Comments

• Francis G

  2009-02-05 02:53:48

  Interesting to drop by here a few months later and see that things haven't changed. That's a real shame, Roy. Still the similarly unsubstantiated and erroneous statements; and you are not linking to pages for context or providing a source. That is poor form. So let us clarify:
  
  (i) The person who made that statement about Ted's departure was me. As you know, I'm not in any way affiliated with Novell. It was even made on a community project's website (openSUSE) so I can only conclude that your non sequitur is an intentionally malevolent lie. I made the statement based on the comments from Ted's leaving blog post, but I was corrected. From what Ted says in the above statement, it suggests that it was his personal decision to concentrate on the positive reasons for his leaving, and absolutely nothing to do with Novell "pretending" anything. (ii) Ted did not think that the deal would be harmful to free software (personal correspondence); from what I gather his main objection is the handling, communication and planning surrounding the event with the community (which is fair enough, because it could have been handled a lot better).
  
  Ted is a positive force in the free software community, so it would be nice if you would not weave lies around him.

• Francis G

  2009-02-05 02:56:22

  Oh, also: Ted was never the openSUSE evangelist. He was a community manager for strictly Novell (not actually involved in openSUSE in any way).

• Lyle Howard Seave

  2009-02-05 04:48:01

  I have no idea who Francis is but go to http://en.opensuse.org/index.php?title=Talk:FAQ:Novell-MS&action=history. You will see the message/edit Haeger left which contains the paragraph attributed to him at top and especially this sentence:
  
  "My departure did have something to do with the Novell-MS deal. I would likely still be at Novell if it had not happened."
  
  Did Haeger leave because of the Novell-MS deal? Yes. Had it not happened would he still be working there? Yes.
  
  Seems to me that its pretty cut and dry when THE GUY HIMSELF wrote those words. You can claim that he whispered something private in your ear but taken in a comment section, it is less then credible (Btw, I've slept with Charlize Theron, Jessica Biel AND Cindy Lauper. For real.) And while someone could have been using his account to modify the text, I dont think you want to go that route either and claim it was forged..
  
  But feel free to debate whether he meant: "My departure did have something to do with the Novell-MS deal. I would likely still be at Novell if it had not happened." or not. You might find something ambiguous in that statement.
  
  >He was a community manager for strictly Novell (not actually >involved in openSUSE in any way).
  
  Except that he had a Opensuse account which let him edit those pages. Yeah, thats NOT involved in any way, is it?
  
  Maybe you should read the bottom of that page again: "The content on this and other wiki pages is posted by community members who are not acting for or on behalf of Novell, Inc."
  
  If that is not enough how about this 2005 article: --------- http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/netware/2005/0822nw1.html Haeger evangelizes OpenSuSE Ted Haeger’s new role on OpenSuSE project Novell NetWare Tips Newsletter By Dave Kearns, Network World, 08/23/05
  
  Last week I mentioned Novell’s new OpenSuSE project. What I didn’t mention, because I didn’t know it at the time, was the name of the person who’ll be talking it up: none other than our old friend Ted Haeger. ---------
  
  Hmm, so he WASNT an Opensuse evangelist? Boy, sure fooled that guy who wrote the article.
  
  And this guy:
  
  http://cannon-linux.co.uk/component/content/article/233 Ted Haeger up for grabs
  
  Former Director of Marketing at Novell and openSUSE Community promoter Ted Haeger is back on the job market.
  
  Reading between the lines Ted has been given redundancy from Bungee Labs after just under 2 years of service. I really like Ted, true I’ve only met him face to face on two occasions, our conversations lasted for at most 15-20 minutes each but he has always struck me as super-friendly, -------------
  
  Gee, I find it interesting that it seems like a lot of people seem to link Ted to Opensuse considering you claim to know him and claim he wasnt involved in any way.
  
  Of course, those could be mistakes but if they are then a heck of a lot of people think that Ted WAS involved in Opensuse in 'some way'.
  
  But hey, why not read what Ted has to say in a blog comment here: http://movingparts.net/2005/08/18/an-impromptu-opensuse-install/
  
  Ted Haeger September 27th, 2005 on 12:41 pm I ran into several similar issues in getting VMware Workstation working, so I decided to document the whole thing on opensuse.org.
  
  There is now a complete page detailing how to do the install. Hope this does the job of de-mystifying the process.
  
  –Ted
  
  The second sentence has a link that leads to: http://en.opensuse.org/Setting_up_VMware_on_SUSE_Linux
  
  Tell me Francis, when you say that Haegar wasnt actually involved with openSUSE in any way, does that include the part where he says that "... I decided to document the whole thing on opensuse.org."? I mean we've seen above that his supposed non-involvement involves editing opensuse.org pages, so do you want me to continue?
  
  I think we can all agree that Ted's his job title is not the one Brockmeier has but "Director, Novell User Communities." also implies OpenSuse if you take the word of the Novell user Communities page at: http://www.novell.com/communities/og In the company where I work, I have a team leader, a supervisor who all the team leaders report to and another 2 levels of mid-management and while our team project leader is responsible for all the developers on his team, the supervisor is also responsible for us and our work. Ted's job seems to not have been OpenSuse exclusive like Zonker but it definitely had Opensuse involvement.
  
  I think we can also all agree that your claim that he wasnt involved in OpenSuse 'in any way' seems to be a lie.
  
  LHS
  
  PS: I might have lied about my involvement with some actress.

• Shane Coyle

  2009-02-05 05:13:28

  Hey Francis, long time no see, welcome back.
  
  Where is the original source, so that way other readers (like me) can draw their own conclusions in regards to context? Also, what did the original posting say that Reverend Ted had to correct (assuming it's been edited since)?
  
  Forgive my ignorance if this is something prominent that I had missed, but perhaps other readers aren't as immersed in all of this as well.

• Roy Schestowitz

  2009-02-05 08:45:43

  I found the quote here, but I don't know the context.

• Jose_X

  2009-02-05 13:06:36

  >> Interesting to drop by here a few months later and see that things haven’t changed. That’s a real shame, Roy. Still the similarly unsubstantiated and erroneous statements; and you are not linking to pages for context or providing a source. That is poor form. ... I made the statement based on the comments from Ted’s leaving blog post, but I was corrected.
  
  Speaking of unsubstantiated.. "It was a false statement made without consulting me."
  
  It seems to me you made the same exact mistake Roy did. You each took a quote from someone else and derived a number of inferences without waiting for confirmation.
  
  Should we now talk about what a "real shame" it is to see you back here again up to your old tricks of making allegations without first contacting the primary sources?
  
  As you can read for yourself in the link Roy just provided and from Ted's own quote, there was plenty of reason to think that Novell (or someone) had not been completely honest.
  
  Mistakes happen, as you clearly just demonstrated twice (once old, once new). Given that I don't know you, should I conclude you do nothing but make mistakes every time you open up your mouth?
  
  >> Ted did not think that the deal would be harmful to free software (personal correspondence)
  
  Given your apparent propensity for making mistakes, I'm not so sure I trust the accuracy of what you are currently saying.
  
  In any case, I and many others think there is plenty wrong with what Novell is and has been doing. Feel free to address either of these (preferably by quoting) http://boycottnovell.com/2009/02/04/the-api-trap-part-1/ or http://boycottnovell.com/2008/11/25/jose-on-mono/ .
  
  There are real problems and they are serious. Maybe next time you will not be so quick to attack. In fact, feel free to rummage through the many weekly postings down here. Should I wait for you to comment on the material "faults" of say 90% of them?

• Roy Schestowitz

  2009-02-05 13:12:15

  There is also this :
  
  

  Martin: Did you know that I left Novell 11 months ago? I’m not part of the “Novell marketing people” that you seem to think I am. I parted ways with Novell for the very same reasons that you cite about the MS agreement–not its evilness, but the careless disregard for the people that the company never bothered to consult (including me). So, you’re mostly spot on in your point, but I’d sure appreciate not being cited as one of the idiots who wrecklessly sullies openSUSE’s good name. Thanks, Ted

• Francis G

  2009-02-05 13:20:03

  @Roy: Do you think it's a good idea to post quotations when you do not know the actual source or the context? The statement comes from here, in public, made over a year ago, and not removed (even though it's in a discussion page). A ranting and uninformed blog entry is hardly the best place to copy and paste stuff from. Ted has even clarified in the comment section there that it is inappropriate to consider him as an employee either leaving because of the deal, or it having nothing to do with his departure.
  
  @Jose_X: "It seems to me you made the same exact mistake Roy did. You each took a quote from someone else and derived a number of inferences without waiting for confirmation."
  
  It was a mistake but I made it based on the entirety of a blog post from a person (hence I know the source). Normally when someone says I left because of "X, Y and Z" it's not the most unreasonable presumption that they did not leave because of W (when it is a hot issue at the time). I know that it doesn't logically follow, but we presume this kind of assumption daily in conversation. That said, the error was quickly corrected anyway.
  
  "Should we now talk about what a “real shame” it is to see you back here again up to your old tricks of making allegations without first contacting the primary sources?"
  
  Can you give me a single example where it has happened in the past? Or is this just a tactless attempt at trying to turn my words against me? Please concentrate on things of substance. On the other hand I have constantly called out Roy on his consistency in making unsubstantiated remarks immersed in non sequiturs (I honestly cannot remember how many times). So it's not even remotely comparable.
  
  "Given your apparent propensity for making mistakes, I’m not so sure I trust the accuracy of what you are currently saying."
  
  Then lucky for me that I can substantiate the remark by pointing you to the comment section of the link above, where Ted clarifies that he does not think the deal would be harmful to free software. Thanks for poisoning the well though instead of facing up to the facts here.
  
  "There are real problems and they are serious. Maybe next time you will not be so quick to attack. In fact, feel free to rummage through the many weekly postings down here."
  
  Fortunately I no longer feel inclined to attempt to inculcate very basic standards of logical reasoning and journalism. I will quite happily not read this site again for a few months, confident in my now established idea that things have not improved with time.

• Jose_X

  2009-02-05 13:53:54

  >> Then lucky for me that I can substantiate the remark by pointing you to the comment section of the link above, where Ted clarifies that he does not think the deal would be harmful to free software. Thanks for poisoning the well though instead of facing up to the facts here.
  
  I think the problem was fixed here as well, thanks to you, in fact (no sarcasm).
  
  I suppose you have some anger/frustration from past dealings with this site.
  
  >> I will quite happily not read this site again for a few months, confident in my now established idea that things have not improved with time.
  
  Is there a site you do read? Since you do not appear to be in the mood to read the two links I offered at the end of my prior comment, perhaps I can post them somewhere else where you do read?
  
  For reference, here they are again: http://boycottnovell.com/2009/02/04/the-api-trap-part-1/ or http://boycottnovell.com/2008/11/25/jose-on-mono/ .
  
  I would think you left this site because you started to see that the bulk of the substance of what is presented here has merit.
  
  I don't know though, and you're saying it's for different reasons.
  
  Is there a site you do visit frequently where you might be willing to entertain me for say 10 minutes to read the above 2 links?
  
  BTW, did you randomly land on this site on this blog posting ..randomly? Or did someone point it out to you?
  
  The random explanation is a little hard to believe, but crazy things do happen in life.
  
  If it's the other reason, perhaps you have not been directed here until this problem because there aren't all that many problems with this site. That's something to consider.
  
  BTW, I wrote myself those two pieces just linked, and I don't think we know each other. I hope you don't judge me by my company and give me the opportunity to make my case, as I have tried to do with those two postings (among many others, but those two cover a lot in a compact fashion).
  
  Thanks in advance for any time you do take to read them and reply.
  
  Also, I may have over-reacted as well. It's a reflex when people come here out of the blue to attack without even reading anything but a single piece which in fact was 99% a quote from someone else. The gun may have been jumped some, I agree.

• Ted Haeger

  2009-02-05 14:01:38

  This is silly.
  
  Francis' first comment is completely accurate. And, thank you, Francis, for the concluding sentence's kind sentiment.

• Jose_X

  2009-02-05 14:08:59

  Ted, hey. I think you can probably figure out that your quote, which does appear to have jumped the gun as well, was taken out of context and that the fix was provided here in the comments section (that is the purpose of the comments section).
  
  Hopefully, it's clear that there was no ill will, but merely a lack of diligence. I think the comments section here is kept open just so that this sort of slip up can be corrected.
  
  If you want to know, I quoted you yesterday here http://boycottnovell.com/2009/02/04/the-api-trap-part-1/#comment-59364 . After which, Roy picked up on it, as you can see if you read his comment that followed on that thread.
  
  Ted, do you still think Novell is doing the rest of the Linux+FOSS community no harm?
  
  Please read those two links I just posted above. I can entertain any question you have. The one about patents is only part 1 or possibly 3 parts (when it's finished).
  
  Thanks.
  
  PS: Here are the links again: http://boycottnovell.com/2009/02/04/the-api-trap-part-1/ or http://boycottnovell.com/2008/11/25/jose-on-mono/ .

• Roy Schestowitz

  2009-02-05 14:18:14

  Ted, I've just rechecked some old posts. I couldn't find anything indicating that you had left because of the Microsoft deal/secrecy (not until you spoke about it later), but I remembered someone making a statement denying this. When Robert Love and some other engineers or managers left, it was them or Novell who specifically denied that it was due to Microsoft.
  
  I've just found this interesting old comment from benanzo:
  
  "I'm happy for Ted. He's seems like a stand-up guy. I can't imagine the stress he's undergone since last year when Novell dropped that nasty bombshell on the community and their own programmers. Ted has always been in the line-of-fire for everything coming out of that. I'm sure he sees the writing on the wall now. I'd be surprised if he didn't see it before. Jeremy Allison certainly did. Now we just need to get Miguel out of there."
  
  http://theultimatebathrooms.com/linux_unix/Ted_Haeger_has_left_Novell

• Lyle Howard Seave

  2009-02-05 14:34:46

  I posted this yesterday but it didnt register (I might have failed the math quiz), so Ill copy/paste it again. Something might have been already covered since then, but the bottom line is still the same: the claim that Haeger was "not actually involved in openSUSE in any way" is a lie considering all the signs that show that he was.
  
  ------------------------------------------------------
  
  I have no idea who Francis is but go to http://en.opensuse.org/index.php?title=Talk:FAQ:Novell-MS&action=history. You will see the message/edit Haeger left which contains the paragraph attributed to him at top and especially this sentence:
  
  "My departure did have something to do with the Novell-MS deal. I would likely still be at Novell if it had not happened."
  
  Did Haeger leave because of the Novell-MS deal? Yes. First sentence Had it not happened would he still be working there? Yes. Second sentence.
  
  Seems to me that its pretty cut and dry when THE GUY HIMSELF wrote those words. You can claim that he whispered something private in your ear but taken in a comment section, it is less then credible (Btw, I've slept with Charlize Theron, Jessica Biel AND Cindy Lauper. For real.) And while someone could have been using his account to modify the text, I dont think you want to go that route either and claim it was forged..
  
  But feel free to debate whether he meant: "My departure did have something to do with the Novell-MS deal. I would likely still be at Novell if it had not happened." or not. You might find something ambiguous in that statement. I havent. Wait!! The word 'likely' is not definitive but I still think it leans towards the yes and not towards the no.
  
  >He was a community manager for strictly Novell (not actually >involved in openSUSE in any way).
  
  Except that he had a Opensuse account which let him edit those pages. Yeah, thats NOT involved in any way, is it?
  
  Maybe you should read the bottom of that page again: "The content on this and other wiki pages is posted by community members who are not acting for or on behalf of Novell, Inc."
  
  If that is not enough how about this 2005 article: --------- http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/netware/2005/0822nw1.html Haeger evangelizes OpenSuSE Ted Haeger’s new role on OpenSuSE project Novell NetWare Tips Newsletter By Dave Kearns, Network World, 08/23/05
  
  Last week I mentioned Novell’s new OpenSuSE project. What I didn’t mention, because I didn’t know it at the time, was the name of the person who’ll be talking it up: none other than our old friend Ted Haeger. ---------
  
  Hmm, so he WASNT an Opensuse evangelist? Boy, sure fooled that guy who wrote the article.
  
  And this guy:
  
  http://cannon-linux.co.uk/component/content/article/233 Ted Haeger up for grabs
  
  Former Director of Marketing at Novell and openSUSE Community promoter Ted Haeger is back on the job market.
  
  Reading between the lines Ted has been given redundancy from Bungee Labs after just under 2 years of service. I really like Ted, true I’ve only met him face to face on two occasions, our conversations lasted for at most 15-20 minutes each but he has always struck me as super-friendly, -------------
  
  Gee, I find it interesting that a lot of people seem to link Ted to Opensuse considering you claim to know him and claim he wasnt involved in any way.
  
  Of course, those could be mistakes but if they are then a heck of a lot of people think that Ted WAS involved in Opensuse in 'some way'.
  
  But hey, why not read what Ted has to say in a blog comment here: http://movingparts.net/2005/08/18/an-impromptu-opensuse-install/
  
  Ted Haeger September 27th, 2005 on 12:41 pm I ran into several similar issues in getting VMware Workstation working, so I decided to document the whole thing on opensuse.org.
  
  There is now a complete page detailing how to do the install. Hope this does the job of de-mystifying the process.
  
  –Ted
  
  *The second sentence has a link that leads to: http://en.opensuse.org/Setting_up_VMware_on_SUSE_Linux
  
  Tell me Francis, when you say that Haegar wasnt actually involved with openSUSE in any way, does that include the part where he says that "... I decided to document the whole thing on opensuse.org."? I mean we've seen above that his supposed non-involvement involves editing opensuse.org pages, so do you want me to continue?
  
  I think we can all agree that Ted's his job title is not the one Brockmeier has but "Director, Novell User Communities." which seems to also imply OpenSuse if you take the word of the Novell user Communities page at: http://www.novell.com/communities/og In the company where I work, I have a team leader, a supervisor who all the team leaders report to and another 2 levels of mid-management and while our team project leader is responsible for all the developers on his team, the supervisor is also responsible for us and our work and that the of the other teams. Ted's job seems to not have been OpenSuse exclusive like Zonker but it definitely had Opensuse involvement and supervision.
  
  I think we can also all agree that your claim that he wasnt involved in OpenSuse 'in any way' seems to be a lie.
  
  LHS