Re: Guix Days: Patch flow discussion

[Suhail <suhail@bayesians.ca>]

Hartmut, thank you for elaborating.

Hartmut Goebel <h.goebel@crazy-compilers.com> writes:

>  * when has this issue/patch been worked on last - is somebody
>    currently working on it
>  * what issue/patches I started to review?
> ...
>  * Even when using the debbugs interface in emacs
> ...
>      o It does not tell what issues/patches I've been working on
>        already - and waiting for a reply

I believe the state tracking could be improved, and have given some
concrete suggestions in another thread.  However, I believe these are
orthogonal to whether or not the workflow is "mail-based".

For clarity, within Emacs' Debbugs interface I can use a combination of
tags and marks to highlight the issues of interest.

>  * commenting on code requires to download the patch - strip out parts
>    which are okay, comment, then mail the commented code to the correct
>    issue number

I believe the ease or not of this would depend on the email client of
choice.

>  * Even when using the debbugs interface in emacs
> ...
>      o It is an insurmountable obstacle for those not using emacs.

This is probably an important issue if true.  To clarify, in "those not
using [E]macs" are you considering developers using other email clients
such as Alpine, Mutt etc?

>      o It does not tell which issues are stale

What does "stale" mean to you?  Do you mean something other than
Debbugs' notion of staleness?

> And as long as vocal (and active :-) members of the community insist
> on being able to work via e-mail — while also not adopting modern
> e-mail-capable forges — this situation will not change.

In an attempt to focus the discussion on the specific features, it seems
if, in addition to improved state tracking, the below were available it
might help (to varying degrees depending on the user):

1. Some tooling that helps in "checking out" a specific revision of a
   patch series.  I don't know if this already exists, given my relative
   inexperience with Debbugs.

2. An ability to leave comments inline on
   <https://issues.guix.gnu.org/>.

While "forges" provide both of the above in some form, they may not be
the only way to accomplish the above.

-- 
Suhail