Sure, I can share the load. I've built tensorflow+cuda from scratch a couple of times and completely understand the struggle. :) On 14/10/2018 22:31, Sven-Hendrik Haase wrote:

On Sun, Oct 14, 2018, 22:34 Konstantin Gizdov wrote:

...

Hello,

I am Konstantin Gizdov [1] [2], (`kgizdov`, `arch@kge.pw`, `kgizdov@gmail.com`)

I would like to apply to be a Trusted User under Baptiste Jonglez's sponsorship.

A few words about me:

I am currently a Particle Physics PhD at Univerisity of Edinburgh and I have used Linux since my early teenage years. After I finished high-school, Linux has been my main operating system. I embraced Open Source software for a long time ago and contribute to such several projects [2][3][4]. I have been with Arch Linux since 4+ years ago, although only more active since 2+ years.

My main work is concentrated on Experimental Particle Physics & the LHCb Detector at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. As part of that I have been involved in the development, upgrade & maintenance of the High-Level Trigger & RICH systems and LHCb's data flow [3]. I also have experience with a lot of data processing & analysis - data distillation & enrichment, machine learning, statistical analysis, etc - and associated tools. Separately, I maintain several machines - a personal web server, company server with several VMs, local workhorse server, personal workstation & laptop (sprinkle around some RaspberryPis and network devices here and there). This put me in a unique position to work with many and different kinds of systems and software - ranging from ASICs & FPGAs, through localized control systems & end-user devices to large clusters & super computers. Daily, I use popular tools such as VMs, docker, git, GCC, CUDA, tensorflow, Cern's ROOT, but I also run a lot of custom and even-self made software [4][6]. All of this has been a breeze on Arch Linux.

Thus, a couple of years ago, I decide to get more involved and contribute. I took on the task to maintain CERN's ROOT package [7] and since then I've involved myself heavily into that, I'm a contributor to the project and I use it daily in my work. I have been providing this package for many colleagues in the field, including all of its stack & complementary tools (Pythia, XRootD & other Python tools). I have enabled a lot of new features and worked with upstream towards new functionality, bug fixes, etc. On top of that I have shipped several other related projects - machine learning packages, SciKit-HEP packages like uproot, Docker images, GitLab CIs and so on.

I have also been able to develop and publish a machine learning project me and colleague came up with [4]. This is soon going to be a package in SciKit-HEP and I will aim to make it package here too. Arch Linux was a great platform for all of this. I was able to install & configure up-to-date software easily and what I did not find, I provided for me & others on the AUR without too much hassle.

Overall, I have to say Arch Linux (and its community) have played a key role in me being able to do all of these things. I have found the OS itself to be stable and flexible and the users & maintainers approachable and direct, which I appreciate a lot. I have met a lot of people through the Arch Linux community - forums, AUR and just saying 'I use Arch, too!', haha.

The reason for applying to become a TU is to get even more involved and give back to the community. If you accept me, I would like to continue maintaining and improving my current packages as well as bring new packages. As an AUR maintainer I basically consider it an on-going duty already.

I would like to maintain/contribute/adopt the following:

* Packages I would like to co-maintain: o python-awkward o libafterimage o xxhash o unuran * Packages I already maintain and intend to move from AUR: o root & root-extra o xrootd o simpletools o root5 o python-root_numpy o python-uproot o python-uproot-methods o python-hep_ml o pythia o llvm50 o llvm50-libs o clang50 * New packages I would like to add/move from AUR: o cern-vdt o cvmfs o HepDrone [4] o python-keras o root_pandas (new) o histbook (new) o decaylanguage (new) o pyjet (new) o vegascope (new) o root_ufunc (new) o formulate (new)

I hope to make Arch Linux more versatile and accessible to users in data science, high-energy physics & machine learning, and possibly as a whole.

Thank you.

-- Regards,

Konstantin

1. https://keybase.io/kgizdov 2. https://github.com/kgizdov 3. https://gitlab.cern.ch/kgizdov 4. https://github.com/Tevien/HEPDrone 5. https://github.com/scikit-hep 6. https://gitlab.cern.ch/kgizdov/pdqa-automation

Great stuff. Would you be interested in co-maintaining tensorflow, cuda and pytorch and related packages? They sometimes cost a lot of time to fix up.

Hey Konstantin, On 10/14/18 11:41 PM, Konstantin Gizdov wrote:

...

...

o llvm50 o llvm50-libs o clang50

Didn't dig into it myself as its easier to ask, could you maybe elaborate why we would need those 50 versioned variants? Normally we try to keep the number of versioned variants to the very minimum and only throw them in as a last resort because of mayor incompatibilities :) cheers, Levente

On 10/26/18 12:29 PM, Konstantin Gizdov wrote:

On 26/10/2018 15:27, Doug Newgard via aur-general wrote:

...

I must point out this very recent mailing list thread: https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-September/034279.html

In this thread, you:

1) whine about someone taking over *your* packages, because you're the one that knows them and has cared for them and, after all, they're YOURS.

I did no such thing. I opened the thread by thanking Felix for picking them up and asked a few questions about the plans for the packages and how to pass on what I know, because I was having trouble doing that over the bug tracker. What ensued after (the responses) was not my doing. I tried to respond to every and all comments respectfully and I think you will find a through discussion was had and a lot of details were sorted.

s/respectfully/passive-aggressively/ By "details sorted" do you mean, we told you to stfu and stop snidely implying oppression?

Part of that was revealing that the ROOT stack was being picked up - yes, I care about it as it directly affects my profession and I've given thorough reasons why. I **never claimed the packages were mine** - if you talk about the usage of the word 'my', it clearly refers to me being the maintainer. I said I've put work into them, continue to do so and wanted to make sure I can pass that on in full. My TU application is me trying to do that.

Thereby implying you're unsure whether we're fit to maintain it, and you wish to pass your personal judgment, as though we needed your approval in order to function as a distribution. I assure you you're not the only person who has ever put work into an AUR package and then seen it be moved to community. Most of those people are cheerfully happy to see it moved, and their instinctive reaction is *not* "gosh, I wonder if they really know enough to package this according to my exacting standards".

...

2) whine about how things were handled on the bug tracker, thinking that this whining is how things get done. It's not.

Again, I did no such thing. I explained what happened and asked how can I do better. I was told I have to stick to the bug tracker. Thus, I said why I think this approach is failing in that particular case and gave exampes.

By the way, it was only because of that email that one of the bugs was reopened (by Eli) and fixed, otherwise it was ignored. Seems to me my email worked fine.

Thanks for lying about me. In case I had any doubt what to vote, I've definitely made up my mind now and I'm voting against you. Just in case I was not somehow clear in the past: YOU FILED A REQUEST TO HAVE THE BUG RE-OPENED. THAT REQUEST WAS EVALUATED ON ITS OWN MERIT. Spamming the mailing list with whiny complaints does not help. Scimmia and I get notifications about all re-open requests, and we have a special admin interface to view all such pending requests. These get evaluated on merit. We will get to them when we get to them. There is no conspiracy to ignore you until you complain on the mailing list like a whiny baby. I hereby swear to you, and will happily have it notarized if it makes you any happier, that I completely ignored your thread when reading your mailing list spam. I will acknowledge that due to noticing your mailing list spam, I took a look at your re-open request. A grand total of maybe two hours before I would have looked at it *ANYWAY*. I don't appreciate having to justify myself over inanities like this conversation, and respectfully ask you to cease and desist on your repeated lies about me.

...

3) Tell bald faced lies about how things transpired on the bug tracker. I'm sorry, but this is ridiculous. In the many emails I wrote that evening, I got confused about one bug being closed, where it wasn't. You tried to call me out for lying and my whole point being wrong, but later **you yourself sent a follow up email to correct your own statement**. I acknowledged my mistake on the spot. Surely, we can agree all of us make mistakes. **In no way or form was I telling bald faced lies.** You really think this makes you TU material? Really?

Yes, I think the way I have handled the situation makes me trustworthy. I care for the packages I maintain and the community enough to make sure the packages are left in excellent shape and hands so people can depend on them. I also have serious respect for the people here, community & TUs - as I've said before, ArchLinux has been good to me I want to good to it. This is why I made the fuss, because I care, but I also took everyone's perspective in and kept a working discussion.

I read this differently, you care so much that you don't trust anyone else to do it right. You're a control freak, and I don't want to have to deal with you on the team, no matter how capable you are as a programmer. Other TUs can make their own decisions of course. -- Eli Schwartz Bug Wrangler and Trusted User

On 26/10/2018 17:49, Eli Schwartz via aur-general wrote:

On 10/26/18 12:29 PM, Konstantin Gizdov wrote:

...

...

I must point out this very recent mailing list thread: https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-September/034279.html

In this thread, you:

1) whine about someone taking over *your* packages, because you're the one that knows them and has cared for them and, after all, they're YOURS. I did no such thing. I opened the thread by thanking Felix for picking

On 26/10/2018 15:27, Doug Newgard via aur-general wrote: them up and asked a few questions about the plans for the packages and how to pass on what I know, because I was having trouble doing that over the bug tracker. What ensued after (the responses) was not my doing. I tried to respond to every and all comments respectfully and I think you will find a through discussion was had and a lot of details were sorted. s/respectfully/passive-aggressively/

By "details sorted" do you mean, we told you to stfu and stop snidely implying oppression?

...

Part of that was revealing that the ROOT stack was being picked up - yes, I care about it as it directly affects my profession and I've given thorough reasons why. I **never claimed the packages were mine** - if you talk about the usage of the word 'my', it clearly refers to me being the maintainer. I said I've put work into them, continue to do so and wanted to make sure I can pass that on in full. My TU application is me trying to do that. Thereby implying you're unsure whether we're fit to maintain it, and you wish to pass your personal judgment, as though we needed your approval in order to function as a distribution.

I assure you you're not the only person who has ever put work into an AUR package and then seen it be moved to community. Most of those people are cheerfully happy to see it moved, and their instinctive reaction is *not* "gosh, I wonder if they really know enough to package this according to my exacting standards".

...

...

2) whine about how things were handled on the bug tracker, thinking that this whining is how things get done. It's not. Again, I did no such thing. I explained what happened and asked how can I do better. I was told I have to stick to the bug tracker. Thus, I said why I think this approach is failing in that particular case and gave exampes.

By the way, it was only because of that email that one of the bugs was reopened (by Eli) and fixed, otherwise it was ignored. Seems to me my email worked fine. Thanks for lying about me. In case I had any doubt what to vote, I've definitely made up my mind now and I'm voting against you.

Just in case I was not somehow clear in the past:

YOU FILED A REQUEST TO HAVE THE BUG RE-OPENED. THAT REQUEST WAS EVALUATED ON ITS OWN MERIT.

Spamming the mailing list with whiny complaints does not help. Scimmia and I get notifications about all re-open requests, and we have a special admin interface to view all such pending requests. These get evaluated on merit.

We will get to them when we get to them. There is no conspiracy to ignore you until you complain on the mailing list like a whiny baby.

I hereby swear to you, and will happily have it notarized if it makes you any happier, that I completely ignored your thread when reading your mailing list spam.

I will acknowledge that due to noticing your mailing list spam, I took a look at your re-open request. A grand total of maybe two hours before I would have looked at it *ANYWAY*.

I don't appreciate having to justify myself over inanities like this conversation, and respectfully ask you to cease and desist on your repeated lies about me.

...

...

3) Tell bald faced lies about how things transpired on the bug tracker. I'm sorry, but this is ridiculous. In the many emails I wrote that evening, I got confused about one bug being closed, where it wasn't. You tried to call me out for lying and my whole point being wrong, but later **you yourself sent a follow up email to correct your own statement**. I acknowledged my mistake on the spot. Surely, we can agree all of us make mistakes. **In no way or form was I telling bald faced lies.** You really think this makes you TU material? Really? Yes, I think the way I have handled the situation makes me trustworthy. I care for the packages I maintain and the community enough to make sure the packages are left in excellent shape and hands so people can depend on them. I also have serious respect for the people here, community & TUs - as I've said before, ArchLinux has been good to me I want to good to it. This is why I made the fuss, because I care, but I also took everyone's perspective in and kept a working discussion. I read this differently, you care so much that you don't trust anyone else to do it right. You're a control freak, and I don't want to have to deal with you on the team, no matter how capable you are as a programmer.

Other TUs can make their own decisions of course.

You call me "passive aggressive" and a "whiny baby"... Everything I say must be with some hidden malicious intent, right? You have to defend yourself and I don't?? I'm sorry Eli, but I have told no lies about you. I and everyone here has emails with dates and hours showing a sequence of events - I sent my initial email at 9pm, you re-opening the bug at 3am UK. Everyone can check that. This is the last email I sent to you about this - thread is public anyway.

On 26/10/2018 18:23, Doug Newgard via aur-general wrote:

On Fri, 26 Oct 2018 17:29:31 +0100 Konstantin Gizdov wrote:

...

...

I must point out this very recent mailing list thread: https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-September/034279.html

In this thread, you:

1) whine about someone taking over *your* packages, because you're the one that knows them and has cared for them and, after all, they're YOURS. I did no such thing. I opened the thread by thanking Felix for picking

On 26/10/2018 15:27, Doug Newgard via aur-general wrote: them up and asked a few questions about the plans for the packages and how to pass on what I know, because I was having trouble doing that over the bug tracker. What ensued after (the responses) was not my doing. I tried to respond to every and all comments respectfully and I think you will find a through discussion was had and a lot of details were sorted.

Part of that was revealing that the ROOT stack was being picked up - yes, I care about it as it directly affects my profession and I've given thorough reasons why. I **never claimed the packages were mine** - if you talk about the usage of the word 'my', it clearly refers to me being the maintainer. I said I've put work into them, continue to do so and wanted to make sure I can pass that on in full. My TU application is me trying to do that. You did thank Felix, but then went on to make your true intent extremely clear. You specifically ask why your packages were moved (there doesn't have to be a reason), and say things like:

"The reason I'm asking is because over the years I've added and been maintaining some professional software and these packages are part of that chain. Colleagues in the field have become accustomed to me for packaging with care and updating with new features."

The aforementioned thanks would appear to be perfunctory, like saying "No offense, but you're an idiot". Nope, it's like - I wanna make sure the stuff works and want to ask some questions.

Reference: https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-September/034279.html

...

...

2) whine about how things were handled on the bug tracker, thinking that this whining is how things get done. It's not. Again, I did no such thing. I explained what happened and asked how can I do better. I was told I have to stick to the bug tracker. Thus, I said why I think this approach is failing in that particular case and gave exampes.

By the way, it was only because of that email that one of the bugs was reopened (by Eli) and fixed, otherwise it was ignored. Seems to me my email worked fine. And this attitude right here is a major problem. One ticket was closed because it was very clearly not a bug. The second one that was closed was closed based on the information you gave, the reopen request contained different information. Based on that, I didn't deny the reopen request and decided to wait until I got home to try it. In the mean time, Eli took a look at the request and reopened it. How do I know this? Also, I just sent an email with questions, you could have replied - 'looking into it'. For example,

https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-September/034281.html

In the middle of all of that, and completely independently and unrelated, you sent your email to this list, but you still seem to be under the impression that it was a good thing and actually accomplished something. I can assure you, it accomplished nothing good. OK. Good to know.

...

...

3) Tell bald faced lies about how things transpired on the bug tracker. I'm sorry, but this is ridiculous. In the many emails I wrote that evening, I got confused about one bug being closed, where it wasn't. You tried to call me out for lying and my whole point being wrong, but later **you yourself sent a follow up email to correct your own statement**. I acknowledged my mistake on the spot. Surely, we can agree all of us make mistakes. **In no way or form was I telling bald faced lies.** So you opened 3 tickets. Two were closed and *one* (1) was denied a reopen. Yet you claim "I tried to re-open all 3 bugs but was denied with little to no comment/explanation." There is too much disparity here to be a typo or a mistake.

Reference: https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-September/034286.html

The mistake was I tried to re-open all 3 instead of 2, which I acknowledged on the spot. I just check in the bug tracker. This is the last email about this to you too.

On Fri, 26 Oct 2018 18:09:50 +0000 Maksim Fomin via aur-general wrote:

‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ On Friday, October 26, 2018 8:23 PM, Doug Newgard via aur-general wrote:

...

You did thank Felix, but then went on to make your true intent extremely clear. You specifically ask why your packages were moved (there doesn't have to be a reason), and say things like:

"The reason I'm asking is because over the years I've added and been maintaining some professional software and these packages are part of that chain. Colleagues in the field have become accustomed to me for packaging with care and updating with new features."

The aforementioned thanks would appear to be perfunctory, like saying "No offense, but you're an idiot".

Reference: https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-September/034279.html

I see no such attitude. After reading this and previous thread the quote above expresses what happened quite neutrally: AUR package was used by group of people, after moving package to community, some things (important to that group) became broken - presumably because of some changes in community package. There is nothing wrong in telling that one person was maintaining package and his colleagues became accustomed to that package.

Except there was nothing wrong with the packages in Community, nothing had broken.

On 10/26/18 12:29 PM, Konstantin Gizdov wrote:

...

3) Tell bald faced lies about how things transpired on the bug tracker. I'm sorry, but this is ridiculous. In the many emails I wrote that evening, I got confused about one bug being closed, where it wasn't. You tried to call me out for lying and my whole point being wrong, but later **you yourself sent a follow up email to correct your own statement**. I acknowledged my mistake on the spot. Surely, we can agree all of us make mistakes. **In no way or form was I telling bald faced lies.**

Are you referring to this correction right here? https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-September/034288.html By using my privileged power of reading comprehension, I've uncovered the astonishing fact that he "corrected" his statement by fixing the sentence fragment "was was never denied" to "one was never denied". (He also expounded on his previous point by providing additional information which his first post never touched on at all.) I'm not sure what subtle point you're trying to make here about "everyone makes mistakes", but when you come to the mailing list spreading assumptions and false information, and someone else corrects their own typo, then you're not even comparing similar concepts, so you should probably look for different proofs. Also it reeks of you trying to inflate someone else's mistake in order to make yours look less bad, because your reference here is, while "technically" not false, nevertheless designed to make readers *think* that Doug retracted something he said about you, rather than correcting a nonsensical typo that could very well have come from autocorrect. And, your false claims about how the bugtracker is being handled is indeed something that could use help in looking less bad. -- Eli Schwartz Bug Wrangler and Trusted User

On Fri, 2018-10-26 at 20:48 +0300, Jerome Leclanche wrote:

I don't understand all the animosity towards the guy in the previous few emails.

There was a thread a while back that got a bit heated.

Is assuming good faith really that far-fetched here? And even if it's not, why not be a little more professional about it?

Agreed.

On 26/10/2018 19:40, Levente Polyak via aur-general wrote:

Hey Konstantin,

I'm wondering which tool you use to keep track of upstream releases? is it urlwatch or such?

cheers, Levente

Personally, the packages I maintain are not that numerous that I need a tool, so I check a couple of times a week as I am on the Git pages anyway. But now I see `urlwatch` supports Telegram Bots, so I might set it up on my server. Regards, Konstantin

On 10/27/18 6:12 PM, Christos Nouskas wrote:

I've been with Arch since around 2004-5 and I've never seen such a hostility against a contributing user.

Konstantin clearly cares about his set of packages because they are the tools of his trade and of some of his co-workers (at a high-profile institution, not at some pet shop). It's also clear that he's not just a packager but also a co-developer of at least some of the software set. It's only normal for him to be concerned about the way this package group is handled, given the importance of its applications. That also was the very reason he applied for a TU.

That's... fine? I mean, there's lots of people for whom the tools of their trade *at high-profile institutions* are php, openssl, nginx, gcc, or numerous others. I'm sure they're very concerned about these things working properly. I don't regard Arch Linux as a *toy* of an operating system, fit only for idleness and hobby time. Appropriately, therefore, I treat all, or at least the majority, of Arch packages as important things which Arch users in general and specifically, should be concerned about. I guess there are games which are unlikely to be of job-related importance, but most packages are important to at least some subset of users, or we wouldn't be so eager to package them. I therefore do not ascribe any explicit importance or special consideration to anyone's job. Furthermore, we have a very well working bugtracker within which the many people who use Arch Linux in professional, and yes, sometimes high-profile environments, frequently communicate their concerns about the packaging of particular software packages. This is called due process. It's something you don't need to be a TU in order to do. If the only conceivable way to to contribute to Arch was to become a TU, we'd have a very small and insignificant distro indeed. To this date, I'm unaware of the fundamental purpose of the bugtracker failing our professional, high-profile users.

Now, even if he had been over-zealous about it, justifiably so in many's opinions, he had been a far cry from whining or implying oppression or telling bald-faced lies or being a control-freak - jeez, why such strong expressions? I read the word "implying" numerous times in the bashing posts and some arguments (not all, for sure) were even based on Konstantin's "hidden insinuations", not his actual arguments.

Mistakes do happen and I doubt that being a TU means being infallible or indisputable. But watching a man getting severely reprimanded over some petty mistakes, which had resulted from over-zealousness and not mal-intent, is just sad.

It is pretty darn hard to make a mistake about whether you yourself have done three things when you only actually did two. It is also pretty annoying for me, personally, to be flat-out told (before this TU application process even started) that I personally, would have refused to reopen a bug report for which there was a reopen request, save for a mailing list thread having been opened about it. I stated pretty clearly on September 30: "It was not denied to reopen. It was reopened as soon as you asked for the first time." I received the response: "Yes, by you after I send this email, unless I am mistaken." I repeatedly explain that we are willing to reopen any bug that has a reopen request, without needing some sort of mailing list drama to force our hands. But a month later, he continues to assert that the dates on the email thread *prove* that I only reopened the bug after his thread, with a pretty obvious logical conclusion that this fact is somehow relevant and therefore pertains to my own hidden motivations. I dislike the idea of encouraging a general perception in the Arch Linux community that anyone who files a bug report should also start some mailing list thread to ensure we actually respond to the bug report. If for no other reason than that we have 60,000 historic bugs, many of which are still open, and people would get pretty bored and stop reading the mailing list if it just became a copy of the bugtracker.

Especially because it comes from the very people who advised him to apply as a TU and that man is now appealing to.

I did *not* advise him to become a TU, and I don't recall anyone publicly doing so on the mailing list at least. I did direct him to the due process for doing so, but that is not proof positive that I encourage and support his application... I would do the same for literally anyone whatsoever, even if that person was the CEO of Microsoft, a core member of some particularly ill-regarded Arch derivative like Manjaro, or an unabashedly public member of some three-letter spy agency who blogged every day about the noble cause of weakening security and injecting spyware into Linux distributions. Everyone deserves the chance to try and be convincing to the general class of Trusted Users, whether I personally feel convinced or not. In fact, everyone deserves the right to try and be convincing even if no one feels convinced. -- Eli Schwartz Bug Wrangler and Trusted User

On 10/28/18 10:43 AM, Konstantin Gizdov wrote:

...

It is also pretty annoying for me, personally, to be flat-out told (before this TU application process even started) that I personally, would have refused to reopen a bug report for which there was a reopen request, save for a mailing list thread having been opened about it.

I stated pretty clearly on September 30:

"It was not denied to reopen. It was reopened as soon as you asked for the first time." I'm breaking a promise to not email you any more about this, but this argument is not correct. I did not say or imply that you denied to re-open the bug. I said it was denied. Which later I admitted was an incorrect statement from my side, because as you said, this particular one was not denied to re-open.

And on the very next line...

...

I received the response: "Yes, by you after I send this email, unless I am mistaken." Again, at the time, I was thinking I did try to re-open this particular bug, when it was another one. This was discussed, pointed out to me and I have repeatedly admitted my mistake. Why am I, two weeks after the fact, being called a liar?

Because when you did admit this mistake, you continued to assert that your mailing list thread was the thing which caused the other bug to be reopened. And because complaining on the bugtracker about how "the bug wranglers are denying to reopen the bug" is not a question, it's an accusation, and I expect if you accuse something of happening that you at least be able to keep your *own* actions straight.

I did not say or imply that you denied to re-open the bug. I said it was denied.

I am one of the two bug wranglers, ipso facto either I or Scimmia denied it if anyone did. More specifically, I never said this at all. I said I was annoyed about your claim that *I would have* denied it -- had you not posted a mailing list thread. Again, let's go back to the email. I said, in my very first post to the list:

One bug was improperly closed and I've reopened it (that's why you can request this)

Your response to my use of the word "I", was to gloss over that paragraph and the following two paragraphs, in which I explained why the second bug was denied, and said that the third bug was never closed in the first place (and pointed out it was even accepted and assigned to the maintainer). Instead, you quoted my fourth paragraph, and responded:

I tried to re-open all 3 bugs but was denied with little to no comment/explanation.

As then later:

The other bug is a bug as confirmed - also denied to re-open without explanation/investigation. The third bug was re-opened by Filipe after my initial email - no need to bash me further about it.

Even though you're literally responding to my pointing out that of the two, one was never closed, and the other was reopened by *me*. Your response is unclear, as I mentioned the python2 bug in position #2, you used position #3. So it's possible you thought the bug I said I reopened is the one you said was "denied", and the one I said was never closed is the one you said Filipe re-opened. I'm still not sure how that confusion would happen either. You finished off with the statement:

So all bugs were closed & denied to re-open until I made a fuss about it here. That to me is 'denied'.

Then when in my next email I stated:

It was not denied to reopen. It was reopened as soon as you asked for the first time.

You respond:

Yes, by you after I send this email, unless I am mistaken.

So, you've switched abruptly from stating that the bug was "denied" to stating that they were only denied "until I made a fuss about it here", and you asserted as proof that since I re-opened the bug chronologically *after* the fuss in question, this means it was your fuss that made me *willing* to re-open it. ... Now, relevant to this TU application thread: You want to know why I am suddenly bringing this up 2 weeks later? Because even after I called you out on this 2 weeks ago, you went ahead and said it again, in this very thread -- the statement to which I responded at all!

By the way, it was only because of that email that one of the bugs was reopened (by Eli) and fixed, otherwise it was ignored. Seems to me my email worked fine.

And you think that by apologizing for your error of thinking all three bugs were closed, you make it all better? I don't care about whether you were correct in stating that! I care about your attitude when you stated it, and I care about the fact that you *still* have not apologized to me for the issue which I *do* care about, which was your accusation that both I and Scimmia have neglected our duty as Bug Wranglers by denying your bugs on a whim, and only reopening them due to the publicity threat that was your mailing list thread!

Could you have not said that simply - e.g. 'Please allow for a couple of days before sending emails. We discourage this on the mailing list.' -

No, I could not have said that. Do not send emails, period. The mailing list is not the bugtracker, and posting to the mailing list does *not* get your issue fixed. The mailing list is a self-help forum for *users*, to which developers, trusted users, and other staff members may or may not be subscribed (we are users too, and many of us are subscribed). We do *not* encourage bug reports on the mailing list, and the only thing the mailing list is good for (save for aur-general, but not arch-general, serving double purpose as the Trusted User voting booth under certain circumstances) is to maybe try to get an idea of "happening things in the Arch Linux community". This is a *horrible* way to get formal process in any package at all, but a great way to tell random Arch *users* everywhere about whatever is on your mind. At the absolute minimum, check the bug report to see if the re-open request has been rejected, and if it has been, feel free to email us *privately* to resolve the matter. Or reach out to us on the active IRC channel. If it is still pending, do *not* bother people about it, until at least a minimum of more than 7 hours has passed since the time you originally opened the bug. In fact, let's be extra generous and wait at least 5 days since the re-open request was filed -- so, 5 days and somewhere up to 6 hours. I think this waiting thing is pretty reasonable. In fact, I think it is common sense! Especially the "wait more than 6 hours" bit. What I don't think is reasonable, is when during the course of that thread you stated:

Well, I wasn't trying to be confrontational. I felt I was being shunned and tried to be explicit in why I'm writing the email and what bothered me. Sorry, if someone was offended.

So because you felt shunned, you ignored due process and ended up providing a couple potential reasons for someone potentially wanting to maybe shun you, when they had no problem with you beforehand. If this is your reaction to being shunned one time, what will happen the next time you feel shunned?

to which I have possibly replied - 'OK, it was late evening Sunday and I didn't wanna leave it for the beginning of the week'.

You didn't want to leave it for the beginning of the week, so you desperately CC'ed aur-/g/eneral in under 7 hours from beginning to end of the entire history of your three bugs, asking why we didn't evaluate based on meritocratic merit within those 7 hours: - your second re-open request - the bug you accidentally thought needed similar evaluation and additionally decided that the best way to determine how to properly handle a package *not being moved to community* (upload it to the AUR yourself?) is to publicly complain/ask that the bug was erroneously rejected? Did you try emailing Felix Yan privately to ask what his philosophical approach to the package would be? Did you try asking how best to handle an AUR package that is the python2 analogue to a [community] python3 one, without implying via reference to your "denied resolution" bug that the blame is on the [community] repository for failing to provide your rightful python2 analogue? I'm sorry our legendary bleeding-edge response time got delayed by 9 hours. </sarcasm>

I am not a trusted user, I am not first-hand familiar with how everything is handled. I do not send emails every day. In fact, if you look in the history, I only send emails when I think there's a problem I have tried to fix, failed to address it myself and looking for advice.

You keep saying "looking for advice" and I keep seeing "posting to the mailing list with an assertion that the bugs you reported were incorrectly denied". -- Eli Schwartz Bug Wrangler and Trusted User

On October 28, 2018 2:42:31 PM EDT, Baptiste Jonglez wrote:

On 28-10-18, Eli Schwartz via aur-general wrote:

...

(endless rambling)

Can we please stop this futile bike-shedding exercise? It does little outside of discrediting you and the Arch community as a whole.

I already said so in previous discussions, but I am still dismayed at your and Doug's tendency to aggressively gang up on anybody crossing your way, assuming from the start that they are lying bastards with devious motives, without ever questioning your own assumptions or actions. You desperately want to always be right and to always have the final word, but I'm sorry to say that life does not work this way.

Regarding the TU application itself, the discussion period is nearly over. Since the bylaws mention that the period lasts 14 "full days", I will open the vote tomorrow morning.

Baptiste

It's upsetting and embarrassing that the only staffer to stand against this behavior directly in the ML is the applicant's sponsor. This disrespectful behavior occurs all the time. Can we enforce our Code of Conduct or is it just for show? -- Best, polyzen

On 28-10-18, Daniel M. Capella wrote:

On October 28, 2018 2:42:31 PM EDT, Baptiste Jonglez wrote:

...

On 28-10-18, Eli Schwartz via aur-general wrote:

...

(endless rambling)

Can we please stop this futile bike-shedding exercise? It does little outside of discrediting you and the Arch community as a whole.

I already said so in previous discussions, but I am still dismayed at your and Doug's tendency to aggressively gang up on anybody crossing your way, assuming from the start that they are lying bastards with devious motives, without ever questioning your own assumptions or actions. You desperately want to always be right and to always have the final word, but I'm sorry to say that life does not work this way.

Regarding the TU application itself, the discussion period is nearly over. Since the bylaws mention that the period lasts 14 "full days", I will open the vote tomorrow morning.

Baptiste

It's upsetting and embarrassing that the only staffer to stand against this behavior directly in the ML is the applicant's sponsor. This disrespectful behavior occurs all the time. Can we enforce our Code of Conduct or is it just for show?

Thank you Daniel -- I actually discover that we *do* have a code of conduct, this is good news: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Code_of_conduct#Code_of_conduct It seems to me that these three rules in particular are relevant in this case and were not respected: "Respect other users", "Do not flame" and "Be responsible". Baptiste

On 10/28/18 4:45 PM, Morten Linderud via aur-general wrote:

It's frankly embarrassing that it has to go this far. Eli is avoiding the discussion on IRC and refuses to answer.

So, is the appropriate fix then, is to do some more shaming on the mailing list? Actually, by the time things got going there, you could have seen something very interesting in the join/part messages: You'll see my internet connection going kaput. I have had really bad internet over the weekends recently, and I spend most of my time pinging out. IRC, as a synchronous communication medium, is simply unreliable, and we shouldn't expect anyone to be online 24/7. Especially when your only proof that I am online is that my bouncer is online. Do you suppose I derive personal amusement and enjoyment from this fight? No! It happened because I care too *much*. And quite frankly, I'm no more thrilled about how I handled things in the heat of the moment than no doubt many readers. I ultimately ended up pretending the internet didn't exist for much of Sunday, my active activity of being present in-channel consisted of like one comment at 10AM. I drafted two fairly tame emails and one in which I tried to back down on the aggression and clarify my thought process re: why I was so upset, and I queued those to be sent "whenever my email client decides it's online again". (Reconnecting to my IRC bouncer today I see that I was promptly accused of ignoring the conversation. Please remember that email, unlike IRC, is asynchronous communication.) I then tried to relax and cool down, ended up going to sleep several hours earlier than the earliest time I usually go to sleep. Morten: I have a lot of respect for your involvement in many initiatives around Arch. But honestly, I often feel that you are taking the discussion to another extreme, on making absolutely anyone feel as utterly welcome as humanly possible and then some and then some more, as the primary goal. It's the other side of the coin and we shouldn't allow situations when one stays silent instead of criticizing an application to avoid backlash. Or indeed just staying silent in general. On 10/30/18 8:27 AM, Baptiste Jonglez wrote:

Hi Santiago,

Now that the discussion period is over, I am taking time to fully answer this, since it's much more general and important than the TU application itself.

...

On 28-10-18, Santiago Torres-Arias wrote:>> I've been following this email thread quite closely and without participating as I was hoping to keep opinions to myself --- I don't think I have much questions other than what's already asked for Konstantin --- and make up my mind for voting.

It's clear that it is time to take a step back and stop fanning the flames. We are all passionate people, and sometimes this passion leads us to the type of arguments we are having right now. I agree with Eli, this is not a toy operating system and there are things at stake. However, I'm completely convinced that no ill intention is coming from everyone involved, and that, if we consider this optic, it's clear that this is just a non-technical quarrel that should've been shelved a while ago.

Personally, I think this is a good opportunity to tone it down for a second, leave the 10+ emails behind us and try to go back to the things that make this community friendly and welcoming.

Baptiste, Konstantin, Eli, and Doug. Please take a deep breath and extend a friendly handshake. I'm sure everyone else following this exchnage thinks this is the reasonable way to move forward.

I understand that you want to calm things down and the intention is good, but you make it appear as if the animosity is symmetrical. But the situation is actually not: we have two bullies ganging up violently on a newcomer, who has so far kept a very cool head and stayed polite where most people would have gotten angry. On my side I reacted more angrily because I am getting fed up with this kind of repeated toxic attitude, and other people expressed dismay at the violent personal attacks we witnessed.

Note that here I am not making any judgement on the validity of the arguments in the various technical debates: this is important but it is not the point here. The point is precisely to be able to have interesting discussions and debates, without resorting to personal attacks, insults or abusing a dominating position, as both Doug and Eli have repeatedly done in the past and now again:

https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-September/034287.html https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-October/034402.html https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-October/034408.html https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-October/034411.html

This is not a witch-hunt: Doug and Eli, this discussion does *not* question your attachment to this community, the quality of your work or the quality of your technical opinions in general. In fact your are both much more knowledgeable and active in Arch than most people including me. But that is certainly not a valid reason to start bullying people around, or else I am grossly mistaken about this whole community.

As a general rule, when nobody stands up publicly against a bully, the bully will just continue bullying people the same way in the future, perhaps even more confidently.

Of course, we can also bury our head in the sand and pride ourselves that our community is "friendly and welcoming" (I think this is still true on the whole btw) while leaving the bullies act unchecked. Santiago, I don't mean this as a personal attack on you, I just think that it's a bad idea to sweep such unacceptable personal behaviour under the carpet as if nothing happened.

Quite frankly, in the future I am considering taking whatever actions are necessary to make sure that this kind of hurtful behaviour doesn't happen again, including asking for the bully's resignation or resigning myself. I hope that we will find ways to work things out without having to resort to such extremes.

Discussing these problems seems like a good start

What really got me angry was the fact that after a *month*, an incorrect statement about me was still being insisted upon (and never mind an apology...). I took offense at what I deemed an insult, and lost my temper. I'll maintain that I did not intend my messages to be perceived as personal attacks, but rather, intended them to reflect on interactions which were directly pertinent to the voting at hand. I've always felt it is important to state my beliefs. And I am not good at hiding my meaning beneath layers of politicians' doublespeak; this means when I'm genuinely angry at someone, you'll be able to tell. I don't believe anything I've done constitutes "bullying". I don't engage in the kind of discrimination repeatedly making political headlines. I've always considered myself very welcoming to anyone willing to learn; I've patiently and cheerfully guided lots of people through making their PKGBUILDs better, often pretty terrible PKGBUILDs too, I offer help on issue discussions I know about, and spend significant amounts of time on the various support fora *trying to help people* (I didn't get 2500 BBS posts by just being idly rude to people al day), etc. and all I ask is that others make a token effort to listen to what I say, and that they be willing to learn. I'm generally unconcerned about non-technical matters. I don't even curse. What I have been known to do, is react harshly to people I feel have violated my sense of what is right -- and usually that means I least perceive them as either being unwilling to learn or flat-out ignoring the actual content of what I say when responding to me. I tend to get very technical in the process, because the mechanics of how things work are dear to me. I tend to get very technical about most of the non-confrontational interactions I have too. Apparently my being articulate in a technical distribution is seen as making things worse, though, because "smart and articulate people make the best bullies". I'm not sure how to respond to that. Ultimately I was unable to let go and should have let it end with my initial response, and I apologize for letting things spiral out of control. I can only promise to try to keep an eye on the tone in which I interact in the future, but I do make that promise. -- Eli Schwartz Bug Wrangler and Trusted User

On October 28, 2018 6:42:09 PM EDT, Santiago Torres-Arias wrote:

Hello everyone.

I've been following this email thread quite closely and without participating as I was hoping to keep opinions to myself --- I don't think I have much questions other than what's already asked for Konstantin --- and make up my mind for voting.

It's clear that it is time to take a step back and stop fanning the flames. We are all passionate people, and sometimes this passion leads us to the type of arguments we are having right now. I agree with Eli, this is not a toy operating system and there are things at stake. However, I'm completely convinced that no ill intention is coming from everyone involved, and that, if we consider this optic, it's clear that this is just a non-technical quarrel that should've been shelved a while ago.

Personally, I think this is a good opportunity to tone it down for a second, leave the 10+ emails behind us and try to go back to the things that make this community friendly and welcoming.

Baptiste, Konstantin, Eli, and Doug. Please take a deep breath and extend a friendly handshake. I'm sure everyone else following this exchnage thinks this is the reasonable way to move forward.

-Santiago.

I appreciate the sentiment, but Please don't downplay known toxic behavior that needs to come to an end. That doesn't help the cause of making this a friendly and welcoming community. Konstantin has clearly extended an olive branch time and time again. -- Best, polyzen

Hi Santiago, Now that the discussion period is over, I am taking time to fully answer this, since it's much more general and important than the TU application itself. On 28-10-18, Santiago Torres-Arias wrote:

I've been following this email thread quite closely and without participating as I was hoping to keep opinions to myself --- I don't think I have much questions other than what's already asked for Konstantin --- and make up my mind for voting.

It's clear that it is time to take a step back and stop fanning the flames. We are all passionate people, and sometimes this passion leads us to the type of arguments we are having right now. I agree with Eli, this is not a toy operating system and there are things at stake. However, I'm completely convinced that no ill intention is coming from everyone involved, and that, if we consider this optic, it's clear that this is just a non-technical quarrel that should've been shelved a while ago.

Personally, I think this is a good opportunity to tone it down for a second, leave the 10+ emails behind us and try to go back to the things that make this community friendly and welcoming.

Baptiste, Konstantin, Eli, and Doug. Please take a deep breath and extend a friendly handshake. I'm sure everyone else following this exchnage thinks this is the reasonable way to move forward.

I understand that you want to calm things down and the intention is good, but you make it appear as if the animosity is symmetrical. But the situation is actually not: we have two bullies ganging up violently on a newcomer, who has so far kept a very cool head and stayed polite where most people would have gotten angry. On my side I reacted more angrily because I am getting fed up with this kind of repeated toxic attitude, and other people expressed dismay at the violent personal attacks we witnessed. Note that here I am not making any judgement on the validity of the arguments in the various technical debates: this is important but it is not the point here. The point is precisely to be able to have interesting discussions and debates, without resorting to personal attacks, insults or abusing a dominating position, as both Doug and Eli have repeatedly done in the past and now again: https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-September/034287.html https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-October/034402.html https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-October/034408.html https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-October/034411.html This is not a witch-hunt: Doug and Eli, this discussion does *not* question your attachment to this community, the quality of your work or the quality of your technical opinions in general. In fact your are both much more knowledgeable and active in Arch than most people including me. But that is certainly not a valid reason to start bullying people around, or else I am grossly mistaken about this whole community. As a general rule, when nobody stands up publicly against a bully, the bully will just continue bullying people the same way in the future, perhaps even more confidently. Of course, we can also bury our head in the sand and pride ourselves that our community is "friendly and welcoming" (I think this is still true on the whole btw) while leaving the bullies act unchecked. Santiago, I don't mean this as a personal attack on you, I just think that it's a bad idea to sweep such unacceptable personal behaviour under the carpet as if nothing happened. Quite frankly, in the future I am considering taking whatever actions are necessary to make sure that this kind of hurtful behaviour doesn't happen again, including asking for the bully's resignation or resigning myself. I hope that we will find ways to work things out without having to resort to such extremes. Discussing these problems seems like a good start :) Baptiste

As an outsider sitting on the sidelines, with absolutely no dog in this fight, I have to say that I don't believe that the messages you linked are examples of bullying or personal attacks. Even if you are 100% correct, there were a lot of other messages, not just the linked ones. I think you should try and make a broader argument

I will make this as brief as I can, even though I feel there is a lot to talk about. On 30/10/2018 13:06, Adam Levy via aur-general wrote: based on broader observations, but I do understand that you can still end up with the same conclusion. It's just not fair to judge the whole situation like this, I believe.

The closest I saw to a personal attack might be Eli saying that Konstantin is a control freak. I believe that could have been said more diplomatically and professionally but it strikes me as a legitimate consideration in the context of whether to admit a new TU that all other TUs would theoretically have to work along side. So me being a blatant liar, having some sort of dark agenda, being a whiny baby and passive aggressive are not personal insults, etc.? Whenever, I tried to make a point I was assumed to have nefarious motives and was insulted and my character attacked. The emails included strong language. Nothing was sugar coated, and efforts to be polite had ceased at that point in the exchange.

We probably have different definitions of bullying, but from my perspective those emails should not qualify as bullying. Additionally two or more people agreeing with each other and backing each other up doesn't constitute ganging up, let alone violently. I'm not sure those are well defined concepts in this context anyway. What is the difference between supporting each other's positions and "ganging up"? How does one have a "violent" email exchange? Those descriptions are metaphorical, to say the least, and I would go so far as to say that they are hyperbole. While I would normally agree that just because two people being in agreement is not ganging up, in this case, persisting with increasing intensity to attack me, call me names and imply horrible things about what I stand for cannot possibly be about anything else. Trusted Users are in a position of power. I do believe that they should strive to behave diplomatically and patiently. I think it is more fair and accurate to say that Eli and Doug were less diplomatic and patient than would appear professional to most outside observers. I don't think that makes them bullies or violent, to borrow your language. If those accusations are to be substantiated we need to agree on what they mean first. To this moment I have kept quiet about this, but I think I cannot do

I don't understand what you mean by bullying. I think what he means is the weeks on end attacks at my character and not actually discussing my initial email - which was about what the available, correct and appropriate ways are to pass on what I know about a package I depend on in my daily life. Please read my initial email and tell me if you would have responded the same way they did and then say what would be the correct way to respond to anyone, not just me, in that situation. I was bullied as a kid. We're all nerds here. I am sorry to hear that happened to you. It really should not happen to anyone. But what exactly is your point? Are you claiming that because you were bullied then you can decide for everyone else universally if

From the first email answer to me there were no efforts to be polite (from the people in question). I actually tried to respond to bring the discussion about the questions I asked rather than what the discussion suddenly turned to. this anymore. I have been emailed privately by people who have experienced the same sort of things from the same people. They emailed me just to comfort me, because I think they understand how it feels and what it does to you. Thank you, to those ones, for lending a shoulder. They did not say anything publicly on the list for fear of the same persecution and lash back. I call for them to say something now as I cannot in clear conscience call them out and put them into this myself. they are being bullied? Or nerds can't be bullies? I don't mean to offend or attack you. I just don't understand your point. If you are trying to sympathise/empathise, I personally do not think you have understood how I feel. Possibly clarify.

Chances are we all had a bully as a kid. If my bully had been as articulate as what was displayed in these emails then I'm not sure he would have even been effective as a bully. Smart and articulate people make the best bullies. They can really get you where it hurts and lasts. I think that's been proven many times. Chances are we probably would have gotten along better because he would have been talking to me directly using mostly logical arguments. But no, my bully called me names and made fun of me. That's exactly what happened here. At one point he was physically violent. That's not to say that I don't think bullying can't happen over digital communication, I just can't reconcile my understanding of bullying with what is being described here as such.

Now I will take the time to say something. I have never imagined myself in this position and do not wish it upon anyone. I sent an email in which I specifically said I did not understand how things work and was asking for advice. Now I am here. I did not claim I was being bullied, other people made that observation. But if anyone thinks that it did not hurt to the point where now I am barely able to hit the keys as I type this and shaking, then you are wrong. Deeply wrong. I will not say whether or not the whole situation qualifies as bullying or anything else, this is not the point I think. All I know is how I feel. I say this: - I did not initially intended to apply as a TU, was just looking for a way to make sure stuff works as-is or better; I think as a person one has to be pretty insecure to think this means I am attacking anyone's abilities - I applied for a TU as no other alternative was presented to me that I felt was enough in the particular case; that does not mean I am dismissing the current available ways in any way - I do not pertain that I deserve the post, that's left to the voters - I do claim that anyone should be able to apply regardless of how good they are, the rules only require a sponsor - I do not want to introduce friction in the internal team, I want to bring something to it - I am not complaining about the current team and their expertise and never implied otherwise Regardless if I get accepted as TU or not, regardless of the fact I have "the stuff" or not, regardless if people think I have "problematic behaviour" or however it was called, regardless of anything else, I will not stand for this and as this emailing list is public I will try my best to make sure it does not happen to anyone else. **Until things change or I get banned, of course** I am dropping this thread now, I leave it to everyone to take it as they will. Regards, Konstantin

On 10/30/18 02:51pm, Ethan Rakoff wrote:

Remember that as technical people working on a project that spans the world, we communicate almost exclusively through text, and it can be easy to misinterpret the tone of someone else. We should all make an effort to remember this in writing and in reading.

Never attribute to malice that which can be attributed to ignorance or misunderstanding.

This went beyond a simple misunderstanding in medium. It's dripping with anger! I understand - and actually prefer - truth and correctness when soliciting help from others. Blunt is fine: It's quick and to-the-point. I am not fond of overly-inclusive communities that effectively censor criticism because it might hurt feelings. However... I spent so long formally submitting my application after the initial mix-up because I wasn't sure I wanted to get reamed in a similar manner - "Does everyone react this way?", I thought. I had urges to speak out but I was afraid that this was just 'how it is'. When things went off the rails I considered withdrawing. Perhaps I won't make TU status but it might be of value to this community to know that this made an applicant think twice about joining. I do appreciate Eli apologizing on the other thread. I can relate to the anger stemming from caring too much - I sometimes have to walk away from my keyboard for the same reason.

Even if you are 100% correct, there were a lot of other messages, not just the linked ones.

First I want to mention that I did in fact read all of the emails, but presumably someone trying to make a point about bullying in those emails would have linked to the most contentious ones. So those are the ones I reviewed prior to writing my first email. As I recall when I was initially reading that chain, I tended to agree with the points that Eli was making. I trust his assessment of what transpired with your bug reports and I agree with his assessment of your complaints regarding how your AUR packages were handled. Frankly reputation and standing do matter here. I have seen Eli be very curt with people in the past and I am not surprised that people have taken offense. But I haven't ever seen Eli do this without some justification, normally that the person in question is ignorant of policies and procedures in a context where they have a responsibility to be informed. I have also seen Eli admit mistakes when he was wrong. So when I read what he wrote about how you were reopening bug requests that had been repeatedly closed I tended to believe him over you. It is totally reasonable to make a character judgement based on reputation and social standing. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems that you are saying that Eli was lying or deceitful or mis-characterizing the situation. I don't generally agree with Eli's tact but I don't agree that it crossed a line into bullying. I feel that now you are mis-characterizing what transpired. But there is some grey area here and room for interpretation so I'll grant you that. I certainly don't think calling you a liar is a fair assessment, nor is that at all productive in nearly any context. My point about being bullied in the past is that I have a hard time seeing how anything that was said constitutes bullying. But as I pointed out, we don't have a well-defined definition of bullying, or ganging up, or violent emailing. So could we be more specific? Saying that you are whining is not bullying. In fact if you are repeatedly trying to complain about something that has already been addressed, or cannot be changed, or is outside of the scope of a conversation, then yeah I would agree that is whining. But again, whining is not a technical term, so I agree Eli took some liberty with that tact. Again I don't agree with that approach. But again, that's not bullying in my view. I'm sorry that this ordeal has caused you distress, to say the least. However, this community doesn't exist to cater to people's feelings. We should be considerate of feelings insofar as it helps us all get along and be more productive, but there will always be times when the people in charge here will want to do things in a way that some users disagree with. Sometimes that gets communicated in a way that rubs people the wrong way and causes some hurt feelings. That's not ideal but it's not uncommon that after a user hears an explanation they don't agree with that they start to argue endlessly. I'd rather Eli's time, and all of the other TU's time, be spent on doing what they are best at: maintaining Arch. If that means that they spend a little less time being exceptionally thoughtful about other people's feelings who are repeatedly trying to argue with him, then I am personally OK with that. On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 6:54 AM Santiago Torres-Arias via aur-general wrote:

On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 01:27:09PM +0100, Baptiste Jonglez wrote:

...

Hi Santiago,

Now that the discussion period is over, I am taking time to fully answer this, since it's much more general and important than the TU application itself.

Hi Baptiste.

I read your email, and I do agree with your picture in general. I don't intend to "sweep anything under the rug" but rather keep two things separate:

1. A TU application 2. A discussion about the way some members of our community approach their peers.*

I personally want to keep both conversations separate, mostly because I think the latter could be better handled internally.

Thanks, -Santiago.

* I don't say names here because I'm sure this is not the only instance of this happening.

*b. *to distort or twist the sense or intention of: the reporters did violence to my speech.

Violent speech, at least of late, is more defined as inciting hate crimes and actual violence. Perhaps we should use "cruel" here.

In fact if you are repeatedly trying to complain about something that has already been addressed, or cannot be changed, or is outside of the scope of a conversation, then yeah I would agree that is whining.

repeatedly trying to argue with him

repeatedly trying to defend himself and resolve the situation*

Frankly reputation and standing do matter here. I have seen Eli be very curt with people in the past and I am not surprised that people have taken offense. But I haven't ever seen Eli do this without some justification,

, then I am personally OK with that

As a professional environment, this is definitively not okay. Also see our CoC.

bully -* 1. * A person who is habitually cruel or overbearing, especially to smaller or weaker people.

-- Best, polyzen

Being curt and direct is against the code of conduct? On Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 12:54 PM Daniel Capella wrote:

hate crimes and physical violence*

On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 4:53 PM Daniel Capella wrote:

...

...

*b. *to distort or twist the sense or intention of: the reporters did violence to my speech.

Violent speech, at least of late, is more defined as inciting hate crimes and actual violence. Perhaps we should use "cruel" here.

...

In fact if you are repeatedly trying to complain about something that has already been addressed, or cannot be changed, or is outside of the scope of a conversation, then yeah I would agree that is whining.

...

repeatedly trying to argue with him

repeatedly trying to defend himself and resolve the situation*

...

Frankly reputation and standing do matter here. I have seen Eli be very curt with people in the past and I am not surprised that people have taken offense. But I haven't ever seen Eli do this without some justification,

...

, then I am personally OK with that

As a professional environment, this is definitively not okay. Also see our CoC.

...

bully -* 1. * A person who is habitually cruel or overbearing, especially to smaller or weaker people.

-- Best, polyzen

-- Best, polyzen

The only rule there that strikes me as potentially having been violated is "respect other users". But I think that cuts both ways in this case to be perfectly honest. It could be argued that Konstantin did not respect the existing TUs initial responses to his questions. But that's debatable. The main point that I am interested in making is that this initial claim of bullying and violent communication was overblown and inaccurate. On Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 1:06 PM Daniel Capella wrote:

On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 5:02 PM Adam Levy wrote:

...

Being curt and direct is against the code of conduct?

...

It seems to me that these three rules in particular are relevant in this case and were not respected: "Respect other users", "Do not flame" and "Be responsible".

Baptiste

-- Best, polyzen

I think that is the most fair assessment of the situation that I have read today. On Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 1:48 PM Connor Behan via aur-general < aur-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

...

On Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 1:06 PM Daniel Capella wrote:

...

On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 5:02 PM Adam Levy wrote:

...

Being curt and direct is against the code of conduct?

It seems to me that these three rules in particular are relevant in

On 2018-10-30 01:23 PM, Adam Levy via aur-general wrote: this

...

...

...

case and were not respected: "Respect other users", "Do not flame" and "Be responsible".

-- Best, polyzen

The only rule there that strikes me as potentially having been violated is "respect other users". But I think that cuts both ways in this case to be perfectly honest. It could be argued that Konstantin did not respect the existing TUs initial responses to his questions. But that's debatable.

The main point that I am interested in making is that this initial claim of bullying and violent communication was overblown and inaccurate.

Hot-button words like "bullying" and "violence" are being used as a rhetorical crutch.

However, I think the initial accusation of "whining" and telling "bald-faced lies" was also inappropriate. An average AUR packager might not realize that TUs routinely take over packages made by others and move them to [community]. Claiming that a package "is broken" instead of "causes orphan dependencies" also sounds like an honest mistake. And I can't blame a user for not knowing enough about the bug wrangler's workflow to tell which mailing list actions will make a difference.

In theory, this can be resolved with an RTFM. But when this realization means that one will have to completely change his approach to developing and packaging software for a larger community, some frustration is understandable.

Em outubro 30, 2018 16:07 Ralf Mardorf escreveu:

Apparently this TU has got special rights. That he could behave like this again and again does strengthen him to continue doing it.

This thread has lived much longer than it's purpose. Let's stop this right now. I'm placing this list into emergency moderation if this continues. I'm confident all the parties understood what happened by now and how to avoid this in the future. Thanks to all, Giancarlo Razzolini

17:16 <dmc> grazzolini, but we're finally getting somewhere :\ 17:37 <dmc> grazzolini, the reason it continues is because they're an underlying problem we're trying to solve 17:37 <dmc> that's long overdue 17:38 <dmc> there's* 17:38 <dmc> I'm afraid this is just a temporary band-aid 17:39 <dmc> eg. I just rejoined #archlinux-offtopic after months of leaving FOR THIS EXACT REASON 17:39 <dmc> then "sangy | Foxboron: don't try to downplay toxic behavior from dmc" 17:40 <dmc> I understand wanting to get the thread behind us because of how bad it looks, but .. it is what it is 17:40 <Foxboron> dmc: Yo, it was an attempt at a poor joke 17:41 <dmc> it was a direct jab 17:41 <sangy> it is not a joke 17:41 <Foxboron> ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 17:41 <dmc> we're literally going on about professionalism 17:41 * Foxboron finds the door 17:41 <dmc> see? 17:41 <sangy> do you not think your attitude is toxic? 17:42 <dmc> why should I continue with you? 17:42 <sangy> the first think I told you was "I'm disapointed that you're not trying to help me find a solution and just fanned the flames" 17:42 <sangy> the first thing you said was 'k' 17:42 <sangy> there you go 17:43 <dmc> grazzolini, the thread isn't trolling. if people want their voices to be heard, to speak out against bullying.. you shouldn't moderate that 17:45 <dmc> dmc | sangy, honestly I don't know if you actually care or just are putting on a show 17:45 <coderobe> could you not 17:45 <coderobe> this is still -testing, and that argument is incredibly unproductive 17:46 <dmc> because you asked nicely 17:47 <jasonwryan> this is my fault: I worng windowed my original comment 17:47 <jasonwryan> sorry: this discussion does /not/ belong here 17:48 <Foxboron> That was my assumption :p 17:48 <dmc> of course not On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 8:48 PM Giancarlo Razzolini via aur-general < aur-general@archlinux.org> wrote:

Em outubro 30, 2018 16:07 Ralf Mardorf escreveu:

...

Apparently this TU has got special rights. That he could behave like this again and again does strengthen him to continue doing it.

This thread has lived much longer than it's purpose. Let's stop this right now.

I'm placing this list into emergency moderation if this continues. I'm confident all the parties understood what happened by now and how to avoid this in the future.

Thanks to all, Giancarlo Razzolini

-- Best, polyzen

Am 30.10.18 um 21:48 schrieb Giancarlo Razzolini via aur-general:

Em outubro 30, 2018 16:07 Ralf Mardorf escreveu:

...

Apparently this TU has got special rights. That he could behave like this again and again does strengthen him to continue doing it.

This thread has lived much longer than it's purpose. Let's stop this right now.

I'm placing this list into emergency moderation if this continues.

I don't want to impute bad intentions to you, but this behavioural pattern might be a root of the problem. This isn't a technical discussion. It's about social interactions and emotions. You can't just weigh facts and find /the/ truth. It's widely believed that the best we have come up with, to reach consensus in large communities, is voting. An equivalent on a mailing list would be to show support through iterating a position in one's own words. What you have written above is like trying to cut off a protest march on the grounds that the first 20 protesters already made their point clear, so there would be no reason for the next 2000 to reiterate it again. This thread might make some people feel uncomfortable. But rightly so. This is not only about some TUs employing a harsh and repellent style of communication. This is also about the community of TUs letting this happen for years.

I'm confident all the parties understood what happened by now and how to avoid this in the future.

I don't. What makes you so confident? I do believe in man's ability to change. But this often needs a bit of pressure. (Don't forget that moderation means to arbitrate, not to censor.) Best regards

Dear community, I am writing on behalf of the Arch Linux team. Despite the initial radio silence, we have been talking about this thread internally and we are still discussing the consequences. We apologize for any emails and actions from our team which may have been inappropriate or disrespectful. We are also sorry for not stepping in publicly earlier but we tried to avoid making a drama out of this with too many people joining in. Moderation is off again, however, as Giancarlo mentioned, we do not think any further comments on people's behavior on this list add any value and we kindly ask you to focus your efforts on other stuff. We will work it out internally. People make mistakes. We learn from it, try to improve and move on. Best regards, Lukas

Hi Eli, On 28/10/2018 01:40, Eli Schwartz via aur-general wrote:

On 10/14/18 4:34 PM, Konstantin Gizdov wrote:

...

Thus, a couple of years ago, I decide to get more involved and contribute. I took on the task to maintain CERN's ROOT package [7] and since then I've involved myself heavily into that, I'm a contributor to the project and I use it daily in my work. I have been providing this package for many colleagues in the field, including all of its stack & complementary tools (Pythia, XRootD & other Python tools). I have enabled a lot of new features and worked with upstream towards new functionality, bug fixes, etc. On top of that I have shipped several other related projects - machine learning packages, SciKit-HEP packages like uproot, Docker images, GitLab CIs and so on.

I have also been able to develop and publish a machine learning project me and colleague came up with [4]. This is soon going to be a package in SciKit-HEP and I will aim to make it package here too. Arch Linux was a great platform for all of this. I was able to install & configure up-to-date software easily and what I did not find, I provided for me & others on the AUR without too much hassle.

Overall, I have to say Arch Linux (and its community) have played a key role in me being able to do all of these things. I have found the OS itself to be stable and flexible and the users & maintainers approachable and direct, which I appreciate a lot. I have met a lot of people through the Arch Linux community - forums, AUR and just saying 'I use Arch, too!', haha.

The reason for applying to become a TU is to get even more involved and give back to the community. If you accept me, I would like to continue maintaining and improving my current packages as well as bring new packages. As an AUR maintainer I basically consider it an on-going duty already.

I would like to maintain/contribute/adopt the following:

* Packages I would like to co-maintain: o python-awkward o libafterimage o xxhash o unuran * Packages I already maintain and intend to move from AUR: o root & root-extra o xrootd o simpletools o root5 o python-root_numpy o python-uproot o python-uproot-methods o python-hep_ml o pythia o llvm50 o llvm50-libs o clang50 * New packages I would like to add/move from AUR: o cern-vdt o cvmfs o HepDrone [4] o python-keras o root_pandas (new) o histbook (new) o decaylanguage (new) o pyjet (new) o vegascope (new) o root_ufunc (new) o formulate (new) Hi Konstantin,

As is customary when someone applies as a TU, I try to review their PKGBUILDs.

$ ./ztrawhcse -Wall -Werror -Wpedantic Segmentation fault (core dumped)

Uh-oh -- I'm not sure what to do with this? https://aur.archlinux.org/cgit/aur.git/commit/PKGBUILD?h=python-awkward-array&id=59bfa242560e113a39bd630d20d21eee45954dd7

This actually came up on [aur-general] before: https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-September/034286.html

In summary, this is invalid PKGBUILD syntax for two reasons - makedepends cannot be specified in build() functions - there is no such thing as split build_*() functions

When I asked you about why you uploaded invalid PKGBUILDs, you responded that "it was added 2 weeks ago in a rush to push a new version upstream, because I maintain my packages well".

I'm afraid I completely disagree. It's not maintaining packages well to upload things without checking that they work, and a good packager focuses on getting something to work properly, rather than slipping on quality in the rush to update other packages as soon as possible -- maybe in order to claim that Arch is always up to date? I don't know, but if that's the reason, then I for one would much prefer less bleeding-edge packages as long as they at least work.

i.e. "bleeding edge", not "hemorrhaging edge".

You also said the package needs a complete rewrite "which I'm well aware of". Does this mean you knew it didn't work when you uploaded it, but you uploaded it anyway?

You also said that "this particular style of package was copied from another [community] package a long time ago, things have changed as it was pointed out to me here in the AUR".

The `python-uproot` package required `python-uproot-methods` in a new upstream release. This in turn required `python-awkward-array`. Then, `python-awkward-array` listed as requirements (on their page, discussed at length and addressed later in the bug tracker as you pointed out) at the time `numba`, `dask`, `bcolz`, `arrow`. I wanted to provide the update so I had to push/find all these. The problem appeared when I tried to create the python2 version of the relevant ones (as I provide the uproot variant of this). `bcolz` does not have a python2 variant still and at the time neither did `dask`. I asked on the relevant pages for the maintainers to add them. In the meantime, I wanted to still update `python-uproot`. Considering all these were optional, I was able to push a new release. This is why it was rushed and this is why it needs a rewrite - it could not, at the time, be complete because of the constraints. Yes, in principle I could have also tried to provide `python2-bcolz` and `python2-dask`, but I thought the current maintainers will do a better job at this. As it was picked up in [community], I have not tried to keep it up to date. I think it was mentioned by you on the bug tracker that `python-awkward` in [community] derives its name from the pypi.org page, rather than the project page (`awkward-array`). Thus, I discovered a few weeks back, that the AUR blacklisting was not taking care of it, at least for me. So pushed a small temporary update, thinking since it was mentioned, it was being taken care of and in due time a `provides=('python-awkward-array')` is going to appear in the official binary. I do not presume to know if that's how these things are addressed, but this is why `python-awkward-array` is in this (meta-)state. I am guessing at this stage the correct action from my side is to request deletion of my AUR variant and change `python-uproot-methods` to point to `python-awkward`, but I did want to give it time to see where things are going. Now I see where they are going and will correct it, if you agree with this resolution. I think that should give responses to all your concerns (including below), since I couldn't find a nice way to structure it under each of your paragraphs.

Can you please refer me to which community package you refer to? I can state with some authority that nothing has ever changed, and this was never correct. I asked you about this a month ago, but you never responded to me.

I did respond to question: https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/aur-general/2018-September/034290.html

...

On the topic of this package, you never fixed it until the 14th of this month, two weeks later, right around the time you submitted your TU application. I'm hoping that this isn't because you don't have time to fix things unless you're actively trying to apply for a TU position, but this *was* a very easy thing to fix...

That being said, I'm not sure why you tried to fix it at all, since the package is a duplicate of python-awkward in [community], as you very well know since you submitted a pretty rapid bug report asking why the package in [community] does not include some optdepends of the package.

You've meanwhile updated it to a version that currently out of date and lagging behind the version in [community], something that is only possible because the AUR blacklist bans packages already in the official repos, but not packages that provide the exact same software under a different name. You apparently had enough time to do so, but not enough time to update the two packages in the AUR which depend on python-awkward-array to depend on python-awkward instead -- nor to even add provides/conflicts on your AUR duplicate since they install the same files.

(The optdepends are still there, even though the bug tracker resolution was that they shouldn't be, and aren't in the official community repository.)

...

I'm afraid I got too discouraged by this immediate result, and did not end up looking at any of your other packages.

I'm sorry to hear that. I think I have good reasons (listed above) for the current state of this specific package. My other ones should be better I hope. In any case, I would appreciate the feedback whatever it is. Regards, Konstantin

On 10/28/18 2:21 PM, Eli Schwartz wrote:

The problem I see is in your mindset -- I don't think you approach packaging with due respect for quality.

Okay, enough about packaging, what about dealing with bugs? Bugs you've opened in the past, 25 in total: https://bugs.archlinux.org/index.php?opened=22733&status[]= Duplicates of existing bugs: https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/51419 https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/52308 https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/53581 https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/49000 https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/51246 Bugs that could not be reproduced: https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/50186 https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/57712 User error bugs/not a bug: https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/51696 https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/56653 https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/56490 https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/51247 https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/49029 https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/60248 (the recent python2-awkward one) https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/60247 (the other python-awkward bug) Suggestion to modify core packages in non-vanilla ways instead of relying on AUR packages that are customized to the user's needs: https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/50054 3 bugs were closed as upstream, not much to do about that. 5 were true bugs and fixed (or pending). 1 was a feature request. ... 15/25 not good track record, with rather a lot of reports that simply weren't correct at all. Particularly eye-raising were: https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/60248 -- report bug because we only moved one package to [community], not two https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/51247 -- misconfigured AUR package breaks python interpreter, reports bug https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/49029 -- reports bug for mainline kernel installed from AUR https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/57639 -- I'm rather skeptical of your interaction when resolving this bug, particularly your attempts to "solve" problems by selectively installing packages from [testing], then installing a package from [staging]!!! Ignoring comments on the bug where someone else figured out the issue, adding fuzz comments that distract from solving anything while you argue over whether you should be allowed to report bugs for [staging] packages because "it is clear to all of us that not having libx265 has absolutely nothing to do with the issue", even though that's missing the point because we explicitly hide the staging repos from *everyone* because they're not supposed to be used. Based on your limited interaction in the bugtracker, you seem to have a predisposition towards getting your system into an unsupported state (AUR/staging) and then having problems. In a couple cases you simply failed to read documentation and decided the package was broken as a result of your misunderstanding. Once again, you've ended up doing things which are completely invalid, because [staging] is just not something anyone does, ever, for any reasons whatsoever. The only reason to put something into staging in the first place is if it's 100% broken and is part of a rebuild involving multiple packages. I don't feel that this shows the right attitude for packaging in [community]. -- Eli Schwartz Bug Wrangler and Trusted User

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA256 On 28/10/2018 11:36, Konstantin Gizdov wrote:

Forgot to mention in my previous email - the [community] > `python-awkward` does not provide python2 variant, so I can't actually > delete my AUR package. (This was one of my original bug reports.) I > would have to keep that up to date, I guess. It should be fixed now - I've pushed the python2 variant only to AUR, moved the dependencies and version bumped where needed. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----

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