On 8/23/2010 11:00 AM, alex wallis wrote:
That's all very true, but at the moment, the tracker is a mess full of old patches, with nobody making a clear decision about what to do with them. The bug tracker is even worse than the patch tracker for this. The reason I suggest formalising inclusion of new features is because it seems to me that you can ask for things to be committed, and nine times out of ten, either there is no will to actually do anything even if people like the idea, or a few people say they don't like an idea and it gets rejected just on their say so.
That doesn't change the fact that if a patch is committed, someone has to be willing to take responsibility for following up by fixing bugs, removing it if there are unexpected problems, and so forth. As well, just because "people like the idea" doesn't mean something belongs in Rockbox.
If you can't find one person who's willing to take responsibility for a patch in the current system, why does it seem likely a designated release manager is likely to take responsibility for dozens of patches? Is the idea that "if a lot of people like the idea, the release manager's job is to just commit it as long as there are no obvious problems?" Someone always needs to take responsibility for a patch. It's not just about including it, but following up, and the impact it will have on other features and aspects of the software. The voices that like it cannot be the only ones listened to. It may seem frustrating, but the process for inclusion right now helps ensure that patches that get included are both well done, and likely to continue to improve after inclusion.
