Note to the list. I am flagging this thread as something to distill into our community guide. I think it's important we talk about this somewhere that is a little less easy to loose than a mailing list post. (And unfortunately, it is not clear in the main ASF doc that we mirror things to the mailing list because it is a requirement that committers subscribe to it.)
On 15 March 2013 16:31, Noah Slater <nsla...@apache.org> wrote: > I'm sorry to hear that you're having problems with the way we do things at > Apache, Matt. But there are very good reasons for all of these things. And > I am happy to talk to you about them, if you're interested? > > We keep things on our own infrastructure so that we are vendor neutral, > and so that we can assure the provenance and longevity of the work we are > doing. This is exceptionally important for an organisation like the ASF. > > We try to keep everything on the mailing lists, similarly, because that > helps to cement the community around a single channel of information. It is > expected that every committer on the project reads the developer mailing > list, as well as the commits mailing list. This way, you can be sure that > if you have something important to say about development, you can post it > there, or check it in to Git, and the committers will see it. There is no > such requirement for participating or monitoring Github, or Google+, or any > other supplementary community. That is why we must make sure that > conversations are mirrored back to the one place we know that everybody is > watching. This is not an attempt to stifle activity away from the mailing > list. It is an attempt to make sure that people can subscribe to the > mailing list and receive all the necessary information they need to > contribute to the project. > > (My wording in my original email in this thread was very unfortunate, and > I regret sending it now. I apologise for it. I was making an assumption > about the solution, instead of talking about the problem. The problem was > not that things were happening on Github. The problem was that the activity > wasn't being sent back to the mailing list which we know everybody reads.) > > I'm also sorry to hear that the mailing list is too high traffic for you. > It is my personal experience that the CouchDB lists are moderately light in > traffic. But I suspect I am not your typical mailing list subscriber, in > that regard. ;) One option is to filter the list. That might be filtering > out things you are not interested in, or filtering specifically for things > you are interested in. > > Also, you are perfectly free to talk about CouchDB wherever you want. And > I really hope I haven't given you the impression that this would be a bad > thing, or that anybody would perceive it in a negative light. Benoit's idea > for the Google+ community was a great one, for instance. But now we have a > conversation about how to mirror some of that content back to this lists. > (Again, because the lists are the project's "virtual office" if you will, > and we form our community around them.) This doesn't mean Google+ is a > bother, and I wish it would go away. In fact, having to worry about this at > all is something I would class as a Good Problem. > > I am sorry you feel like the Foundation's policies are beurocratic and > poorly explained. For what it's worth, when I first joined, I also felt > like this. Over time, I figured out the bits that were not in the docs > (which are often poorly organised) and started to understand the logic > behind why we do things this way. So if you wanna chat about it, just lemme > know what causes you the most pain. > > I guess the main doc that you should read is this one: > > http://www.apache.org/foundation/how-it-works.html > > That sets things out in very broad strokes. > > Again, I am sorry for your frustration. Obviously, we have to follow ASF > policy, because we are an ASF project. But if something truly did not make > sense for us, we can change it. The reason we even use Git now is because > that made sense for us, and people like Paul worked very hard to introduce > that to the Foundation in a way that would play nicely with everything else > here. > > The policy is not meant to be here to frustrate. And it is certainly not > meant to be here to shut down activity happening on Github. My email was > poorly worded, and I think you should open your PR again. :) Sorry if it > felt like I was picking on you. I actually think your PR is a very good > one, and is exactly the sort of thing we should be doing. One of my plans > post-1.3.0 was to convert all of our top level documentation (README, etc) > into a format so that we look very nice on Github. > > Please, if you have any questions, just let me know! Happy to help! > > > On 15 March 2013 15:54, matt j. sorenson <m...@sorensonbros.net> wrote: > >> On Fri, Mar 15, 2013 at 7:16 AM, Noah Slater <nsla...@apache.org> wrote: >> >> > Hey folks, >> > >> > I'd like to bring two things to your attention: >> > >> > https://github.com/apache/couchdb/pull/43 >> >> >> ^ I opened that one (obviously(?)) >> >> >> > >> > https://github.com/cloudant-labs/couchdb/pull/18 >> > >> > These just happen to be two pull requests I looked at today, there are >> > more. >> > >> > On the one hand, this is great. Obviously. Any sort of constructive >> > activity happening around CouchDB is great. >> > >> >> thank you! >> >> >> > >> > But on the other hand, this discussion is core development discussion, >> and >> > should be happening on the dev list where everybody can see it. >> > >> >> I'm not sure where you get that PR#43 is core dev at all, plz clarify? >> >> >> > >> > (This is foundational stuff for an Apache project. Community building >> > should be focused around the mailing lists. >> >> >> (I've already made it known that I don't agree with this at all) >> >> >> > I get that Github is useful for >> > people, but we're not a Github project, so our activity should not be >> > happening there.) >> > >> > I don't know what to suggest. Obviously, I think pull requests are >> great. >> > And I think the forking model of Github is great, because it allows >> people >> > to contribute more easily, and in a manner that suits them. >> > >> >> PR#43, for anyone that may have skipped the description and comments >> thread there (or who may have commented and then deleted the comment >> in a rush of "OMG-i-made-a-PR-comment-instead-of-sending-to-the-ML" >> ASF policy loyalty silliness) is precisely about surfacing the Apache >> CouchDB >> contribution policy in a "github-official" manner that will make it far >> more >> obvious ***to githubbers*** in just the way githubbers have (or will) come >> to expect! >> >> IOW, it aims to greatly aid the very challenge that this email rant is >> about. >> >> >> > >> > But on the other hand, we shouldn't be having important development >> > discussions in pull requests. >> >> >> disagree, again. >> >> >> > The PR isn't even against the Apache CouchDB >> > mirror. It's against a Cloudant fork! (So even less likely that folks >> are >> > going to see it.) >> > >> > Perhaps one of the policies we could document is that discussion of pull >> > requests must be brought to the list. >> > >> >> Again, could be accomplished in the manner PR#43 describes(!) >> >> >> > >> > That is, if a PR comes in to the Apache Github mirror, then we make a >> > polite comment on the PR that points them to the mailing list thread and >> > asks them to participate in that forum, so the maximum amount of devs >> can >> > see and contribute. >> > >> > We could also say that if you have a fork of CouchDB, and you're >> planning >> > to contribute the work back to Apache CouchDB (as is the case with the >> > Cloudant fork) that you do the same with any PRs that are made to your >> > repos. >> > >> > A sample template comment could be as follows: >> > >> > == >> > >> > Thank you for the pull request! >> > >> > This is a mirror of the Apache CouchDB project, so many of the >> committers >> > do not monitor it for comments. Instead of discussing this pull request >> > here, I have started a thread on the [developer mailing list] and I >> invite >> > you to participate! >> > >> > [LINK TO MAILING LIST THREAD] >> > >> > == >> > >> > Additionally, the mailing list thread, or the first reply to it, should >> CC >> > the original author. >> > >> > One alternative to this (which is a bit of a mess, I know) is to write >> > an integration that copies Github comments to the mailing list thread, >> and >> > mailing list posts to the PR. Not sure that would work with forks of the >> > main mirror, however. >> > >> > Thoughts? Flames? >> > >> >> I'm speaking personally, and I know there are strong and varying >> opinions on the subject among participants here. >> >> I also know the CouchDB PMC leads have a strong desire to spur >> involvement in the project, and nothing dooms my personal desire >> to work towards contributing than some ill-explained ass-backwards >> 90's era bureaucratic mandate that EVERYTHING be facilitated over >> the ML. >> >> In fact it is due to that policy and general ASF-iness that keeps me >> closer to the sidelines. This is a hobby, at best, for me at this time, >> and I already have no chance of keeping up with the ML activity. >> >> I'd rather see the asf git become the archive mirror, quite frankly. >> How many resources could the ASF preserve (or apply more >> productively - development, conferences, promotion) by adopting >> github infra formally (for starters). >> >> And i'm not some 19-yro kid who grew up always thinking of email >> as irrelevant legacy tech, I've been doing this awhile myself. >> >> There's a lot to it. And, unsurprisingly, I don't care for essays in >> emails. >> It's about the bazaar model. It's about signal-to-noise (for each >> individual!). >> It's about being able to subscribe to the topics you care about and not >> have >> to wade through the noise of the topics you don't care about, just to find >> those topics you do care about (because at some point, the value prop >> just isn't worth it anymore). It's about *thinking like the web* and >> **observable work**[1]. >> >> (is the ML observable? sure, in a sense, but barely) >> >> It's about all of that and a whole lot more. >> >> >> > Thanks, >> > >> > -- >> > NS >> > >> >> >> feedback always welcome of course, and thx for listening >> -- >> matt >> >> [1] http://emjayess.net/think-like-jon-udell >> > > > > -- > NS > -- NS
