Re: Automatically testing package updates

[Suhail Singh <suhailsingh247@gmail.com>]

Ricardo Wurmus <rekado@elephly.net> writes:

> It would be preferable to automate trivial updates *completely*, even
> bypassing the need for manual patch generation and submission to the
> bug tracker.

I agree with the goal of automating trivial updates.  One way of doing
so is outlined in the proposal I shared here:
<https://yhetil.org/guix/87ed2yufar.fsf@gmail.com/>.  Importantly,
automating trivial updates which result in _automated_ patch generation,
is not fundamentally mutually exclusive with "submission to the bug
tracker".

> I'd rather reserve the issue tracker for humans and keep bots in a
> realm that is separate from the user interfaces designed for humans.

I believe it is important to provide _some_ way of distinguishing bot
activities from that of humans.  It's not clear to me that keeping said
activities entirely separate from human activities is the best way of
doing so.

I don't necessarily disagree with keeping the two separate.  However, it
is still important to provide some transparency on bot activities.
Keeping things on the issue tracker has said transparency as a nice
side-effect.  However, it is by no means the only way of doing so.

If we do decide to keep bots in a separate realm as it were, it would be
desirable (and in my opinion, important) if that still allowed for at
least as much transparency that the issue tracker provides for human
activities.

It would help the discussion if we could express the benefits that would
be achieved by not tracking bot activities on the issue tracker.
Especially since there are certain drawbacks (reduction in transparency,
unless addressed by other means) of doing so.

Do you have thoughts on the matter?

-- 
Suhail