Re: Maintenance and future of Guile

[Blake Shaw <blake@nonconstructivism.com>]

Taylan Kammer <taylan.kammer@gmail.com> writes:

> On 17.12.2021 16:48, Olivier Dion wrote:
>>> Olivier Dion <olivier.dion@polymtl.ca> skribis:
>>>
>>>> I would also like to contribute in some meaningful way.  In what way
>>>> someone with none wizard knowledge of Scheme can contribute the most to the
>>>> project?
>>>
>> On Fri, 17 Dec 2021, Ludovic Courtès <ludo@gnu.org> wrote:
>>> Triage of bugs and patches is always welcome I guess, and communicating
>>> what needs to be applied/addressed first to whoever can actually commit
>>> it.  That’s one possible way to help.
>> 
>> Where can this be done?  I know that Guix is using debbugs, but do Guile
>> does the same or is it all tracked on Savannah?
>> 
>> Also, any way to help on the C side?
>> 
>
> Guile also uses Debbugs:
>
> https://bugs.gnu.org/guile

hi folks, from what I'm seeing here it seems like there are quite a few
of us who are interested in engaging in steady, organized participation
in Guile's upkeep, but we're unsure whether we're qualified. At the same
time Ludo needs to find a replacement and Andy is apparently quite busy,
and some issues in the ecosystem are apparently starting to show their teeth.

personally I've been programming for about 15 years now but my career
has been entirely in new media (video, graphics, audio), so while I've
worked with plenty of lower-level libraries over the years, I didn't
start to get an itch for compilers until covid happened. I was also
doing a PhD in philosophy of mathematics at the time (which I've
postponed indefinitely to prevent being separated from my partner during 
covid travel craziness) so I definitely think I have the *potential* to
contribute to a project like Guile, its just a matter of finding the
time to read some compiler books (which usually are neither short nor easy!).

It sounds like others are coming from similar-ish places: you feel
confident in your abilities to accede to the challenges, but lack the
background that would enable you to take the initiative. So what are we
TODO?

In a situation like this, I would recommend that we form a little
working group to collectively study the implementation of Guile, and
with Ludo's suggestions come up with a roadmap for tackling various areas
of the repo/compiler/infrastructure that need work, which we could then
divide up among ourselves with each of us creating a presentation on our
assigned areas, with group hack sessions following each bi-weekly (or
whatever) presentation. This way we could distribute the knowledge
aquisicition work in a structured fashion while forming a support group for
developing a collective understanding of the codebase, as a cohort of
sorts.  
 
wdyt?

ez,
blake 

-- 
“In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni”