On 04 Jun 2010, at 2:51 AM, Jeff Trawick wrote:
+1 for the continued, and perhaps more widespread, voluntary
soliciting of approval in advance for changes which add new modules
or other significant new function, or make other widespread changes,
or change prerequisites in a meaningful way, or have been discussed
in the past without resolution (or with outright rejection), etc.,
etc. (We don't need an explicit laundry list, or any additional
policy, to codify the practical matter that multiple developers need
to be ready and willing to cope with such changes when they reach
the user base).
This has been done countless times by numerous people in this
successful decade, in spite of, and even for the continued viability
of, the C-T-R policy.
This creates an artificial "two tier" hierarchy of committers, those
who regularly "approve" changes, and those who don't.
A new person arriving here is certainly not going to feel confident
enough to step in and "approve" a change. What they'll see is a small
group of people "approving" changes made by a larger group of people,
and they'll naturally fall into the second "tier".
The ASF is a meritocracy, and someone attains committership by proving
their merit to the point where they are invited to become committers:
http://www.apache.org/foundation/how-it-works.html#meritocracy
Where this has started to become a problem is when committers in the
"first tier" feel their "seniority" is enough basis for an objection
to a code contribution. All committers are equal, and no matter how
long a committer has been around, they have to provide a justification
for their objection to a piece of code just as thoroughly thought out
as the original committer is expected to be thorough with their
original contribution.
Regards,
Graham
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