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Date: Mon, 22 Feb 1999 11:54:52 -0500
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From: DJ Delorie <dj AT delorie DOT com>
To: paul-ml AT is DOT lg DOT ua
CC: cygwin AT sourceware DOT cygnus DOT com
In-reply-to: <13561.990222@is.lg.ua> (message from Paul Sokolovsky on Mon, 22
	Feb 1999 13:28:16 +0200)
Subject: Cygwin participation threshold
References: <19990219093658 DOT A29653 AT cygnus DOT com> <13561 DOT 990222 AT is DOT lg DOT ua>


> Hopefully, that's what you wanted - to give people a nice tool,

I think it would be more accurate to replace "give" with "share with".

As a bit of history, Cygnus had a purely business reason to create
cygwin.  Doing so let us host our tools on 95/NT platforms, which
meant more customers (i.e. more money).  AFAIK, releasing cygwin to
the net had two reasons: the first philosophical, in that we like to
share; and the second practical, in that the more people using cygwin
the more paid support contracts we'll get.

>     But when someone wants to fix or add something to cygwin, here
> comes another problem - it's high enough threshold to be able to do
> so. Even higher threshold to make it acceptable for inclusion back.

DJGPP has a much higher threshold (it's much more complicated), but
there are far more people contributing to djgpp than to cygwin.  If
anyone can figure out *why*, let us know! ;-) I think it's social -
djgpp contributors just know that they'll get a friendly reception to
their contributions, good or bad, so they aren't as hesitant to send
stuff in.

> By this I mean whole technology issues - not Cygwin technology, I
> call it GNU technology - configuration/setup methods, coding styles
> (not just mere conventions for identifier naming / block
> indentation, but modularization conventions, from source modules
> thru libs to executables, etc.) And all that are obstacles to
> contributing.

Even so, I'd rather people contribute what they can instead of just
sulking off in a corner and getting nowhere.  We're not going to laugh
at you for bad style (I hope).  More likely, we'll explain how to
change what you've got to work better with what we've got (it's called
"learning").  Cooperation is a two-way street!  If you're willing to
do *anything*, we'll probably meet you half-way.

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