Re: GOP-PROP 2: mentors and Frogs

[Jan Warchoł]

2011/6/15 Graham Percival <address@hidden>:
> On Wed, Jun 15, 2011 at 08:56:54AM +0200, address@hidden wrote:
>> 2)  Many-a-university have open-source-upkeep CS (or music in
>> centers like CCRMA) courses (i.e. "Case studies in advanced
>> algorithmic auto-reglation of white space inconsistencies").
>
> I think we
> need *much* more of a culture of mentorship before we could
> honestly approach one of those programs (or even just google
> code!) for new contributors.

I agree that we should wait a bit with active search for contributors.
It will be extremely important, but we are not ready for it.

2011/6/15 Graham Percival <address@hidden>:
> gamma) a general mailing list diffuses the "responsibility" of
> answering.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bystander_effect

Exactly!

> delta) a private personal connection can foster more of a personal
> bond between the two people

I also think that communication with a mentor may be faster than with
a whole list - in some cases.

>> I'm not convinced we need a Frog Meister.  Anyone capable
>> of developing a patch to LilyPond code is capable of uploading
>> it to Reitveld.  Any help required could be given on the list by
>> any of the contributors.
>
> Frog Meister, under this (re)interpretation, is more of a social
> position than a technical one.

Yes. It will be good to know someone like this is there. Also if
someone has a less-technical problem (he feels not appreciated or
noobish), he certainly won't post such problems on a list, but will
send them to a Frog master.

> Perfect example: two weeks ago, issue 1630 chord autosplit  was
> almost finished (it only needed a few minor code formatting).  But
> then it stalled until I suggested to Janek that he should get in
> touch with Karin 2 days ago.  Then suddenly stuff started
> happening.
>
> I think the story of this patch
> http://code.google.com/p/lilypond/issues/detail?id=1630
> http://codereview.appspot.com/4490045/
> is a horrible black eye for us.  Initial patch sent on 2011-04-29.
> Janek said (in private email) that he could mentor her on
> 2011-04-29, but the patch only went on rietveld on 2011-05-07
> because he was on vacation.

Just for the record: as far as i remember i didn't say anything on
2011-04-29 because i was already absent. You send me a mail about
mentoring Karin on 2011-04-29 and i replied on 2011-05-07, uploading
the patch.
I may be wrong, though.

> A few comments, then nothing happened
> for two weeks.  Then a few more revisions happened, followed by
> another two-week gap.
>
> This whole patch could have been done in 5 DAYS if we'd had our
> cards in order.
> - new contributor comes.
> - "welcome, here's the guidelines, ask on frogs or xyz for
>  personal help"
> - revision 1, comments for 24 hours, revision 2, comment for 24
>  hours, revision 3, patch review countdown 48 hours.
>
> Instead, this has dragged out for almost 7 WEEKS.  Given this
> experience, I fully expect Karin to abandon any attempt at future
> bugfixing in lilypond.  Seven weeks for a 68-line patch?!

5 months (and counting) for a 500-line patch isn't much better. but
OTOH, it's a new feature, not a bugfix ^^

cheers,
Janek