Re: Considering Gerrit for CFs

On 2/8/13 5:23 AM, Magnus Hagander wrote:
> But do you have any actual proof that the problem is in "we
> loose reviewers because we're relying on email"?

Here is one: Me.

Just yesterday I downloaded a piece of software that was previously
unknown to me from GitHub and found a bug. Within 15 minutes or so I
had fixed the bug, made a fork, sent a pull request. Today I read, the
fix was merged last night, and I'm happy.

How would this go with PostgreSQL? You can use the bug form on the web
site, but you can't attach any code, so the bug will just linger and
ultimately put more burden on a core contributor to deal with the
minutiae of developing, testing, and committing a trivial fix and
sending feedback to the submitter. Or the user could take the high road
and develop and patch and submit it. Just make sure it's in context
diff format! Search the wiki if you don't know how to do that! Send it
to -hackers, your email will be held for moderation. We won't actually
do anything with your patch, but we will tell you to add it to that
commitfest app over there. You need to sign up for an account to use
that. We will deal with your patch in one or two months. But only if
you review another patch. And you should sign up for that other mailing
list, to make sure you're doing it right. Chances are, the first review
you're going to get is that your patch doesn't apply anymore, but which
time you will have lost interest in the patch anyway.

So, I don't have any further evidence that we are losing reviewers, but
in light of the above and the options out there were interested
developers can contribute much more easily, I'm amazed that we are
getting any new contributors or reviewers at all.

Of course, Gerrit doesn't actually address most of the issues above, but
it could be part of a step forward.