We have so many important and useful email discussions. Many of these work out issues or define new techniques or describe something that should be added to the documentation so that we can easily refer to it later.
However we are all so busy that we don't manage to follow up. Such gems become hidden in mail archives. Then we get trouble because the issues arise again. We tend to forget, or cannot find, the previous discussion. We are destined to repeat it. Sure we can search via Google, and directly at favourite archives, and we can search local archives with powerful tools like Mairix. (BTW, http://forrest.apache.org/mail/). However to search effectively does take time and we need to know some clues like: when, what, who. I wonder if Jira can help with this, so to experiment added a new Component: "Discussion links to archives". Use multiple Components, i.e. add the relevant Plugin Component too. I thought it good to have a special Component because that assists the powerful Jira search/browse. It also enables viewing current and past issues at a glance. Closed past issues are still relevant to find detail and reasons. It could also be a useful tool for recording past consensus or votes. It does take time for someone to do this, but there is huge benefit by giving other people a starting point. This is not just for committers, any developer can assist. I don't expect that this will ever be thorough or replace the need to search the archives, but it should help. Anyway lets try, if it doesn't work then we can dump it. -David
