>
> I have a question about how you handle multiple communities. I'm
> subscribed to ~30 python-dev style mailing lists across different
> projects. There is no way I can open up 30 Discourse sites each day.
> Mail brings everything into one place for me, and I have things setup
> so that new mail from python-dev style lists is separated from my
> general inbox.
>

+1

I have other interests outside Python. Email filters allow me to categorize
email automatically, saving messages in folders which wait for me to get
around to that category.

Considering the explosion of outlets for Python discussion, I will relate a
recent unfortunate incident I don't think would have happened a couple
years ago. I won't name names, but I won't go out of my way to keep the
parties from being discovered. Someone posted a note to the [Python Help]
forum on discuss.python.org recently stating Python had an obvious memory
leak. I tried to help, explaining what I thought he needed to do to
demonstrate a leak. He posted a small C program which initialized, then
immediately finalized the Python runtime, and basically said, "this is a
memory leak." I pointed out that you need to loop over the same operation
to determine if you really have a leak. Back and forth for a bit.

Finally, I said, "if you believe this to be a memory leak, then you should
open an issue on GitHub." My intent was to get his argument in front of the
people who really are the experts on Python's memory management. His
response, "Oh, I already have, here and here and here." What a nice way to
waste my time... I imagine he was trolling, but maybe he was just
dissatisfied with the responses he got on GH and thought he could get
someone to go to bat for him.

My thinking is this would likely have not happened in the olden days when
almost all Python development/programming traffic was housed in python-list
and python-dev.Granted, the Python community was smaller, but, perhaps just
as importantly, a couple active core developers always seemed to keep an
eye on python-list. It seems likely that someone would have seen this
thread and nipped it in the bud early. "I responded to your issue a couple
months ago and explained why this isn't a memory leak. Now go away." Today,
I don't recall noticing core developers on the [Python Help] forum. (I
could well be wrong, but the web interface doesn't make it obvious
at-a-glance who's posted to a thread from the summary page. It's tiny
avatars all the way down.)

The flip side of that is that if you want to ask a question about
something, it's less obvious where to post that question. The fragmented
community means you stand a greater chance of guessing wrong and have it
not be seen by anyone who can help.

Just my 2ยข

Skip
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