Yeah you're right. I should have worded that differently, my point was that in using the term "moron", he was focusing on the interface design: code.

Linus' tone is not really defensible, but I just don't think the response compares favourably either.

And, perhaps more importantly, Linus' concerns aren't addressed and the response isn't particularly informative. dwmw2 mentions in comments here on this HN thread that he has been pushing back on Linus' concerns, but the response appears rather to defend those decisions in Intel. Perhaps I misread?

At the end of the day, I just don't care about this tone argument. I only care that the issue is resolved properly, and like it or not, there's nobody I would trust to analyse an issue like this more than Linus.

People in this thread are making the (understandable) mistake of assuming that Linus' remarks were aimed at individual engineers at Intel. But they obviously weren't: they were clearly aimed at senior management at Intel to say "we're not going to accept garbage from you."

And I don't even care if it was garbage. Because either it was garbage, or they failed to demonstrate to Linus that it was not garbage. Either way this is entirely Intel's fault.