And I'm going to go further and claim: Plan 9 is contentious. It continues where Unix left off and pushes the idea of radical simplicity of design.
The "Worse Is Better" essay[1] illustrates a bit of the controversy over radically simple design, which Gabriel contrasts with "doing the right thing."
The philosophy that led to Plan 9 is articulated in "cat -v considered harmful" : "One thing that UNIX does not need is more features. It is successful in part because it has a small number of good ideas that work well together."[2]
I am firmly convinced that this is an unpopular position. People really do want more features, and are not really concerned about how well they work together ... until they don't, in which case they have a reason to post an incredulous condemnation.
Eh, "the right thing" is in large part about simplicity and uniformity of interface, not just punting on corner cases to save 100 lines of implementation. That Plan 9 managed to keep it's LoC down is credit to the Pike et al but (in part) because Plan 9 actually pushed everything is a file far enough to be useful Plan 9 is -at least compared to Unix- waywayway closer to the right thing than it is worse is better.
The "Worse Is Better" essay[1] illustrates a bit of the controversy over radically simple design, which Gabriel contrasts with "doing the right thing."
The philosophy that led to Plan 9 is articulated in "cat -v considered harmful" : "One thing that UNIX does not need is more features. It is successful in part because it has a small number of good ideas that work well together."[2]
I am firmly convinced that this is an unpopular position. People really do want more features, and are not really concerned about how well they work together ... until they don't, in which case they have a reason to post an incredulous condemnation.
[1] https://www.dreamsongs.com/WorseIsBetter.html
[2] http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/unix_prog_design.pdf