[Author Prev][Author Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Author Index][Thread Index]

gEDA-user: Best use of my time? [WAS: Re: Open Collector Error Checking]



On Mon, 2011-02-14 at 22:39 +0100, Kai-Martin Knaak wrote:
> Karl Hammar wrote:
> 
> > I understand the hint etc., but we should have one or more person
> > that could actually *commit* thoose simple fixes, 

Myself, Peter-B, DJ, Dan, Ales, Ben Jackson, Stuart Brorson, Anthony
Blake....

We all seem to be either busy, or just not familiar enough with the code
in question to make this an easy problem to fix. Reviewing patches isn't
its-self trivial though, as to do it well often requires an intimate
knowledge of the code-base - perhaps deeper than the patch submitter may
have had. (That is - if we wish to spot any potential system-level
gotchas).

I won't commit patches I view to be of low quality, but I do try and
address this with the submitter. For cases where I don't know enough - I
am prepared to give the submitter the benefit of the doubt if they seem
switched on and the code "looks" good. Just prod me to do that.. We can
always revert if it turns out to be a bad change.


> ack. 
> Patches are the result of non-trivial efforts. The contributers 
> deserve some attention. Even a short note, that the patch will 
> not applied is way better than let the patch rot until forever 
> and a day. IMHO, this kind of ignorance is a sure way to drive
> away potential developers.

I fully agree, and I'm trying my best where I can, but I have a lot of
much more critical things taking up my life at the moment. I'm sure this
applies to many other of the devs too.

>  See bug 699454 by Ineiev:
>  https://bugs.launchpad.net/pcb/+bug/699454

> The patch was filed in October 2008. danmc asked for some clarification 
> in November. Ineiev responded in December and updated the patch.
> In February somebody not logged in suggested to split the patch 
> into smaller blobs. Ineiev resonded the next day and provided a 
> series of patches two weeks later in March 2009. 
> Then nothing until today.

The last comment on that bug was me doing a bit of mass-triage on bugs
with patches attached. For our sins, if people don't keep pushing issues
- they will sadly get forgotten. My triaging by adding the tag wasn't
indicating that I'd paid a great deal of notice to what the patches were
in detail, or whether I could commit them right away. A more thorough
triage would have done that though, yes.

Perhaps we should just give Ineiev commit access - this would be a way
of addressing the issue in this particular case. His patches are
generally good, and we'd not be in the way then. He is known to the
community, so would probably be approved without much hesitation.

Ineiev - fancy requesting commit access? (I approve - but you'll have to
ask Dan / DJ, and possibly Harry Eaton).

> Not another semi fork, please. It is already a pain to have the 
> OpenGL only in Peter Cliftons version. 

I'll fix it - sometime ;)

Right now I've got PhD work which I'm failing at (I'm on medical leave
due to being depressed), and some part-time paid work trying to avoid
going broke (which is otherwise imminent) so I can keep paying the rent.

My girlfriend lives ~2.5 hours drive away, and I do like to see her when
I can (e.g. weekends), so add running a car to the list of expenses, and
take weekends away from free time for paid work or gEDA activities.

After a long list of personal problems, I'm trying to sort my life out -
and that means less time for gEDA (where it doesn't overlap with paid
work).

Unfortunately (as I love gEDA), the times I'm working most on gEDA have
often corresponded to the times where I've been most depressed, or least
effective with time management in other aspects of my life.

I would love to get the PCB+GL stuff finished and merged soon - but I'm
trying to keep sensible hours, manage a decent work/life balance and
generally sort things out. I will schedule some gEDA time periodically,
but there has to be a balance between patch-review and progress on PCB
+GL. I can do both, but there will be a trade-off due to the finite time
I can spend.

I'm hoping that I've been able to invigorate some interest in the
project recently, and I see that we have several up and coming new
developers who might be able to take the torch for a while - in terms of
driving gEDA forward.

FWIW... one of the work projects I'm doing at the moment will hopefully
benefit gEDA and PCB. I hope to be able to talk more about that if and
when the details of the project. are sorted out.

Best regards,

-- 
Peter Clifton

Electrical Engineering Division,
Engineering Department,
University of Cambridge,
9, JJ Thomson Avenue,
Cambridge
CB3 0FA

Tel: +44 (0)7729 980173 - (No signal in the lab!)
Tel: +44 (0)1223 748328 - (Shared lab phone, ask for me)

Attachment: signature.asc
Description: This is a digitally signed message part


_______________________________________________
geda-user mailing list
geda-user@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user