That's not the read I got from Andrew's comment, or the situation. If the poster doesn't feel knowledgeable/able enough to collaborate in the community discussions (like the issue links, which don't require contributing code) then doing individual blog posts instead is only going to give even worse results for everyone.
Author here. I see it both ways.
Blog posts are collaboration (1). I did get the sense that Andrew doesn't see it that way. (And for this post in particular, and writegate in general, I have been discussing it on the discord channel. I know that isn't an official channel).
My reasons for not engaging more directly doesn't have anything to do with my confidence / knowledge. They are personal. The linked issues, which I was aware of, are only tangentially related. And even if they specifically addressed my concerns, I don't see how writing about it is anything but useful.
But I also got the sense that more direct collaboration is welcome and could be appreciated.
(1) - I'm the author of The Little MongoDB Book, The Little Redis Book, The Little Go Book, etc... I've always felt that the appeal of my writing is that I'm an average programmer. I run into the same problems, and struggle to understand the same things that many programmers do. When I write, I'm able to write from that perspective.
No matter how inclusive a community you have, there'll always be some opinions and perspectives which get drowned out. It can be intimidating to say "I don't understand", or "it's too complicated" or, god forbid, "I think this is a bad design"; especially when the experts are saying the opposite. I'm old enough that I see looking the fool as both a learning and mentoring experience. If saying "io.Reader is too complicated" saves someone else the embarrassment of saying it, or the shame of feeling it, or gives them a reference to express their own thoughts, I'm a happy blogger.
I don't even like Zig but I read your blog for the low level technical aspects. I agree completely that blog posts are collaborative. I read all kinds of blogs that talk about how computers work. I can't say if it brings value to the Zig people, but it certainly brings value to me regardless!
Author is posting honest and respectful critique of Zig features on their blog. That is a valid way of collaborating in the community discussion. The project github isn't the only place where discussion is allowed to take place.
The claim isn't you should shut down your blog and only talk on GitHub to be engaged with the community. Zig has tons of communities https://github.com/ziglang/zig/wiki/Community and, of course, blogs also play a part in the overall community too. Picking a single engagement option is probably always a poor choice, but that option being your personal blog alone would be one of the poorest. That's where the feeling of lack of collaborating with the community is coming from, not that they specifically don't engage in GitHub alone.
Make blog posts, it's great!, but if you don't think you're the expert then they'll go a lot farther for everyone if you put 5% of the work of doing so into engaging with the community about it for additional insights first. That's a fair note to make, though I agree the ending could be less passive aggressive about those who don't want to engage with the community.
FWIW as someone with only a pinky toe in the Zig community, it's quite engaging and interesting to see a blog post like this. It makes me want to learn more, and reminds me that there's a wide tent here (that might even include me!), not just a tight-knit "inside" group.
I think it's a reasonable response aside from the last sentence aside.
Is it reasonable in its entirety?
Might be cultural differences but, to me...
> Kinda wish the author would attempt to collaborate rather than write stuff like this [...] but, whatever, it’s their blog so they can do what they want.
...feels like passive aggression. In particular the "stuff like this" (like what?) and "but, whatever" felt very unnecessary and the whole "I wish he'd collaborate on my terms" is IMO uncalled for.
Yeah, I could see it being better without that portion of the final sentence. At the same time, I think opening "What a terrible way to take constructive feedback" is at least equally as grating a way to engage about it - but at the end of the day we're all humans, not saints, and it seems clear to me both comments are well intentioned and decently put as a whole. Same as me, I'm sure if I look back at these comments in 3 days there will be parts I would have changed, but overall I'd probably thing they were decent instead of terrible.
I'm glad you made the note about that part though, I agree with it and we can always do better.
Meh, I have the impression the blog author really hates Zig's new Writer (fair, I disagree, but fair), but his criticism in this example is in my eyes slightly questionable -- it is a bug in the implementation and not a conceptual issue. He then uses quite some loaded phrasing like "I must be too dumb to understand this" and "I can't be really too dumb can I?" which I think ruin the discussion (as do the titles. He failed to convince me, for instance, that the new Writer was inherently unsafe by design). It feels like a "Look I told you!!! You run into bugs like this!!!" which is not helpful for a feature/refactor that was already advertised as complex and not fully implemented or verified.
Disclaimer: I'm a zig fanboy and do all my hobby stuff in it
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