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by nupark 5561 days ago
Given where Core OS sits in the software stack (kernel, libc, file systems, etc), being "academic" and "by the book" shouldn't be surprising. :)

As to the rest; my point was that Bertrand was very opposed to change in 'his' code, not that he wasn't open to any change. Regarding malloc, I think Bertrand still thought he'd be best suited to do it, and he has always objected strenuously to others approaching his problems.

Oh, and as for top…when they did change it in early SnowLeopard builds, it broke a whole host of tooling, etc., and they had to revert some changes...

That's pretty normal when tools depend on text output of commands (something Core OS has told everyone not to do, and then they do anyway). The initial conversion to modern top/libtop actually occurred back in the 10.{1,2,3} release cycles, and was subject to a very heavy amount of push-back and compromise with Bertrand about "his" top(1) :)
1 comments
jballanc 5561 days ago
Oh, I never had a problem with Core OS's academic bent...enjoyed it actually. I was more commenting about the unique sort of tension that existed there, and that managing that tension while also developing kick-ass software is a relatively impressive feat. Also, you're right about the "I can do it better than anyone" attitude regarding fixing things that he wrote...but then my experience was that this was a pervasive attitude at Apple. The only way you could get someone to listen to you was to not only do it better but prove that you had done it better. So, maybe that's not the best attitude for a manager to take, but hardly out of the ordinary (for Apple).

I also feel that as time moved on, Bertrand was making more bad decisions, but that this might have been a consequence of pressure from the top. It may not look like it to the outside observer, but there is a major metamorphosis going on at Apple internally. I think this move will be for the best for Bertrand. As for Apple... * shrug *

...oh, and thanks for bringing back memories of the Core OS "you're doing it wrong, stupid" lessons I got so familiar with. If only we could all be so perfect as Core OS! ;-)

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