Re: In support of Jonas Bernoulli's Magit

[Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org>]

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[[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies,     ]]]
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  > 1) Get list of all contributors
  > 2) Email them all, recording the date
  > 3) Email those who respond instructions
  > 4) Email assign@fsf to find out current status
  > 5) Email those who havent again
  > 6) Reply to people who say "haven't heard anything"
  > 7) Repeat some variation of 4,5, and 6

  > 8) Work out how many are left
  > 9) Once n < 3 or 4 check how big their contributions are
  > 10) Write them out

Step 4 is due to FSF procedures, so I will try to change them to
eliminate it.  I hope the clerk will directly notify the person
managing this process when each package contributor's papers arrive.

The rest, however, has nothing to do with how the FSF operates.  At
least, not that I can see.  It is rather the nature of persuading many
individuals to do something, independent of what the something is.

Do you have any suggestions for how to simplify parts other than step
4?

Step 8 is easy if you make a list of all the contributors, one per
line, and add a * once a contributors's papers are done.  I think that
will be faster and easier than using RT to keep track of them.

We don't have to wait till there are only 4 nonsigning contributors to
start steps 9 and 10.  It would be feasible to do with 10 or 20 or 50
contributors left out, if their code is small.  Thus, I suggest
identifying after a few months those whose code is not too hard to
replace.

-- 
Dr Richard Stallman
President, Free Software Foundation (gnu.org, fsf.org)
Internet Hall-of-Famer (internethalloffame.org)
Skype: No way! See stallman.org/skype.html.