+ The problem here is that R-T-C expresses a fundamental + DISTRUST of your peers. We had problems stabilizing the + code simply because there are numerous interests in the + codebase, and those are not fully compatible. With the
It's also the fact that I have no way of knowing whether my fix is perfect - I might think it is, but I just won't stake my reputation or this group's reputation on it. Actively enforcing peer review allows some confidence that at least two other people agree with the change. It's a way of backchecking not as a matter of distrust.
In fact, I'd say it is the reverse: R-T-C mandates a trust in your peers that they are able and willing to understand the code. Creating code in isolation without anyone else understanding it is harmful. We're developing this server together. We have a number of places in our code that there may only be one or two people who fully understand it. I don't believe that is goodness on our parts. If we enforce code review, then it makes it such that others start to get exposed to other areas they may not have been exposed to before. That is the best way we can deal with people leaving and abandoning 'their' code.
Even the most trivial 'common sense' commits can generate essential feedback that a single developer overlooked. I can only perform limited testing on it with my own platforms, compilers, etc. I may be too close to the problem to get an accurate view of what the fix should be. I view peer review as a safeguard and a mechanism to show the community that we are doing our best to produce the highest-quality releases that we can.
The fact is that with C-T-R, we hardly ever did R. The sheer volume of commits was just too much for lots of developers - AIUI, this is why we abandoned R-T-C not because anyone in the Apache Group wanted to. If we all weren't so damn lazy, C-T-R might have worked in producing stable releases. I just don't believe that materialzed. Our release quality has been reducing for a long-time because we haven't been relying on what made us good: 'high-quality well-tested releases.' -- justin
