Maintenance status of individual Org libraries

Maintenance status of individual Org libraries

[Ihor Radchenko]

Dear all,

I have gone through the maintainers of individual Org files and,
especially after Nicolas went missing from the list, the situation is
rather dire.

The following libraries have no maintainer or author active on the list:

ob-comint, ob-core, ob-css, ob-ditaa, ob.el, ob-emacs-lisp,
ob-eval, ob-exp, ob-forth, ob-fortran, ob-js, ob-latex, ob-lilypond,
ob-lob, ob-lua, ob-matlab, ob-ocaml, ob-octave, ob-org, ob-per,
ob-plantuml, ob-ref, ob-R, ob-ruby, ob-sass, ob-sed, ob-table,
ob-tangle, oc-basic, oc-biblatex, oc-bibtex, oc.el, oc-natbib, ol-bbdb,
ol-docview, ol-doi, ol.el, ol-eshell, ol-info, ol-irc, ol-mhe, ol-rmail,
org-agenda, org-archive, org-capture, org-clock, org-colview, org-compat
(maintenance would be useful, especially wrt compat.el), org-ctags,
org-datetree, org-duration, org-element (I can), org-entities,
org-faces, org-feed, org-footnote, org-goto, org-id, org-indent,
org-keys, org-lint, org-macro, org-macs, org-mobile, org-mouse, org-num,
org-refile, org-table, org-tempo, org-timer, ox-ascii, ox-beamer, ox.el,
ox-icalendar, ox-man, ox-md, ox-odt, ox-org, ox-publish, ox-texinfo

83/127 (~65%) of the libraries do not have someone familiar with their
code.

Should we try to make a call for maintenance at least for some of these
libraries?

-- 
Ihor Radchenko // yantar92,
Org mode contributor,
Learn more about Org mode at <https://orgmode.org/>.
Support Org development at <https://liberapay.com/org-mode>,
or support my work at <https://liberapay.com/yantar92>

Re: Maintenance status of individual Org libraries

[Ihor Radchenko]

Ihor Radchenko <yantar92@posteo.net> writes:

> Should we try to make a call for maintenance at least for some of these
> libraries?

Ping!

Re: Maintenance status of individual Org libraries

[Bastien Guerry]

Ihor Radchenko <yantar92@posteo.net> writes:

> Should we try to make a call for maintenance at least for some of these
> libraries?

Definitely.  We should probably prioritize files in this list, then
ask on this list *and* on the web.

Let's make sure we propose this as something fun to do, not a chore.

How do you want to proceed?

-- 
 Bastien

Re: Maintenance status of individual Org libraries

[Ihor Radchenko]

Bastien Guerry <bzg@gnu.org> writes:

> Ihor Radchenko <yantar92@posteo.net> writes:
>
>> Should we try to make a call for maintenance at least for some of these
>> libraries?
>
> Definitely.  We should probably prioritize files in this list, then
> ask on this list *and* on the web.
>
> Let's make sure we propose this as something fun to do, not a chore.
>
> How do you want to proceed?

I have no concrete plan. Some random thoughts:

- We may run a poll on how people use various parts of Org to see
  popularity/user base for different libraries. This may be a useful
  metrics for prioritization.

- We may need to identify the core libraries that have to be maintained
  better because everything else relies upon them.

- Some people are scared of maintenance partly because they do not want
  to follow all the messages in the mailing list.

- Rather than asking straight about maintenance, we may ask about
  problem people encounter with the Org libraries they use.  Having some
  real, personal problem to solve may be a driver to get started with
  maintaining a library.

- Instead of maintenance, we can ask people to demo using some less
  popular libraries during meetups (like
  https://orgmode.org/list/87tttlflht.fsf@localhost). This may reveal
  problems better and may allow writing the often missing tests. At
  least, tests can make things more robust even if not maintained.

-- 
Ihor Radchenko // yantar92,
Org mode contributor,
Learn more about Org mode at <https://orgmode.org/>.
Support Org development at <https://liberapay.com/org-mode>,
or support my work at <https://liberapay.com/yantar92>

Re: Maintenance status of individual Org libraries

[Matt]

 ---- On Mon, 30 Jan 2023 14:41:18 +0100  Ihor Radchenko  wrote --- 

 > The following libraries have no maintainer or author active on the list:
 
 > ob-comint, ob-core, ...

I'm interested (and technically still maintainer of ob-shell). ob-comint and ob-core are both used by ob-shell, so I've looked at good bits of both.  I'd be willing to work on those.

Unfortunately, my new job has yet to sign the FSF disclaimer, so I'm unable to contribute at the moment (I'm doing what I can to facilitate communication between parties).  Feel free to reach out off-list with advice for how I might help that process.

Until the disclaimer language gets resolved, I may be able to help in other ways.  I have notes explaining the ob- API (https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-orgmode/2023-02/msg00531.html).  Maybe if that were completed, it would make being a maintainer more approachable for people?  I'd also be happy to mentor new maintainers.  What other ways might I help?

Re: Maintenance status of individual Org libraries

[Ihor Radchenko]

Matt <matt@excalamus.com> writes:

>  ---- On Mon, 30 Jan 2023 14:41:18 +0100  Ihor Radchenko  wrote --- 
>
>  > The following libraries have no maintainer or author active on the list:
>  
>  > ob-comint, ob-core, ...
>
> I'm interested (and technically still maintainer of ob-shell). ob-comint and ob-core are both used by ob-shell, so I've looked at good bits of both.  I'd be willing to work on those.

Thanks!

> Until the disclaimer language gets resolved, I may be able to help in other ways.  I have notes explaining the ob- API (https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-orgmode/2023-02/msg00531.html).  Maybe if that were completed, it would make being a maintainer more approachable for people?  I'd also be happy to mentor new maintainers.  What other ways might I help?

You may help by confirming bug reports, discussing new features, and
providing idea about how to fix things.

For example, check out
- Discussion about merging header arguments:  https://list.orgmode.org/8735451u20.fsf@gmail.com/
- Discussion about :results header arg: https://list.orgmode.org/orgmode/87sf9x8n38.fsf@localhost/
- Some ob-shell Windows-only bug: https://list.orgmode.org/orgmode/87y1rbeohp.fsf@localhost/
- Some weird edge cases related to comint and command that read key:
  https://list.orgmode.org/orgmode/878re5g0ir.fsf@localhost/

You also do not need FSF assignment to contribute to WORG documentation.
Your example babel template may go there.

> I'd also be happy to mentor new maintainers.

It would also be nice to help people who submit patches to
ob-core/ob-comint, by suggesting improvements and answering their
questions. These people are the perspective maintainers - we should
better help them early :)

-- 
Ihor Radchenko // yantar92,
Org mode contributor,
Learn more about Org mode at <https://orgmode.org/>.
Support Org development at <https://liberapay.com/org-mode>,
or support my work at <https://liberapay.com/yantar92>