Who is alienating whom? It sure sounds like Zed is offering to do something that he doesn't have to do, that could potentially be more work for him to maintain, and that could easily lead to a lot more political trouble in the long run.

The way I see it, Zed made a (correct and polite) criticism of Python. Someone childishly taunted back at his criticism with the typical "where's the patch?" defensiveness, and he's now responding in a rather polite fashion. If Zed is making a mistake, it's that he's engaging in the debate at all. He's expressed his opinion -- if the Python people are so petty that they can't handle constructive criticism, the best response is to ignore them and move on.

"Polite" is a bit too strong here. "Civil" is closer.

"Zed is offering"

yeah, right. he's a talker.

Sure he's a talker, but he has a long history of putting his (usually excellent) code where his mouth is.

I would hesitate to call his code "excellent". How about chunked encoding for mongrel? Here (http://www.ruby-forum.com/topic/142852) is his naive rant about it, but it turns out that there are real reasons for CE. I would describe his code as a ghetto.

And where are your patches?

I haven't bragged about how great I am while releasing software that fails to implements parts of the spec.

I don't think that Zed got the joke.

Jesse gave a lightning talk at PyCon this past year, blowing off some steam about the people that complain about Python on Slashdot/Reddit/Hacker News without submitting a patch. The video is here if you're interested. It's actually kinda funny: http://pycon.blip.tv/file/1931026/

He suggested a new Python license that would forbid people complaining about the language without first submitting a patch. If people did this they would be "Van Lindberged". Van Lindberg is the Python software foundation's lawyer.

Jesse proceeded to showcase the "Van Lindberg engine." It was a javscript bookmarklet that took a comments page on reddit that complaining about python, and superimposed pictures of Van Lindberg all over it. The reddit page had then been "Van Lindberged" or "Lindbergified".

It didn't sound like Guido was trying to start shiznit with Zed. It sounded like he was making light of the situation, and suggesting that Jesse "Van Lindberg" Zed for his comments.

Zed was at PyCon, and probably got the joke.

Van Lindberging is funny because it's an extreme response to what some devs see as a real problem, opinions without patches. Zed's pointing out he does in fact have patches, and can have more patches if they're likely to be accepted.

He has no patches. I see nothing on python-dev, bugs.python.org, etc. All I see is someone saying "I have code which is the balls, awesome". That's it.

He has a replacement SMTP library downloadable at the Lamson website.

Then he should probably raise that fact on python-ideas if he hasn't already. The SMTP library hasn't been tried and tested to any significant degree in the real world, so the likelihood of having it accepted right now is slim -- but it's the usual approach for getting stuff like this on the radar...

Let me bet.

He will not do it. He doesn't like to play with others or have his brilliant ideas scrutinized by who he considers lesser people.

So, the way he has to prove me, and others who agree with me, is

- to provide the said patches (a plus, if they don't collide with already existing libraries, let's call Zed's SMTP "zsfasmtp") in publicly accessible libraries

- accept criticism and patches from others

- work with the Python maintainers to help them include his fucking awesome libraries in a future Python release

And that's it.

Until then, we all would gain if only he did shut the fuck up.

I love it! Petty bickering is going to ultimately hurt everyone using python...

a) Either you won't get good quality code because Zed may be right.

or

b) You will get Zed's python branch because he/others got pissed off enough and the python community will be split into two.

I say B is a good solution. Eventually python-fusion will come out. :)

Edit: Let the war begin!

it's funny that wherever zed goes there are problems. Hm, what's common to all of these situations?

Programming? Nerds? Open Source Software? People running businesses? Hacker News?

I dunno, what do you think is common to all of these situations? :P

(point being, zed surely could stir the pot less, but he's not changing what's in the pot. And if two pots happen to be similar, i don't know that that's his fault)

"but he's not changing what's in the pot"

Exactly, being an asshole all the time isn't changing anything for the better.

It sheds light on incompetence and disingenuousness, which possibly creates an environment where things will start solving themselves.....possibly.

being an asshole doesn't have that affect. It's very easy to find flaws in anyone's work. For instance, almighty zed didn't implement chunked encoding in mongrel. You don't see me running around calling him names and putting down the work he's given to the community to boost my ego. It wouldn't have any positive affect at all.

"It wouldn't have any positive affect at all." Really? You mean you are saying it is impossible that because someone high profile like zed shaw pointed out some factual deficiencies in a product, that it would never light a fire under their ass to fix them....because the manner in which he did it was rude? But, if he was polite about it, it might get fixed?

I can see how politeness would be more successful, but I am comparing causing visible public scrutiny while being an asshole vs no public scrutiny.....and you say this approach never could and never has worked?

Think about what you said for a second. You start by saying that zed is "high profile". You then assert that if he were polite there would be no public scrutiny.

The truth is that one must create these false hypotheticals in order to justify zed being an asshole.

"You start by saying that zed is "high profile". You then assert that if he were polite there would be no public scrutiny."

Huh? Maybe try a re-read of my post.

I'm not justifying him being an asshole, I am countering your assertion that if you are an asshole while pointing out legitimate shortcomings, that it will have no positive affect.

I re-read, here is what you said "but I am comparing causing visible public scrutiny while being an asshole vs no public scrutiny"

This is a false choice as is clear by your statement that zed is high profile. If he were polite there would still be public scrutiny so your binary hypothetical is meaningless.

For some reason, I cannot infer the same after reading that article. Probably, I'm low on caffeine. What sequence of events do you visualize in near future? They will deny and he will walk away? I guess this time the whole ball game is different. Zed has placed himself in a different situation now :)

Pythonists will turn up their nose when they will see Zed walking down the same street. He won't be invited to dinner. People will hide their babies when he shows up. This is just the beginning.

He seems to be trying to become a "center of gravity" in python-land by being controversial. Why not just work with the community in a productive non-confrontational way?

Lots of opportunity for pop-psychology here... but best to let it pass...

Hah, yeah I think I'd be more impressed if Zed had actually submitted some patches and had them refused. Why did this blog post have to happen now, before Zed was actually wronged?

Because Zed is saying, "I'll write these patches if..."

It seems to me he's justified in not wanting to waste his time writing patches that wouldn't be accepted anyways.

Uh, what if every would-be open source contributor wrote a grandstanding blog post promising only to submit patches if the maintainer(s) publicly eat crow for an offhand remark they made ... :)

Zed is a gifted hacker of software systems, but I don't really think he's all that good dealing with other mammals.

Is it necessary to use character attacks for what should be a technical discussion on the project management of the python base?

not intended as a character attack at all... any more than Zed's was an attack on Guido's character.

I met Zed in real life. I can assure you that he's really good at dealing with people offline.

I'm sure he's a nice guy -- he actually seems like the kind of person I'd be friends with -- I just think it's appropriate to sort of call him out on the grandiose blog posts :)

I'm all for it to the extent that Zed is building his personal brand and (in essence) being a self-promoter. If he really feels self-righteous about it, then that's a bit worrisome.

Zed vs Guido is exactly the sort of David vs Goliath story that makes for entertaining reading...

That sounded somewhat sinister.

"It seems to me he's justified in not wanting to waste his time writing patches that wouldn't be accepted anyways."

He is free to provide packages that replace core python libraries. The fact he doesn't want to do so and would only give his contributions if they are included in the standard Python libraries is childish, at best.

"slowly"?!