As much as I love zen koans, especially hacker koans, it's worth remembering that ESR doesn't really code and I don't know if he merits the 'authority' that some people ascribe to him.
Man, don't be like that. I think ESR is a pompous ass, same as everyone. That doesn't mean he's useless. His maintenance of the Jargon File has been going pretty well, and while The Cathedral and the Bazaar had its weaknesses, it was the best introduction to the "Big Deal" about the open source movement the general public had at the time. Since co-founding OSI in 1998, Wikipedia says "He also took on the self-appointed role of ambassador of open source to the press, business and public," which I think he's been doing fairly well at since it's 100% 'personality'.
ESR claims that these koans appeal to hackers. You like them, and you're a hacker, so unless he got lucky, he has at least some small insight into what makes hackers tick.
His stewardship of the Jargon File has certainly not been going well - the terms he's added to the glossary have mostly been crap he's imported from his political circles, and his additions to the appendix have been even worse (eg. look at the Portrait of J Random Hacker and tell me it isn't ESR jerking off over himself). Perhaps my perspective is limited, but I've never spoken to someone familiar with the jargon file from before ESR took over its maintenance who felt his care had been anything but detrimental.
But that is work he's produced. I'm not sure whether he's a particularly good sociologist/chronicler of hacker culture or not, but that work should be judged on its own merits. Is it good sociology/history, or is it poorly done/inaccurate/done-better-elsewhere? I don't think looking at the quality of his C code is a particularly useful way of answering that question. I mean, some minimal technical knowledge is probably necessary to do a good job at it, but beyond that I'm not sure if there's good correlation between awesome-coder and great-chronicler.
I think what people are up in arms about, is that ESR calls himself a hacker—and most hackers, being programmers as well, think of hacking as referring to a particular kind of programming. These hackers, thus, form their meritocratic scale of "hackerlyness" around programming ability.
> Hacking might be characterized as 'an appropriate application of ingenuity'. Whether the result is a quick-and-dirty patchwork job or a carefully crafted work of art, you have to admire the cleverness that went into it. An important secondary meaning of hack is 'a creative practical joke'. This kind of hack is easier to explain to non-hackers than the programming kind. Of course, some hacks have both natures.
If this is how ESR defines "hacking", then his claim to be a hacker is not, also, an implicit claim that he is a good programmer (that one must then refute.) He simply claims to "apply ingenuity" and "joke around"—which, it's pretty clear from the OP link, he does, in the medium of prose.
> I think what people are up in arms about, is that ESR calls himself a hacker—and most hackers, being programmers as well, think of hacking as referring to a particular kind of programming.
Not a certain kind of programming. Just programming in general. I think in most people's minds, the concept "hacker" implicitly includes the concept "programmer."
What do you mean, he doesn't really code? He has certainly produced open source code in the past. You mean he's not primarily a programmer at the moment?
Eric can't code like Johnny can't read. He has produced minor, working code (e.g. popclient)or managed certain projects (e.g. ncurses), but he's not great, or even good at it.
The problem is that Eric stomps around claiming things that aren't his. He claims to be a "core Linux developer", when in reality, the only code he has is the kernel are the speaker driver (since pushed out) and some minor use of ncurses used for vt100 emulation in thr console driver.
The last time he tried to contribute code was more than a little embarrassing.
He managed to be on the ground at the right time for the whole free software and hacker culture thing, but as far as actual coding goes, he's nothing special.
Why did you feel it neccesary to criticize his coding skills when we are discussing a semi-humorous piece of writing though? Does Reymond's skill or lack thereof these days effect whether the Unix Koans are worthwhile? If there's something wrong or inaccurate in them surely you could point that out rather than proceeding straight to criticizing their source.
I'm having trouble understanding your comments here as anything other than defensiveness or elitism.
Whether or not he is a good programmer or not is sort of irrelevant. I think he exaggerates his position as "spokesperson of hackers everywhere", and it is occasionally annoying (although more often I do enjoy his writing).
What connore said, that and hackerne.ws appears to be turning into a rather uncritical bunch of cheerleading, rather than any real sensible evaluation of what's in front of them.
This community is starting to feel more like slashdot and TechCrunch collaborated on a sister site than a bastion of valuable conversation.
When was the last time he tried to contribute code and how was it embarrassing? Actually, you'll need more than one example. You may well be right, but until you provide evidence, your assertions are baseless ad-hominem and I think less of you, not him.
Hey, come on... fetchmail deleted a lot of my mail back when I used POP3 over dialup. Without fetchmail, who would have been motivated enough to write offlineimap!?
