Author Topic: Danny Smith left MinGW project  (Read 9047 times)

Offline Biplab

  • Developer
  • Lives here!
  • *****
  • Posts: 1874
    • Biplab's Blog
Danny Smith left MinGW project
« on: September 03, 2007, 08:37:43 pm »
I was browsing the MinGW developer mailing list and I read this email. :shock:

Quote
http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.gnu.mingw.devel/2565

Danny Smith, the MinGW-GCC admin, has left the project due to some unspecified reasons. This leaves that crucial project without an admin and they are looking for volunteers to fit into his role.

Quote
http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.gnu.mingw.user/23730

I hope they will find a suitable successor in future. But surely this is a big jolt to the project.
Be a part of the solution, not a part of the problem.

Offline JGM

  • Lives here!
  • ****
  • Posts: 518
  • Got to practice :)
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #1 on: September 03, 2007, 09:41:22 pm »
Thats something to worry about  :(.

Offline thomas

  • Administrator
  • Lives here!
  • *****
  • Posts: 3979
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #2 on: September 04, 2007, 10:03:56 am »
Danny sure is a big loss for that project. He has been in that position for as long as I can remember.
The MinGW project has lost an admin and a packager, but most importantly, a captain who held the ship's course in rough sea for many years.

However, as dramatic as it looks, let's not panic. They still have 3 admins and 40+ developers, so this shouldn't necessarily be the death of the project.
Also, Danny is still listed under developers, so he may just be taking a break from being admin (I found no reference that said he wanted to quit), so he may give the new captain a hand when he needs.
"We should forget about small efficiencies, say about 97% of the time: Premature quotation is the root of public humiliation."

Offline Biplab

  • Developer
  • Lives here!
  • *****
  • Posts: 1874
    • Biplab's Blog
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #3 on: September 04, 2007, 10:13:15 am »
Danny sure is a big loss for that project. He has been in that position for as long as I can remember.
The MinGW project has lost an admin and a packager, but most importantly, a captain who held the ship's course in rough sea for many years.

However, as dramatic as it looks, let's not panic. They still have 3 admins and 40+ developers, so this shouldn't necessarily be the death of the project.
Also, Danny is still listed under developers, so he may just be taking a break from being admin (I found no reference that said he wanted to quit), so he may give the new captain a hand when he needs.

I hope so that they will restart soon with a new captain. But honestly the lasts part of the message (Second link in my original post) posted by Keith scared me a lot. I'm quoting that part.
Quote
Unless someone is willing to step forward, I fear that development of GCC, as a MinGW project, will either die, or it will henceforth remain frozen in its present state, for the forseeable future.

Well, it's not explicitly written that he's quitting, but we can guess that he'll be inactive. He's still listed as a member of MinGW project, but if you note his status, it's undefined.
Be a part of the solution, not a part of the problem.

Offline wwolf

  • Multiple posting newcomer
  • *
  • Posts: 34
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #4 on: September 04, 2007, 03:17:03 pm »
Now you've made me to seriously consider to contribute there. However I have not worked on GCC ever before, so... :(  I would like to learn compiler technology, but I am not sure if I can do it fast enough to actually benefit the community...

Offline stahta01

  • Lives here!
  • ****
  • Posts: 7678
    • My Best Post
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #5 on: September 04, 2007, 05:42:35 pm »
Now you've made me to seriously consider to contribute there. However I have not worked on GCC ever before, so... :(  I would like to learn compiler technology, but I am not sure if I can do it fast enough to actually benefit the community...

Try to build the minGW GCC from source code and if you can then think about starting as a developer.
Note, I failed building minGW GCC from source code twice now, I am waiting till I have free time to try again.

Tim S
C Programmer working to learn more about C++ and Git.
On Windows 7 64 bit and Windows 10 64 bit.
--
When in doubt, read the CB WiKi FAQ. http://wiki.codeblocks.org

Offline kelo81

  • Multiple posting newcomer
  • *
  • Posts: 86
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #6 on: September 04, 2007, 08:44:59 pm »
I don't know if I'm wrong, but I thought that GCC 4.3 was adding windows as a supported platform... (or at least as an experimental one)
Ezequiel Ruiz
Tango/04 consultant
www.tango04.com

Offline stahta01

  • Lives here!
  • ****
  • Posts: 7678
    • My Best Post
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #7 on: September 04, 2007, 08:55:50 pm »
I don't know if I'm wrong, but I thought that GCC 4.3 was adding windows as a supported platform... (or at least as an experimental one)

It is adding MinGW as an secondary ?target/platform? just like Cygwin is/was.

Tim S

Edit: http://gcc.gnu.org/gcc-4.3/criteria.html

Quote
Secondary Platform List

The secondary platforms are:

    * hppa2.0w-hp-hpux11.11
    * powerpc-ibm-aix5.2.0.0
    * powerpc-apple-darwin
    * i686-pc-cygwin
    * i686-mingw32
    * ia64-unknown-linux-gnu
    * s390-linux-gnu
« Last Edit: September 05, 2007, 03:50:55 am by stahta01 »
C Programmer working to learn more about C++ and Git.
On Windows 7 64 bit and Windows 10 64 bit.
--
When in doubt, read the CB WiKi FAQ. http://wiki.codeblocks.org

Offline darthdespotism

  • Almost regular
  • **
  • Posts: 163
    • Coder's Nemesis
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #8 on: September 04, 2007, 08:59:48 pm »
Yes I've read this some time ago but I didn't find anything on gnu.org about it yet.

Offline wwolf

  • Multiple posting newcomer
  • *
  • Posts: 34
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #9 on: September 05, 2007, 02:14:07 am »
Now you've made me to seriously consider to contribute there. However I have not worked on GCC ever before, so... :(  I would like to learn compiler technology, but I am not sure if I can do it fast enough to actually benefit the community...

Try to build the minGW GCC from source code and if you can then think about starting as a developer.
Note, I failed building minGW GCC from source code twice now, I am waiting till I have free time to try again.

Tim S

I think I am going to ask the gcc guys on the Kona C++ standardization meeting. I guess they can tell me if it is hopeless to get up to speed or not.

Offline Roman

  • Multiple posting newcomer
  • *
  • Posts: 78
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #10 on: September 05, 2007, 07:50:54 pm »
Quote
I hope so that they will restart soon with a new captain.

Where is that guy 20-40? May be he is a new capitan?  :D
CB LSI (C::B as a Little Secret Initiative)

Offline thomas

  • Administrator
  • Lives here!
  • *****
  • Posts: 3979
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #11 on: September 06, 2007, 09:44:04 am »
You are obviously joking.  8)

See, the problem with with Danny Smith stepping back is not that they lost some random fool that can easily be replaced with an even bigger fool.
They lost someone who knows what he is doing, someone who has a lot of knowledge and years of experience in maintaining such a project. A captain who has been holding a steady course through the sea of naysayers, wiseacres and grudgers. And, his course was a good one. Maybe not the fastest one, but the safest. During all the years, MinGW has never failed me.

Coming back to your original question "Where is that guy 20-40": He is not welcome here any more.
"We should forget about small efficiencies, say about 97% of the time: Premature quotation is the root of public humiliation."

Offline Biplab

  • Developer
  • Lives here!
  • *****
  • Posts: 1874
    • Biplab's Blog
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #12 on: September 06, 2007, 10:08:53 am »
They have assigned a new maintainer.

Quote
http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.gnu.mingw.devel/2571
Be a part of the solution, not a part of the problem.

Offline thomas

  • Administrator
  • Lives here!
  • *****
  • Posts: 3979
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #13 on: September 06, 2007, 10:24:23 am »
Looks like someone we know (guessing from the email) :)
"We should forget about small efficiencies, say about 97% of the time: Premature quotation is the root of public humiliation."

Offline TDragon

  • Lives here!
  • ****
  • Posts: 943
    • TDM-GCC
Re: Danny Smith left MinGW project
« Reply #14 on: September 06, 2007, 03:37:23 pm »
They have assigned a new maintainer.
Judging by context, I believe Keith was asking Chris to be the new maintainer for libmingwex, but not for MinGW/GCC.
https://jmeubank.github.io/tdm-gcc/ - TDM-GCC compiler suite for Windows (GCC 9.2.0 2020-03-08, 32/64-bit, no extra DLLs)