Project coordination (was Re: [ADMIN] process for applying patches)

[Giacomo Pati <gi...@apache.org>]

Ovidiu Predescu wrote:
> 
> I have a simple question, which might have wider implications though: how do
> patches get applied to the source code?
> 
> I submitted a few patches in the past few weeks but received comments only on a
> few of them. Are they good? Do they fit nicely in the Cocoon framework? Nobody
> seems to care about this or to take any action. This is quite amazing to me, is
> the first free software/open-source project I work on where people don't seem
> to be preoccupied analyzing other people's patches and do something about them.

I've seen your posts and hoped someone else will have the time to look at it
because IIRC most of them were for Cocoon 1 which I'm not dealing with. Robin
and Donald doing that just fine.

> Until now Stefano was the one in charge with the management of this project.
> What happens after his departure? 

Of course this is a point we have to discuss. I was asked by Stefano to take his
place but I want the community to decide upon this. I'm knowing Cocoon 2 quite
well but I'm not having that much free resources (mainly time) as Stefano to
offer (approx. 2 hours/day off which almost 1 hour needed to read the mails :().
I'm also not the guy with those many Random Thoughts [RT] and the overview over
the XML/Java world as he was. But I've clearly commited myself to this project
and if everybody of the commiters and users can support me I will give it a try
and do the coordination of this wonderfull project.

> Who is going to take the responsibility of
> accepting new contributions? 

Accepting new contribution has nothing to do with Stefano's absence or presence
nor with project coordination. Every committer should care about them and take
responsability to apply them.

> Successful free software and open-source projects
> like the Linux kernel or the GCC compilers suite have a few individuals that
> analyze the proposed patches and accept or reject them. 

I would think this is the same here, too. There is at least Robin and Donald
doing that regularly for Cocoon 1 and it's me and Ross and others doing that for
Cocoon 2 as well.

> If we want to be
> successful in this project we need to setup a similar thing. I realize that
> this is an open-source project and it might eat a substantial amount of time
> from somebody's time to do it. 


> But we have to find the resources to do it,
> otherwise new contributions are going to be lost or people will get bored
> submitting contributions nobody is analyzing.

Yes, you are right. Speaking for Cocoon 2 and myself I haven't had the time to
analyze many patches because most of them are dealing with peripheral stuff and
the main concerns at the first place (IMO) is to take care of the inner
architecture (and this is really burning under my nails). 

> I managed to convince the group I work in here at HP that we should use Cocoon
> in some of our projects; it was a hard thing. An even harder thing was
> convincing them that is worth contributing back to the project our changes. Now
> that I managed to do it, hardly anybody seems to care about the contributions.
> I think it would be a shame if these and any other contributions don't get at
> least discussed if not accepted.
> 
> Maybe the people that have CVS commit access can come up with a way to look at
> all these contributions and decide on whether they fit in the Cocoon framework
> so they accept them or they don't, in which case they reject them. I strongly
> feel we need to have such a process in place.

I think that we have such a process. It has worked since I contribute to the
project. Please, if we have missed your contribute (for C2) please repost them.
I usually mark them if they are (IMO) not that important at the moment to come
back later on (or someone else had taken care of it already).

Giacomo

Re: Project coordination (was Re: [ADMIN] process for applying patches)

[Nicola Ken Barozzi <ni...@supereva.it>]

From: "Giacomo Pati" <gi...@apache.org>
> Ovidiu Predescu wrote:
> > 
> > I have a simple question, which might have wider implications though: how do
> > patches get applied to the source code?
> > 
> > I submitted a few patches in the past few weeks but received comments only on a
> > few of them. Are they good? Do they fit nicely in the Cocoon framework? Nobody
> > seems to care about this or to take any action. This is quite amazing to me, is
> > the first free software/open-source project I work on where people don't seem
> > to be preoccupied analyzing other people's patches and do something about them.
> 
> I've seen your posts and hoped someone else will have the time to look at it
> because IIRC most of them were for Cocoon 1 which I'm not dealing with. Robin
> and Donald doing that just fine.

AFAIK, if a patch is applied... well, its good! :-)

> > Until now Stefano was the one in charge with the management of this project.
> > What happens after his departure? 
> 
> Of course this is a point we have to discuss. I was asked by Stefano to take his
> place but I want the community to decide upon this. I'm knowing Cocoon 2 quite
> well but I'm not having that much free resources (mainly time) as Stefano to
> offer (approx. 2 hours/day off which almost 1 hour needed to read the mails :().
> I'm also not the guy with those many Random Thoughts [RT] and the overview over
> the XML/Java world as he was. But I've clearly commited myself to this project
> and if everybody of the commiters and users can support me I will give it a try
> and do the coordination of this wonderfull project.

IMHO, the basic thing to do now is to finish Cocoon2.
The ideas are there, the framework is there, we need to finish the implementation.
If Stefano left, I'm sure he knew we all know how to continue.
+1 for Giacomo for now, if a votation is required... are there any other "candidates"?

> > Who is going to take the responsibility of
> > accepting new contributions? 
> 
> Accepting new contribution has nothing to do with Stefano's absence or presence
> nor with project coordination. Every committer should care about them and take
> responsability to apply them.

right.
 
> > Successful free software and open-source projects
> > like the Linux kernel or the GCC compilers suite have a few individuals that
> > analyze the proposed patches and accept or reject them. 
> 
> I would think this is the same here, too. There is at least Robin and Donald
> doing that regularly for Cocoon 1 and it's me and Ross and others doing that for
> Cocoon 2 as well.

yes.

> > If we want to be
> > successful in this project we need to setup a similar thing. I realize that
> > this is an open-source project and it might eat a substantial amount of time
> > from somebody's time to do it. 
> 
> 
> > But we have to find the resources to do it,
> > otherwise new contributions are going to be lost or people will get bored
> > submitting contributions nobody is analyzing.
> 
> Yes, you are right. Speaking for Cocoon 2 and myself I haven't had the time to
> analyze many patches because most of them are dealing with peripheral stuff and
> the main concerns at the first place (IMO) is to take care of the inner
> architecture (and this is really burning under my nails). 
> 
> > I managed to convince the group I work in here at HP that we should use Cocoon
> > in some of our projects; it was a hard thing. An even harder thing was
> > convincing them that is worth contributing back to the project our changes. Now
> > that I managed to do it, hardly anybody seems to care about the contributions.
> > I think it would be a shame if these and any other contributions don't get at
> > least discussed if not accepted.
> > 
> > Maybe the people that have CVS commit access can come up with a way to look at
> > all these contributions and decide on whether they fit in the Cocoon framework
> > so they accept them or they don't, in which case they reject them. I strongly
> > feel we need to have such a process in place.
> 
> I think that we have such a process. It has worked since I contribute to the
> project. Please, if we have missed your contribute (for C2) please repost them.
> I usually mark them if they are (IMO) not that important at the moment to come
> back later on (or someone else had taken care of it already).

It has worked for me too, but it's not easy to understand open-source (for me at least
it wasn't).
Suggestions are always very welcome.

nicola_ken