the last year hasn't been an easy one for debian. we've seen lots of fights, unproductive discussions, & in general behaviour which contributed to what enrico in his brilliant blog post called the "stink in the kitchen". people's feelings were hurt, some became less active, others resigned from a specific position or retired completely.
it happened to me as well that reading through threads full of trolling, aggressiveness, finger-pointing, unrespectful or abusive behaviour, etc. made me frustrated, or sad, or angry, or all kinds of other negative feelings.
but then I usually told myself: this is not the debian project as I know it; this is only a small part – a part which urgently needs improvement! –; but if we only look at it alone, our picture of debian at large is distorted.
the much bigger part of the debian life I know doesn't happen on this handful of high-profile mailing lists; it happens on dozens of specialized mailing lists, in many small IRC channels, in the BTS, & in in-person meetings. – & what I see there is most of the time constructive, collaborative, respectful communication, & committed, helpful, funny, awesome people.
the idea of this advent calendar was to give examples of some of my recent experiences which demonstrate what the bright side of debian is in my opinion & what contributes to my fun in debian. with the aim of sharing my impression that the proverbial "stink" is, if we take a step back, only one piece of the bigger picture, & that we shouldn't let ourselves get demotivated by only staring at this puzzle piece. – thanks to all the awesome contributors for polishing existing & adding new shiny puzzle pieces to our common picture every day!
finally: thanks for reading this series of posts, & especially thank you to all who provided positive feedback – this in turn motivated me to follow through!
& now: back to work, & don't forget to help cleaning the kitchen :)
this posting is part of GDAC (gregoa's debian advent calendar), a project to show the bright side of debian & why it's fun for me to contribute.
