How many fixed the problem and never published the fix? Not many I bet, at least not for significant bugs. Perhaps trivial one liners. Trivial one liner can be difference between working and not working code, so simplicity to solve problem doesn't mean that it should not be reported.
The "trivial one liner" is just a *rare* outlier that it barely merits consideration.
They use free OS, but don't give back anything, keeping their knowledge for another opportunity to cash on it. Or, alternatively, have no intent to cash in on it at all, just want to get their job done. Agree. That is the same case as those that fixed, but "have no time, will, interest, knowledge or even permission to dicuss further".
Which is just dumb since if you fix without sending upstream you will have to fix again, and again, and again.... The concept that not submitting a fix saves time is crazy; if you really want to save time then use packages, no way does patching and compiling your own code constitute efficient use of time.
You need only to read about the demanding standards necessary for submitting patches (especially to the kernel tree) to know that you can't simply hand in a patch and expect it to see the light of day unless you are well versed in the mechanics and politics of that portion of the community. I read the article about kernel patches, but I bet that a lot of bugs would be fixed if procedure wouldn't be so strict. The reasons for strick procedure are given in the same article, but on the other side who is going to take time to read article and create proper patch, for something like one liner?
You can toss out the concept of the "one liner" as it applies to almost nothing in reality. And I don't understand how this became about submitting patches to the kernel? It began as someone's diatribe against Evolution because of what they thought they saw in their Bugzilla and my pointing out this was bogus; Evolution is an application, not a kernel module. Personally, I want the standards for kernel code to be brutal - it is the base of the pillar. Even so, the number of contributors to the kernel manages to be pretty high.
I suspect these imagined fixers-but-never-submitters were submitters at some point in the past who never got so much as a thanky thanky back, and decided it was not worth it. Some yes, for sure, but not all.
I think that proportion is very low; and I'm more concerned with the "vanishing submitter" as I'll never even see the "fixers-but-never-submitters". The "fixers-but-never-submitters" just don't 'get it'. -- Adam Tauno Williams Network & Systems Administrator Consultant - http://www.whitemiceconsulting.com Developer - http://www.opengroupware.org -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org