Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/David S. Miller


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   keep. The notability is not an issue according to the comments and refs at the moment, the article needs improvement and not deletion. Tone 14:54, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

David S. Miller

 * – ( View AfD View log  •  )

I can find no evidence of this individual meet the bar of WP:Notability FellGleaming (talk) 22:09, 13 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep. Sigh. Have you even tried? --Joy &#91;shallot&#93; (talk) 22:32, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I looked for citations or mentions of him in third-party publications. None.  The sources in the article are links to a blog, a web forum, a list of 100+ maintainers of the Linux Kernel (of which his is just one, and not indicated as having any special status).  The only thing that seems to come close is his giving a speech at a minor regional developers conference, but that still seems to be well below the bar.  FellGleaming (talk) 22:47, 13 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Wow. Just wow. But perhaps you do need some help - try these:
 * Just look at all those books that refer to him? --Joy &#91;shallot&#93; (talk) 14:20, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Just look at all those books that refer to him? --Joy &#91;shallot&#93; (talk) 14:20, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Just look at all those books that refer to him? --Joy &#91;shallot&#93; (talk) 14:20, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Just look at all those books that refer to him? --Joy &#91;shallot&#93; (talk) 14:20, 17 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Delete -- not an academic nor a creative professional: no publications found, not a subject matter expert, only ports other people's work. No references in the Personal section (admittedly, the only section with information that Linux developers didn't already know). Reads more like a press release: "famously asked", "conquered", "has been key", etc. --William Allen Simpson (talk) 00:02, 16 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Please don't be offensive and claim that the person responsible for the networking subsystem and an architecture is not a subject matter expert. In fact that's not just offensive, it's completely daft and slanderous. I'm sorry, but if we can have an entire layer of policy against slanderous statements against living people in articles, we should not publish such things in these discussions either. --Joy &#91;shallot&#93; (talk) 14:20, 17 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep. Not every entry has to fall under the "academic" or "creative professional" category to be notable. In general, AfDs should really be made by people from the domain, qualified to pass such a judgment. Passing judgment that someone is not notable when you don't know the domain is a bit unfair, don't you think? Anyone who says that David Miller is not notable CLEARLY knows NOTHING about the Linux & FOSS field. Example: have a look at Linux.conf.au - check the keynote speakers of 2001. LCA is one of the world's foremost Linux conferences, the other two keynote speakers are evidently NOT non-notable. Plenty of evidence out there to prove Dave's notability. Achitnis (talk) 13:16, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

— 88.72.228.171 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
 * Keep. The list of Linux MAINTAINERS generally does not include any ranking. Linux kernel developers consider themselves equals. David S. Miller has been maintaining not only a Linux architecture port (for Suns SPARC CPUs), but he is one of the core developers and maintainers of the Linux kernel networking stack, including its TCP/IP implementation.  This TCP/IP implementation is running on tens if not hundreds of millions of nodes on the Internet.  He has given keynote speeches at all the major Linux kernel developer conferences, including Linux Plumbers 2009, linux.conf.au (mentioned in the wikipedia article), Ottawa Linux Symposium 2000 .  Futhermore, he has been giving technical presentations at all the other major technical Linux conferences such as Linuxtag , Linux-Kongress , just to name a few.  I agree with Achitnis comment that "notability" should be established by somebody in the field.  Ask anyone involved with Linux kernel development whether he things DaveM is notable, and you will get an unanimous response. -- Harald Welte 13:38, 17 April 2010 (UTC)  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.72.228.171 (talk)

— Cdamian (talk • contribs) has made few or no other recent edits outside this topic.
 * Keep. He is one of the main maintainers and developers of the Linux Kernel. If you have a look at this LWN.net article [Who wrote 2.6.20] you will see that he is one of the top 20 contributors and the one with the most signoffs after Andrew Morton and Linus Torvalds --Christof Damian (talk) 16:05, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

— 69.47.21.48 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
 * Keep. David Miller is a prominent, notable figure in the computer field and very worthy of a wikipedia article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.47.21.48 (talk) 16:35, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

— 71.102.225.71 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
 * Keep. David Miller is a major figure in the Linux world. there is no justification for removing this entry. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.102.225.71 (talk) 16:39, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

— MarceloMagallon (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
 * Keep. David S. Miller is a prolific Linux developer and has made significant contributions to the Sparc port of the Linux kernel, among other fields. Porting an operating system kernel to a different architecture is a creative work, as it not only entails adapting other's work, but also creating whole parts from scratch.  In this regard, David S. Miller is in fact an authority on the subject, with close to 15 years of experience.  Some of his orginal work can be traced back to [1994] MarceloMagallon (talk) 16:45, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

— 188.24.86.218 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
 * Keep. In that case everyone here should be in the GCC steering committee http://gcc.gnu.org/steering.html, who uses GCC anyway ... wait, a gazillion people.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.24.86.218 (talk) 17:22, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Sigh, I see this deletion request must have found its way to some Linux message board somewhere. Fell Gleaming ( talk ) 17:14, 17 April 2010 (UTC)


 * It did not. Did you see WHO posted a message after mine? If you don't, then you probably aren't even qualified to put up this AfD. User:Joy tried to gently warn you up front, but you ignored it. This AfD was a serious mistake, and should be closed NOW to avoid further embarrassing people. Achitnis (talk) 18:41, 17 April 2010 (UTC)


 * He is somewhat true, as Harald Welte - another notable developer - has mentioned this case in his blog. However, this is totally irrelevant. The simple truth is that FellGleaming failed to do his homework before proposing to delete the article. While this is a shame, it can happen. But failing to admit the mistake and instead trying to distract by making such claims with the implication that the "keep"-voices are all shills is outrageous and makes the mistake worse. -- Kju (talk) 19:30, 17 April 2010 (UTC)


 * "Harald Welte - another notable developer - has mentioned this case in his blog." Thank you Kju; I knew something similar had to have happened. The simple fact is that, if you define any subject narrowly enough, a person is notable.  In the field of software, this person does not quality.  In the field of software development, he does not quality.  In the field of Linux kernel developers, he may well be notable, but such narrow definitions are rarely helpful.    I'm sure the model airplane builders of America have a list of people they consider notable as well.   Wikipedia is not a page for Vanity Pages.   Is a biography about this person of any possible interest to someone who doesn't already know who he is?  That is the unanswered question here.   Fell Gleaming ( talk ) 19:45, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
 * In the field of software, this person does not quality. In the field of software development, he does not quality.  In the field of Linux kernel developers, he may well be notable, but such narrow definitions are rarely helpful.  What makes you think that he does noy qualify in the field of software development?  Do you have any evidence of that?  Citing the [Wikipedia:BIO] guidelines ..., engineers, and other creative professionals: The person has created, or played a major role in co-creating, a significant or well-known work. Now ask yourself is Linux a significant or well-known work?  No doubt.  Did David Miller play a major role in co-creating it?  I have no doubt about that:  The Linux kernel network stack is one of its major components.  Linux would be insignificant if it wouldn't have such a network stack.  In fact, a lot of the early (and still today) sucess of Linux is due to its extensive networking features.  Porting Linux to the SPARC and UltraSPARC CPU architecture is also a major role in creating Linux as it exists today.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by HaraldWelte (talk • contribs) 20:39, 17 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep. Of course he's notable. Sometimes I wonder if the deletionists understand what the meaning of an encyclopedia is meant to be. Unless your suggesting we delete the entry for Linus Torvalds while we are at it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Alex (talk • contribs) 17:57, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

— 90.189.251.112 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
 * Keep. Narrow-minded wikigays morons wants to delete everithing they not familiar with. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.189.251.112 (talk) 18:13, 17 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Delete on the basis of the article, he fails WP:BIO. --Cameron Scott (talk) 19:50, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
 * OK, at the risk of sounding like a complete groupie, I am compelled to comment again and express an utter dismay with this kind of reading of the actual guidelines at hand. BIO, which says it applies to engineers, states among the requirements the creation of a significant new concept. This is eminently true for the subject at hand because Linux on SPARC simply did not exist before he created it. It could technically be argued that it's insignificant because its user base is probably significantly smaller than that of Solaris on SPARC, but as a development effort, it's significant at least as much as any other operating system kernel port to a different architecture. And for extra value it was done standalone, without complete support from the architecture creator. Also, another criterion is satisfied - having a major role in creating something covered by multiple reviews - which is the Linux networking stack. So where is this failure to observe the WP:BIO guidelines? --Joy &#91;shallot&#93; (talk) 22:48, 17 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep. According to the Linux Foundations report (April 2009) on who writes the linux kernel David S. Miller is the top contributer (that is number 1) to the Linux kernel over the last 5 years.  I call that significant!  If someone reads that report, e.g. an unknowing journalist, I think its relevant to be able to look this person up on Wikipedia. --Brouer (talk) 20:54, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Delete, has not been the primary subject of non-trivial coverage in reliable independent sources. That's the only definition of "significant" that really matters here. Guy (Help!) 22:06, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Keep. One of the best sources WRT linux is lwn.net, which should have been evaluated before this AfD. More specifically, google site:lwn.net david miller gives 1 020 results, of which and  should be added to the article, among others. BTW there was another Afd in july 2008, but I can't find it. Comte0 (talk) 22:28, 17 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Keep Adequate sources for notability. A somewhat incomprehensible nomination, considering the wide known public notability. DGG ( talk ) 22:50, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

— 76.228.85.230 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
 * Keep DaveM is one of the key linux networking architecture implementors. Most recently he's been implementing multiple queues on the existing Linux stack, primarily driven by the needs wireless networking and 10G Ethernet, and presented at the netfilter workshop held in Paris, France .  He's a known expert on Sun and Sparc architectures and infamously was once accused by Bryan Cantrill of Sun, of never having kissed a girl in ad hominem.   yanfali 16:00, 17 April 2010 (PST)  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.228.85.230 (talk)


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Computing-related deletion discussions.  —  Lady  of  Shalott  03:32, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Note: To those who are making arguments in favor of this entry, it would be very helpful if you would incorporate your specialized knowledge on notability into the article. Well-sourced, valid claims within the entry itself will certainly silence any objections. Thanks  Fell Gleaming ( talk ) 03:50, 18 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree. Let's not waste any more time on this badly researched AfD that will, without any doubt, fail. Let's go spend our efforts beefing up the actual article so that it in itself becomes the primary shield against deletionists. Which would, of course, make it self referential in a way, which brings up a few questions of its own, but never mind :) Achitnis (talk) 04:45, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.