Weird stance to take.

I can understand "untested AI-genned code is bad, and thus anything that reeks of AI is going to be scrutinized" - especially given that PostmarketOS deals a lot with kernel drivers for hardware. Notoriously low error margins. But they just had to go out of their way and make it ideological rather than pragmatic.

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jonathrg 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

It's fine for a project to have moral/ideological leanings, it's only weird if you insist that project teams should be entirely amoral.

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trollbridge 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The main reason open source projects exist at all is because of people who started them with quite often fringe ideological leanings. Just look at the GNU project.

	▲	UqWBcuFx6NV4r an hour ago \| parent \| next [-]
		It’s nowhere near 2003 anymore, and whether you or I like it or not there is a far greater visitation in ideology than there used to be. Your point is basically irrelevant.
	▲	Joker_vD 3 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		And fringe economical leanings, too. Just look at the GNU project: the firmware in printers is still of subpar quality, and GNU didn't really help to change that... and why on Earth would it, anyway?

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Joker_vD 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> It's fine for a project to have moral/ideological leanings

As long as they align with the correct (i.e. yours) values, of course. When they adopt the wrong values, it's not fine.

	▲	debugnik 3 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		There's still a line between values I disagree with and values that directly attack me as a person. The former is how many of us feel about some of our dependencies and most proprietary software we use, so it's clearly fine to some degree.
	▲	jonathrg 3 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		But it is fine. If I disagree with a project's values I'm not going to contribute to it, and they wouldn't want me there either.

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yehoshuapw 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

as a kernel developer, I use LLMs for some tasks, but can say it is not there yet to write real kernel space code

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egorfine 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Absolutely.

But at the same time I cannot imagine reverting to code with no help of LLMs. Asking stackoverflow and waiting for hours to get my question closed down instead of asking LLM? No way.

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cuu508 an hour ago | parent [-]

> But at the same time I cannot imagine reverting to code with no help of LLMs.

And doesn't that bother you a little?

If you listen to podcasts, check out this podcast episode: https://www.pushkin.fm/podcasts/cautionary-tales/flying-too-...

It is about Air France 447, but also draws parallels to AI and self-driving cars

	▲	egorfine 20 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Look, every medicine is a poison as well. Every single byte of code I commit I fully understand. I am strongly against slop. However I'm not going back to asking stackoverflow and pretend that I have nowhere else to find answers.

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crimsonnoodle58 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Exactly, you can use it for some tasks. But why "explicitly forbid generative AI".

If you use AI to make repetitive tasks less repetitive, and clean up any LLM-ness afterwards, would they notice or care?

I find blanket bans inhibitive, and reeks of fear of change, rather than a real substantive stance.

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zozbot234 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> and clean up any LLM-ness afterwards

That never happens. It's actually easier to write the code from scratch and avoid LLMness altogether.

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UqWBcuFx6NV4r an hour ago | parent [-]

If you’re unable to use your tools then that’s a skill issue on your part. Why are you so confident that something can’t be done just because you don’t do it? Some people are better than you at this particular skill. Learn to live with it.

	▲	zozbot234 an hour ago \| parent [-]
		The skill of cleaning up LLM-written slop to bring it to the human-like quality that any sane FLOSS maintainer would demand to begin with? It's just not worth it.

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jonathrg 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

They explain why in their AI policy. It's an ethical stance. Of course they wouldn't notice if there aren't clear signs of LLM-ness, but that's not the main reason why they forbid it.

https://docs.postmarketos.org/policies-and-processes/develop...

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crimsonnoodle58 3 hours ago | parent [-]

Thanks for the clarification. Not that I agree with their stance (the exact same could have been said at the start of the industrial revolution) but I respect it nonetheless.

	▲	coldpie 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		> the exact same could have been said at the start of the industrial revolution The pollution caused by said revolution is currently putting humanity at a serious risk of world war and maybe even extinction so... maybe they had a point? I'm not taking a strong stance either way here, but worth thinking about the downsides from the industrial revolution, too.

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jsheard 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> But why "explicitly forbid generative AI".

The AI policy linked from the OP explains why. It's half not wanting to deal with slop, and half ethical concerns which still apply when it's used judiciously.

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ACCount37 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Same.

Having an LLM helps, especially when you're facing a new subsystem you're not familiar with, and trying to understand how things are done there. They still can't do the heavy duty driver work by themselves - but are good enough for basic guidance and boilerplate.

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hedora 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

My reading of their AI statement says your kernel contributions are no longer welcome in PostmarketOS, and also, since you're encouraging others in their space to use such tools, you're in violation of their code of conduct.

This applies to the person you're replying to too.

I think their policy is poorly thought out, and that little good will come of it. At best, it'll cause drama in the project, and discourage useful contributions. It's a shame, since we desperately need an alternative to the phone duopoly.

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trollbridge 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Guidance and boilerplate... in other words, documentation.

	▲	UqWBcuFx6NV4r an hour ago \| parent [-]
		No, dude. Do you genuinely think that people don’t know what documentation is? That’s insulting. An LLM can help surface relevant information, taking your intent / goals into account, summarising vast quantities of code and indeed other documentation. That’s, like, their single most effective use.

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xantronix 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

The licensure of the code generated by LLMs is not a settled matter in all jurisdictions; this is a very valid pragmatic concern they address.