| HN Mirror

> How would you feel when you put in all that work and receive basically no recognition for it?

I would feel that nothing bad happened and that my code was actually reviewed by a kernel maintainer, that acknowledged the problem, and found a solution based on mine, which is in itself a big ego boost.

But probably it's just because I have been programming for over 25 years, because I like solving problems, and I don't do it for the recognition, which is basically a false coin. The recognition at work is the salary, the recognition when I volunteer is that I contribute to help people when I can, not that the people I help are grateful to me. Sometimes they are ungrateful too, but that's not why I do it, so I don't care.

In my opinion it is childish otherwise, you do things you think they are right because you think they are right, not for some prize.

Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right.

> ----------------

- diagnosed a longstanding bug

- contributed an initial patch

- actively reached out to the maintainer, who said they would reach out in private

- contributed additional versions that were reviewed

That's basically what I used to do when my car had a problem and I brought it to the mechanic, because I grew up in my uncle's body shop.

but the mechanic does it professionally and of course he wants to do all the process again, so he can be sure what the real problem is. At that point he probably found a solution which is slightly better than mine or that solves the root of the problem, not just the symptom.

So now I just go there and tell him what is that I feel it's wrong (e.g. the motor keeps stalling) and I let him fix it. If I wanted to become a real contributor, I would start from the bottom, as everyone does: changing oil (here's a bug you can fix)