OSSは技術よりもソフトスキルの重要度が高い

ACM: Ep78: Russ CoxのRuss Coxがしているコメントより、少し長いが引用する。

On the collaborator side, open source is really a fascinating method of program development. It’s somewhat different from being in a company or on a team at a university or anything like that, because anyone can show up and anyone can leave, and there’s not a clear decider for disagreements, things like that. Whereas if you’re on a team, there’s usually one person, the professor or the company CEO or someone, who ultimately can decide any problem that you have with someone else. Whereas in open source, you can’t. And so open source really is not so much about programming, although obviously we’re all writing programs, and you have to be able to write and debug programs or you’re not going to get very far.

But the biggest thing about open source is communication. It’s a social endeavor. You have to be able to work well with people, to write clearly, to talk about what you’re going to do before you do it, to convince others that your approach is the right one, to give constructive feedback without making people feel terrible, to listen to users and really hear what they’re saying. All of that is arguably more important than the programming, and that is where projects succeed or fail. And so being a good contributor, I think really is about working well with others and communicating well with others.

これによると、OSSはプログラミング手法というよりは社会的な取り組みだという。

他人とうまく協力する
明確に文章を書く
行動の前に何をするか説明する
自分のアプローチが正しいことを他人に説明して納得させる
相手に不快感を与えることなく建設的なフィードバックを返す
ユーザーの声を聞いて真に理解する

こういったことがプログラミングよりも影響が大きいので、うまくコミュニケーションを取ることが重要という話。

Linus TorvaldsもTorvalds On Linux Security Modules: “I Already Think We Have Too Many Of Those Pointless Things”で技術の良し悪しではなく、まずは他の人と協力しろと促している。

So my suggestion is to standardize on normal existing security models instead of thinking that you can do better by making yet another one. Or at least work with the existing people instead of trying to bypass them and ignoring what they tell you.

Linusは bcachefs のときも協力しろと言っていたようだし、意外とそういう傾向があるのかもしれない。