[zeromq-dev] Thread Safe sockets

[Pieter Hintjens]

On Tue, Feb 7, 2012 at 12:11 PM, Dave Duchene <dduchene at absolute.com> wrote:

> Why not add JSON and XML serialization for messages while we're at it? Why not have a configuration language for describing socket pairs? Because it complicates the library, and isn't needed for most applications. And *most importantly*, because the users of the library aren't asking for it.

This is my opinion too, that change should be driven by demand, not
philosophy. If anyone makes a patch that adds XML serialization, my
next patch to libzmq will be to remove that.

However, let's separate the different threads here.

* One, what actual features do users want in libzmq?
* Two, how can we encourage people to learn to contribute to libzmq?

Confusing these two is easy but leads to the often-repeated, and toxic
response, "we don't want your help, because we don't like your patch".

The discussion should be, how to encourage people to contribute (even
pointless or wrong) patches to libzmq, without getting a single change
that we don't actually need (as users) into stable releases. There is
no conflict between these goals, unless you imagine we work without
process.

Last, let's not let nostalgia interfere with accuracy. Even Martin S.
has often proposed changes that the users did not ask for and did not
want. The stable 2.1 releases exist *despite* and not because of, the
work done in more experimental versions. And that is exactly as it
should be.

-Pieter