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Comment by phkamp | Hacker News Reader

You are not even in the same zip code as the point I'm trying to make, which, I guess, sort of makes my point.

Nobody says you have to write iOS games using the same methodology as avionics, what somebody is trying to say is that random walk will only get you so far...

iOS is a pretty bad example btw, because iOS is very much a Cathedral and has a designer and architect who cares and who is in control.

That's precisely why don't need to use autoconf to compile stuff for iOS.

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> That's precisely why don't need to use autoconf to compile stuff for iOS.

You don't need it to compile stuff for one specific version of Debian with packages X, Y and Z installed, either. You're comparing apples to oranges.

But Debian v.x.y.z isn't a target; "Linux" is.

Not necessarily. Plenty of commercial packages say "made for Redhat X.Y.Z".

The fact that something only runs on iOs means it's a fairly limited piece of software in terms of portability - which is an acceptable tradeoff for many things, but not for others.

While I (a younger developer) may not have much experience in cathedrals, bazaars, or what have you. I've noticed one major issue come up again and again in this discussion here on HN: no-one seems to be able to agree on what these terms even mean and everyone is talking past one another. I've seen arguments using Office, Windows, iOS, and OSX as examples of Cathedrals, and I've seen just as many using them as examples of Bazaars.

It's very difficult to learn when everyone is just ranting.

iOS, and most of the stuff that comes out of Apple other than the hardware, does not have a single designer. This is one of the greatest myths that Jobs promulgated. He did not hand down directives from on high. Quite the opposite. He waited for new ideas to come from his engineers, then he would wield veto, but that's all.

This absolutely accords with my experience.

I almost posted that at the top-level of this thread, but it was your comment, not the original article, that prompted the train of thought behind my comment. I wasn't arguing with you.

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