> This is all predicated on the assumption that forks and clones are a bad thing
No, they are just different things. Linux is what people use. It would be nice to be able to write drivers in Rust for the system people use. It's a very practical desire to want to use Rust and Linux to build real systems, right now, instead of having to choose one or the other.
You can write out of tree Rust drivers for Linux right now, no one is stopping you. Your 'very practical desire' to write Rust drivers doesn't extend into some sort of corresponding obligation for anyone else to accept that code into their projects. Your desires do not take priority over the desires and needs of others.
I feel like people have some kind of misconception about what OSS requires on this point. The only meaningful right you have with the Linux kernel, that you don't have with - say - NT, is the right to fork it. Nothing about the idea of OSS extends you a right to merge whatever code you want into someone else's project to satisfy your 'very practical desires'.
You could have the best idea of all time, and you still wouldn't have any rights to anyone else's OSS project other than forking it.
Drew is offering a practical solution here to all sides, and all that the critics can come up with is 'yeah but wouldn't it be nicer if they got along?' (it would! they don't) or 'I hate Drew', which is an irrelevant and cruel thing to say about an actual human being.
> Your 'very practical desire' to write Rust drivers doesn't extend into some sort of corresponding obligation for anyone else to accept that code into their projects.
Never said it did?
> Nothing about the idea of OSS extends you a right to merge whatever code you want into someone else's project to satisfy your 'very practical desires'.
And that's why I called them practical desires, not rights?
> Drew is offering a practical solution here to all sides, and all that the critics can come up with is 'yeah but wouldn't it be nicer if they got along?' (it would! they don't)
My solution is to first deal with the bad behavior or it will fester. Then I'd ask if the technical reasons for including Rust in the Linux kernel still hold. I think they do. So I'm not sure we've reached the point where a fork makes sense yet. If we forked every time a kernel dev acted nasty to others, we'd have far too many forks.
> or 'I hate Drew', which is an irrelevant and cruel thing to say about an actual human being.
No, they are just different things. Linux is what people use. It would be nice to be able to write drivers in Rust for the system people use. It's a very practical desire to want to use Rust and Linux to build real systems, right now, instead of having to choose one or the other.