On 06-Jun-22 23:56, Keith Moore wrote:
On 6/6/22 04:20, tom petch wrote:
I saw an apology for the use of '...considered harmful' recently and
was suprised that that phrase was .. well considered harmful
This makes me wonder: how is making a reference to a letter that's
rather famous in Computer Science history any different that referring
to any established technical term or concept? Granted not absolutely
everyone will have heard of that letter, but is it really hostile to
newcomers to use well-established language of the subject domain that we
work in when that language isn't, say, sexist or racist? Is
it hostile
to newcomers to refer to the end-to-end principle?
I suspect that, as always, context is everything. If somebody had written
a draft "6to4 considered harmful" some years ago, I don't think that
Keith or I would have been upset. (If you don't get that, see RFC 3056.)
But if they had written a draft "Carpenter and Moore considered harmful"
we would have been quite angry. Somewhere in between is "Carpenter and Moore's
work considered harmful" - I'm really not sure how I would have reacted to that.
As a matter of fact that work was subject to a lot of criticism, as was its
extension by RFC 3068, but I don't recall a single ad hominem comment.
We can be critical without being rude.
Brian
