[LLVMdev] [cfe-dev] Status of SEH?

Chris Lattner
Fri, 31 Jan 2014 05:16:58 -0000

<responding to llvmdev too>

On Jan 30, 2014, at 4:08 PM, Alp Toker <alp at nuanti.com>
wrote:
>> There are roughly no open source projects where the
>> rule is "talk about patents all you like on random development
mailing
>> lists"
>
> Your remarks suggest that you've worked on a limited range of projects
without the perspective it takes to accurately word a developer policy like this
for an international audience.

I agree, we absolutely need to be more clear about this on the developer policy.

The problem with discussion on the mailing list is twofold: 1) for almost
everyone (myself included), patent discussion is *speculation*, because they are
not qualified patent attorneys.  Patent law doesn't make sense, and applying
logic to it only makes things worse.  2) when patents get discussed, invariably
people get irritated about the state of the patent system and the discussion
spirals off in an off-topic and destructive direction.

I'd rather that the community stay productive and focused on technical
matters, while people who understand this discuss it off-list.  It also happens
that this specific topic is one that is well understood by people who care a lot
about such things.

> I can't stand by while new contributors receive abuse for some
violation of a rule that's not even written in the LLVM developer policy.

Yes, the policy needs to be more clear.

> What next, turn people away because they have a funny name? Reject patches
because their skin color is different to yours? I'm disappointed that
you've tried to defend what is clearly repeated and inexcusable behaviour by
Chandler towards people who are graciously trying to help out. In so far as
there is a community, we must stand up distance ourselves from behaviour like
that.

We're all friends here.  Harassment will not be tolerated, and I'm sorry
if you took the responses about this issue that way.  You're absolutely
right that the policy should be made crystal clear, and that future instances of
this can be handled simply by pointing to the policy.  I don't speak for
Chandler, but I'm pretty sure that he didn't mean to drive anyone away -
he was just being a little over-eager in enforcing the poorly documented policy
we have.

-Chris