority in favour of re-adopting the OpenWrt name. I have been
> looking up and down but seem to have overlooked the final tally - I
> cannot find it? Can somebody link me?
> 
> I'm sure a lot of people want this to be fixed, want things to be
> right again. Most of those have the best interests of the community
> and both projects in mind, but some do not, and the latter seem to be
> waging a war of attrition. I enjoy being part of the LEDE community. I
> never felt OpenWrt was much of a community in the months prior to the
> fork, and I'd hate to see LEDE go the same way as OpenWrt right
> before. There will be infighting again, snide remarks, stalled
> development... And meanwhile, people will say 'hey we need new blood',
> but that won't come with such a backstabbing culture.
> 
> My two cents.
> 
> Cheers
> 
> Stijn Segers
> 
> [0] http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/lede-dev/2017-May/007403.html
> [1] http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/lede-dev/2017-May/007342.html
> [2] http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/lede-dev/2017-May/007347.html
> [3] http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/lede-adm/2017-May/000461.html
> [4] http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/lede-adm/2017-May/000462.html
> [5] 
> http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/lede-adm/2017-March/000436.html
> [6] http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/lede-adm/2017-May/000461.html