Hi, I'd just like to mention that we already have a fair amount of tooling around jira, so switching to another issue tracker would require some additional development effort: - automatized pull-request issue linkage - merge script - various release scripts - cherry-pick tooling for patch releases - changelog generator
We'd also need to maintain the jira links for the existing tickets, which could cause some confusion. On Tue, Mar 2, 2021 at 6:03 PM Wes McKinney <wesmck...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > FWIW, the amount of bureaucracy that goes into JIRA is a major contributing > > factor for the reduction of my time commitment to this project by 80%+. > > This seems a bit overly dramatic to me =) Let's dig more into what are > the actual problems. I admit that adding people to the Contributor > role in Jira can be a nuisance, but surely this is something we can > automate? (note: I think I have spent way more time doing Arrow Jira > gardening than anyone else affiliated in this project) > > The core problem as I see it is one of communication. Do we expect > contributors to this project to communicate about what work they are > doing, plan to do, or want others to do? I think the answer is yes > across the board. Having a lot of people simply opening pull requests > with little discussion or planning to indicate intent or other > development direction is neither scalable nor sustainable. How are > other developers supposed to know what other people are working on or > planning? At the point where significant / non-trivial work has been > completed and is now in code review, there has already been a failure > of communication. > > What issue tracker we use to me is secondary to this point. If we have > contributors who don't wish to communicate with the community about > what they are doing, we need to solve that problem first and make > clear our expectations. That is part of the Openness tenet of the > Apache Way. If people are not being open and simply throwing code over > the wall, that behavior is not consistent with this principle. We must > hold ourselves to some kind of standards. > > I've seen open source projects with more than 10,000 GitHub issues, > and it is... not pretty. Having thousands or tens of thousands of > issues in Jira feels manageable to me in a way that GitHub is not. But > I'm someone who loves to make lists and organize things — linking > issues together, creating subissues, that sort of thing. > > Thanks > Wes > > On Tue, Mar 2, 2021 at 7:12 AM Rok Mihevc <rok.mih...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > Have we ever considered GitHub issues to Jira sync? > > This way users could choose to use GitHub but Jira would still be the > > single source of truth. > > > > Rok > > > > On Tue, Mar 2, 2021 at 1:15 PM Adam Lippai <a...@rigo.sk> wrote: > > > > > Antoine, > > > > > > you are right I'm directly challenging the statement that any issue > > > tracker, forum or chat is as good as GitHub. > > > I'm not speaking about tools and efficiency. In those terms you are > > > absolutely right and most of the solutions are clearly superior to GitHub. > > > > > > I was talking about reach, community size and ease of onboarding. > > > I don't think I need to bring examples of how GitHub is a magnitude ahead > > > of others, being The Ecosystem for OSS development. > > > I don't like this trend, I'd be happy to see the ecosystem to be more > > > distributed on GitLab and Bitbucket, but that's not the current status and > > > not a trend today. > > > > > > The new people have to learn to interact with the Arrow community now. I > > > don't doubt their ability to learn it, but the thing is that they have to > > > learn and get involved in Arrow specific tools. > > > Most of the people are less focused on Arrow, they use dozens or hundreds > > > of projects, so we are asking them to move from their usual workflow > > > (GitHub) to a specialized one. > > > They are users first, active members and developers second and they always > > > will be in majority. We might want or not want to please that future > > > group. > > > > > > Let me know what you think, whether you agree that people are more > > > familiar > > > with GitHub than other tools without putting in extra effort. > > > I was trying to give attention to the people/social/community aspect, not > > > the ease of use or the right level of automation. > > > I don't think the current setup is any harder than others, but it's > > > different and an outlier. > > > > > > As this is one (minor) aspect of the question only, I don't think I need > > > to > > > convince you this is important or I am right. > > > I was feeling that we are a little bit in an echo chamber, that's why I > > > brought up this controversial dimension. > > > I didn't want to exaggerate and I don't think I did when I used the words > > > "huge difference", "magnitude". > > > From a users perspective discussions sometimes happen on GitHub, but never > > > on GitLab, BitBucket or Jira. > > > I might live in my own bubble, but I didn't see a popular Jira tracker > > > where discussions are live and diverse yet. > > > > > > Likely choosing GitHub would shift the focus (towards users and ecosystem > > > from development) and temporarily (measured in months or years) put more > > > work on the existing core members. > > > > > > P.S. I have a positive experience here with you and the Arrow community, > > > I'm grateful for all the answers and help I got. The mails above are not a > > > criticism, not a little bit. > > > > > > Best regards, > > > Adam Lippai > > > > > > On Tue, Mar 2, 2021 at 12:35 PM Antoine Pitrou <anto...@python.org> wrote: > > > > > > > On Tue, 2 Mar 2021 11:10:23 +0100 > > > > Adam Lippai <a...@rigo.sk> wrote: > > > > > > > > > > All the (multiple) mailing lists, stack overflow and JIRA are > > > definitely > > > > > barriers for new contributors. > > > > > > > > I'm not sure what Stack Overflow has to do with this? Interaction with > > > > Stack Overflow isn't required to contribute to Arrow. > > > > > > > > (also, I don't really understand the concern with SO, at least where > > > > user-friendliness is concerned) > > > > > > > > > They require familiarity (people born after 2000 are not familiar with > > > > > mailing lists or JIRA, but they are with GitHub) and setup (filters, > > > > > notifications). > > > > > > > > Well, I'm not very impressed by this argument. "People born after 2000" > > > > aren't cognitively different, and they should be able to adapt to the > > > > same tools as other people. Everyone was unfamiliar with mailing-lists > > > > and issue trackers at some point, and very diverse people learned to be > > > > familiar with them. > > > > > > > > I'm also concerned by the laziness that seems implied by the "Github or > > > > nothing" mentality. Experienced developers need to master a variety of > > > > tools over their career. Learning a second issue tracker is a very > > > > mild effort to require of them. > > > > > > > > > Keeping everything (discussions, issues, PRs) in one place has huge > > > added > > > > > value, but not for the core members and people working in this > > > > environment > > > > > for years. > > > > > > > > It does have added value, but I disagree that it's "huge". There are > > > > integrations in place between Github and the Apache JIRA that are > > > > perhaps not to the level of the integrations within Github itself, but > > > > still convenient. > > > > > > > > We can discuss opening more communication spaces. But they will need > > > > core developer attention (since mailing-lists are not going to vanish), > > > > which will increase the required effort to keep up. > > > > > > > > > I understand if we stick with JIRA, but I'm 100% sure there are people > > > > not > > > > > asking questions, not raising issues, not giving feedback and not > > > > > contributing because of the mailing lists and JIRA already. > > > > > They wouldn't have the best ROI, but we can acknowledge there is a > > > > > room > > > > for > > > > > improvement. > > > > > > > > Sure. But I doubt that framing the topic as "it's Github that we need" > > > > is going to lead to productive discussion. > > > > > > > > Regards > > > > > > > > Antoine. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >
