[mythtv-users] mythtv-users Digest, Vol 74, Issue 55

Justin Smith justin at smithpolglase.com
Thu May 21 08:37:57 UTC 2009


> On Wed, May 20, 2009 at 6:11 PM, Jean-Yves Avenard <jyavenard at gmail.com> wrote:
>> As for the usefulness of what I distribute, over 11000 people (last
>> month) disagree with you.
> 
> I don't deny that people crave what you're distributing.  I know that
> people are eager to see some of the new features to be found in trunk.
>  Out of those 11,000 people, how many of them have Myth commit access?
>  How many of them feel that your backports and applying of unapproved
> patches is a fantastic idea?  How many of them read the patches that
> are applied?  You sell your packages as though they were a stable
> product.  They're not.  What's more, in a thread having *nothing* to
> do with this topic, you felt the need to passive-aggressively hint at
> comments I have made to you in the past.  So you tell me, what kind of
> community member comes into someone else's house and disrespects their
> rules?  If you come in to my house and I tell you we take our shoes
> off at the door, do you stomp in with your muddy boots because you
> don't agree?  When you're on these lists, you're in someone else's
> house.  Is it okay to argue with the rules because you don't like
> them, even though they've been debated a thousand times?  No.  At
> *that's* what open source is about.  It's the freedom to take what you
> want if you don't like it, and do what you will with it.  As they say
> in the song, you don't have to go home, but you can't stay here.  If
> you stay, you follow the rules of this project.  If you want to be
> respected by the people who presumably you want to commit your work,
> that means learning to work with them and not brush aside their
> opinion.  If you don't agree, that's okay too, but you can't have it
> both ways.  Do it your way, but don't do it here.

Actually, Jean-Yves, please do it your way and please do it here.

Robert, scratching this itch, plus the open technical discussions on 
this mailing list are what open source is all about.

Frankly, Robert, just because some users "don't get it" about open 
source (i.e. they expect support) doesn't mean the majority of us are 
the same. Jean-Yves is not the cause of this problem. It has, and always 
will, exist (to some extent). That is one of the reasons for having a 
separate users list after all.

The fact that Jean-Yves' patches have not been accepted into -fixes 
makes it clear that there is not 100% support behind them. And this 
means extra risk involved in using them (for someone not intimately 
familiar with the code). Any rational user should appreciate that.

Jean-Yves might be a bit of a maverick, but from a user's perspective 
(I'm not a dev, and I don't use IRC) he is clearly contributing to the 
conversation about this fantastic MythTV hobby we are all enjoying. Over 
the past few months, he has been largely responsible for explaining the 
potential benefits of VDPAU and the support of various video hardware. 
Plus other technical issues (sound etc). I *want* guys like him to 
contribute their point of view on the mailing list.

Personally, I am excited about VDPAU. I have been compiling and using 
-fixes for years (since 0.18) and love what MythTV gives me. But my HD 
STB always gave a marginally better quality picture than Myth. Jean-Yves 
has possibly provided a solution, at least until 0.22 arrives. When I 
decide to go ahead with this, it will be my decision, my money, and my 
risk. If it goes belly up, I have no-one to blame but myself.

But I want the *option* to make that call.

Cheers,
Justin.

P.S. And thanks for *your* contributions to MythTV and to the mailing 
list too. Much appreciated. Seriously.


More information about the mythtv-users mailing list