From almost the first response, the tone was quite condescending
No.
Here we go. I'll try again. Yes.
If professionalism means never giving up, even when it has been *explained* to you why your idea won't work in practice, then you succeeded.
In the end someone did explain, yes. But it took about 10 posts until anyone started to actually read what I had written and stop reading in other things into what it said. Like constantly stating that "photoshop isn't the all only application" and the like, when that had nothing to do with what my point was. I don't give up. Especially when I have time to spare. Which I did.
perhaps your idea isn't as brilliant as you think?
I did not think of my idea as brilliant. In fact, I have never even remotely tried to convey that. I just thougt of it as an idea. This is exactly the kind of attitude that leads nowhere. Why even write that sentence? Did we get anywhere?
You have to treat valid critical response with the same respect as valid positive response.
I did, even if it didn't adress what I said. Although I did comment when someone persisted with strawman arguments like "should we let users in control of the project" even though I had never said anything like that.
Ever managed a project as big as Wine? In terms of number of developers, or sheer lines of code?
Have you? Regarding sheer lines of code, the main application (a portfolio/fund management system) I am working have roughly the same amount of code that wine does. Or at least around 90%. The database currently has 327 tables and customer databases range from 1-100 gigabyte in size. With regards to complexity, wine has nothing on it, at least as far as I have seen so far. So I'd say I know a thing or two about large projects.
You seem to think that the wine project is some kind of huge beheamoth of a project. In fact, most fairly common business applications are just as large(especially in later years when so much code is auto-generated). One or two million LOCs is not huge. Big, but not huge.
Especially, I know that when a project grows, softer values tend to become more important. And that users, handled correctly, can be more of a resource, than a liability.
//Nicklas