After rereading the below email I just realized I often use the term "we" and "us". Sorry about that. I do not mean to pretend like I am speaking on behalf of everyone (I do not forget that I am a relative newcommer here!). Instead of taking the time to correct all the "we" and "us" I am just issuing this apology in advance.
On Tue, Oct 20, 2015 at 02:11:46AM +0200, Uwe Stöhr wrote: > Am 20.06.2015 um 05:11 schrieb Scott Kostyshak: > > >The attached file produces a left-aligned box in 2.1.3 but a centered > >box for 2.2dev. > > > >Uwe I remember you've done a lot of work on boxes in master. Can you > >take a look? I did not do a git bisect (let me know if this would be > >useful). > > It would have been nice to send me at least a direct mail to assure > that I am informed. I CC'ed you on the following emails (it hides that I CC'ed you but if you search for the message in your email client it should show it): https://www.mail-archive.com/search?l=mid&q=20150620031110.GA7412%40VAW70 https://www.mail-archive.com/search?l=mid&q=CAO7dr0ibT5vdRz_dxEphozZTeNOZJLn%3DkXpk%3DwVGWSMERfTyMw%40mail.gmail.com https://www.mail-archive.com/search?l=mid&q=20151010175502.GA6939%40cotopaxi https://www.mail-archive.com/search?l=mid&q=20151016193502.GA6689%40cotopaxi And you responded to one here: https://www.mail-archive.com/search?l=mid&q=55872177.2040708%40web.de and I really appreciate that you took the time to do that. I thought you would make a note so that when you did have time to work on LyX that would be the first thing you worked on since it was considered a possible regression. Which email address is best? uwesto...@web.de or uwesto...@lyx.org ? I tried both. Perhaps I misunderstand what you mean by a "direct" email---Is there a difference on your end whether I CC you or put you in the "to" header? Which do you prefer? > The new feature to set a horizontal alignment is very useful (at least I > already use this already) and therefore it would be sad if you remove the > whole feature. I don't understand how it is useful. Why can't use you use the paragraph alignment? Please respond to Georg's email on this matter. > I feel a lot of aggression against me in todays' posts. I see what you mean, but I would say if anything there is aggression towards your *work flow*. LyX developers are a team and we want to be on the same page as much as possible. Everyone will work differently and that is fine, but when those differences affect other people that is when frustration happens. Just to take the recent example of the tex2lyx tests failing. Because of your commit, I spent time tracking down the problem, Kornel spent time running the tests and reporting the failure, Georg spent time confirming your commit was the issue, Guillaume spent time trying to fix the issue, and Gűnter had finally fixed the tests that he broke but there was confusion because at the same time you broke the tests so it wasn't clear whether it was his commit or your commit. I'm not necessarily saying it's your fault, but I'm saying that because of something you did a lot of people lost time on a not-so-fun activity. So this is why we have rules. I think if you tried to understand how this could be frustrating for a lot of us then that might help understand why sometimes we get upset. What if no one fixed the commit that was causing master to fail to compile for you on master? What if Guillaume, the one who introduced the issue, went away for 5 months and none of the other developers did anything about it because we all use Linux and it compiles fine for us? And what if Guillaume came back after a few months and the first thing he did was work on a bunch of issues that had nothing to do with the compilation failure? Would you be frustrated? I think this example also shows how many developers today wanted to fix an issue that is affecting you even if it isn't affecting them. Guillaume, Georg, and Vincent all kindly jumped in to help and fix the problem that only you were affected by. So in summary, I think that this is all just a bunch of failed communication. You have communicated to us why some things are difficult for you (e.g. the tex2lyx tests, Git). We need to make a sincere effort at understanding that it is difficult for you and doing our best to make it easier. And on your end I think it would help if you understood how some of the things that you do cause other developers wasted time and frustration. I know that you do not do it intentionally, but whether it is intentional or not, it causes frustration. I have a few ideas that could make things better: 1. It seems a good idea to me that whenever you (or anyone else of course) make a file format change, run the tex2lyx tests. If a test fails, then do not commit. If you don't know how to proceed, send an email to lyx-devel *before you commit* asking for help. 2. Let's work together to find a way so that we can notify you and get your responses. What email client do you use? How can we set up a system such that you are guaranteed to see every message that we CC you on? 3. If you come back after a period away, do you think it is reasonable to first check the emails that you were CC'ed on before you do any other work or commits? 4. Although they might not be important for you, many of us place a high importance on tests. If you break a test, it would be nice if this jumps to the highest priority for you, and similar for a regression. This is similar to master not compiling for me, for example. Also, it would be great if you learned how to run the tests. I am the one to blame for not writing proper documentation for the export tests, but will you be willing to work with me to have a system where you can run the tests? These are not rules. They are just ideas that I think would make everyone happier. What are your ideas? What can we do? > (E.g. I spent 2 hours to get cherry-picking to work before I gave up. Next time send an email to lyx-devel and I bet someone will be able to help. > months ago I could use this feature but forgot it.) For those who use a > commit system daily it is not easy to understand. Well for someone with a bad memory like me it is easy to understand :) Git is a vast and complicated world. But if you just write down the procedures you use the most that will make things much easier. Either save your favorite git commands or steps or sequences of commands in a text file, or actually it might help to literally write them out on a piece of paper. > The idea was to document everything to make it possible for people like me > to follow the development but obviously I am still the only Win developer so > that the LyX coding docs only reflect how it works on Unix. Since my coding > abilities are very limited I fear I will sooner or later loose track how to > compile LyX - which will then also be the end of a Windows installer > release. Yes it must indeed be frustrating. I'm happy not having to deal with compilation issues and letting others do it. It is also helpful though because you catch issues that we wouldn't see if you weren't here (like the compilation fix today). > Sorry for changing the topic. I'm glad you did. This is a necessary issue to get out of the way and to continue working on in the future together. > If I am nevertheless welcome you should know > that I will also in future be off completely for weeks (I hope no longer for > months). In these periods I tried at least to keep the installer running. Many developers pop in and out. I think JMarc is the only developer who is consistent. It is a wonder how he has not gone insane yet (or maybe he is pushing his commits from the inside of an insane asylum?). The rest of us us have other priorities come up, or lose a little motivation for working on LyX, or get tired of some heated debates. This is not at all the problem. The issue is that when you make a commit, you should hold yourself responsible for that commit. If your commit breaks something, then try to make time to fix it, and to understand the issue and if necessary tweak your work flow to protect against breaking the same thing in the same way the next time. And when you come back after a long period, check for the emails that you were CC'ed on. This means we want your input on something. By ignoring them and committing other stuff, it makes us feel like you are ignoring us and not wanting to make the sacrifices that are necessary in order to be on a team. You are very valuable to the development of LyX, Uwe. I don't think there is any doubt about that. Without you, I sincerely think LyX would suffer in many dimensions. I hope that development of LyX will become fun again for you as I think it once was. Let me know if there's anything I can do to help with that. Best regards, Scott
