From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Eli Zaretskii Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: New maintainer Date: Wed, 07 Oct 2015 18:27:47 +0300 Message-ID: <83k2qyem18.fsf@gnu.org> References: <560CCEBA.9080607@online.de> <874miapdhs.fsf@openmailbox.org> <87pp0yktyx.fsf@fencepost.gnu.org> <22029.59130.54156.957525@turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp> <87io6pnujl.fsf@red-bean.com> <874mi840si.fsf@wanadoo.es> <561034C3.2060101@cumego.com> <838u7j2lq0.fsf@gnu.org> <5610CF32.6080701@cumego.com> <83vban14y5.fsf@gnu.org> <56144409.5070501@cumego.com> Reply-To: Eli Zaretskii NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1444231691 17537 80.91.229.3 (7 Oct 2015 15:28:11 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 7 Oct 2015 15:28:11 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org To: =?utf-8?Q?Przemys=C5=82aw?= Wojnowski Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Wed Oct 07 17:28:02 2015 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1ZjqdM-000710-BG for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Wed, 07 Oct 2015 17:28:00 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:58224 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1ZjqdK-0004mF-Nc for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Wed, 07 Oct 2015 11:27:58 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:53087) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1ZjqdG-0004lv-83 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 07 Oct 2015 11:27:55 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1ZjqdC-0007pC-VS for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 07 Oct 2015 11:27:54 -0400 Original-Received: from mtaout23.012.net.il ([80.179.55.175]:44010) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1ZjqdC-0007oN-Hi for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 07 Oct 2015 11:27:50 -0400 Original-Received: from conversion-daemon.a-mtaout23.012.net.il by a-mtaout23.012.net.il (HyperSendmail v2007.08) id <0NVU00I00W7PDD00@a-mtaout23.012.net.il> for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Wed, 07 Oct 2015 18:27:48 +0300 (IDT) Original-Received: from HOME-C4E4A596F7 ([84.94.185.246]) by a-mtaout23.012.net.il (HyperSendmail v2007.08) with ESMTPA id <0NVU00IQ0WAB7X90@a-mtaout23.012.net.il>; Wed, 07 Oct 2015 18:27:48 +0300 (IDT) In-reply-to: <56144409.5070501@cumego.com> X-012-Sender: halo1@inter.net.il X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: Solaris 10 X-Received-From: 80.179.55.175 X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:191047 Archived-At: > Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org > From: Przemys=C5=82aw Wojnowski > Date: Tue, 6 Oct 2015 23:58:33 +0200 >=20 > >> W dniu 04.10.2015 o 08:26, Eli Zaretskii pisze: > >>>> IMHO one problem might be that, due to lack of roadmap and cle= ar > >>>> priorities, a lot of different things are developed at the sam= e time, > >>> > >>> I don't think you can prevent that in a project as multi-facete= d and > >>> multi-discipline as Emacs, nor do I think you should want to. > I'm not saying that people should stop work on things that would no= t be > on a roadmap or in the next release. My point was that there should= be a=20 > vision of Emacs in 5-10-15 years (what we would like it to be?), a= =20 > roadmap based on that - list of features that bring us closer to th= at=20 > vision, etc. All written down. I already agreed that it would be a good thing to have such a roadmap. But it's entirely not easy to come up with. It's not that we didn't try before. The best result we could come up with is in etc/TODO. It's an undeservedly forgotten resource. > Based on that maintainers would be able to plan releases with featu= res=20 > from a roadmap - with consensus with developers. Maybe not many fea= tures=20 > would make it into the next release. Maybe just one of them. This assumes that there will be some sufficient correlation between the roadmap and the significant features being developed each year. However, such an assumption will only hold if the roadmap is coordinated with the existing developers before it becomes official. Otherwise, you have only luck on your side, which IME is not a good plan. > [roadmap] would make it clear what we want and were are we going > (the vision). It would also make developers to focus on the next > release. That's the hope, but it won't happen by itself, IME. For this reason, we have been doing until now the exact opposite: decided on a major release when enough significant new features becam= e available. I cannot say it worked badly, btw. You can review the major releases and see for yourself. > Nobody wants to work on a project that goes nowhere. There always > have to be some goal. I don't think there could be _a_ goal for Emacs. It will always be quite a few significant ones, and then many more less significant, bu= t still important ones. In this sense, there's no single direction in which Emacs is, or should be going. > For example I see Emacs in 5 years with strong tests that immediate= ly=20 > catch bugs and make refactoring fun. To achieve that I would add a = goal=20 > that can be started right now, especially by newcomers: > 1. Write unit tests to learn how Emacs works. > It's clear, very easy to do, very good for newcomers, and brings va= lue > to Emacs. :-) And it's already in etc/TODO, not very far from its beginning. Besides, "more tests" is hardly a development direction, it's a means to an end. > Anyway, the beauty of Agile Software Development is its adaptabilit= y. > Such teams try different things to improve their development proces= s. > Things that don't work are refined or rejected. It's like evolution= .=20 > IMHO Emacs community could try to apply such process. :-) Reality check: we are not a team, in the Agile development sense. > > I just don't > > think it could relieve the workload of the head maintainer and th= e > > resulting burn-out, which is what you were suggesting, AFAIU. > IMHO working on a concrete release would constraint number of topic= s > and decisions to make, which would relieve the workload. I don't believe we will be able to constrain contributors to "working on a release". Just watch the pressure we have every time we declare a feature freeze to cut a release branch and end the freeze. > Here are other ideas: > 1. Constraint maintenance term (for example 3 years) No need. Someone who feels burnt out will step down. Someone who don't, and does a good job, should be allowed to proceed. > 2. Cut off-topics and end with action items. > Cutting off-topics should be done be everyone on the list. It creat= es a > flood of, maybe interesting, but irrelevant to the main topic, mess= ages. This is not a job with bosses and employees. There are no means for anyone here, including the head maintainer, to shut anyone up or forc= e them to stop discussing something. Trying to do that wastes energy and does little else. > Unrelated messages make it very hard to follow the main thread. Yes, liberal democracy is the worst of all regimes, except for all th= e rest. > Even this topic has a number of unrelated threads (politics, keylog= ger, > mac os, compiler support, etc.). How that help to find a "New > maintainer"? There's nothing you can do against that.