Public SourceMage Discussion List

[Arwed von Merkatz <v.merkatz AT gmx.net>]

On Sun, Jun 04, 2006 at 12:45:19PM -0700, Andrew Stitt wrote:
> On Sun, Jun 04, 2006 at 02:35:12PM -0500, Jeremy Blosser wrote:
> > On Jun 04, Arwed von Merkatz [v.merkatz AT gmx.net] wrote:
> > > there's a quite old bug[1] about getting MAINTAINER files in a state
> > > that we can have per-spell maintainer declarations again.
> > > The basic idea is that we would have a hierarchy of MAINTAINER files,
> > > looked up like this:
> > > - if there's a MAINTAINER file in $grimoire/$section/$spell, use that
> > > - otherwise, use $grimoire/$section/MAINTAINER if it exists
> > > - use $grimoire/MAINTAINER
> > > 
> > > The file itself would just have a list of developers who maintain that
> > > grimoire/section/spell, with one developer per line in the format
> > > "full name <the.mail AT domain.org>"
> > > 
> > > We currently have a few MAINTAINER files, like in the mail section, that
> > > include spell names + maintainers. The advantage of the above scheme is
> > > that it can be looked up automatically very easily.
> > 
> > I guess I'm skeptical of the need for yet another spell file vs. just
> > sticking it in DETAILS at the spell level like we do with BUILD_API, but
> > whatever the Sorcery team prefers works for me.
> > 
> > We will want some kind of concept of how we're going to keep these from
> > going stale before we let people start claiming individual spells.  It's
> > too common for people to do an update or two and then disappear, and no 
> > one
> > is sure if they really still maintain it or not.  We could only allow
> > individual spells to have a maintainer if the section they are in has a
> > maintainer and that person approves.  That way the management of the
> > maintainer status has a hierarchy as well that is more likely to work.
> > That might kill the point, though.
> 
> I dont really see a point in a *spell* MAINTAINER file. We've had a
> MAINTAINER line in DETAILS before, spells dont really have multiple
> maintainers, certainly any case where that happens now is the exception
> rather than the rule.
> 
> The MAINTAINER line in DETAILS historically served basically no purpose
> since as mentioned by Jeremy, people put their name there then tend to
> disappear. Sure some people do maintain one or two spells, but again,
> thats by and large the exception rather than the rule.
> 
> I guess I just dont see it being of any use, and like last time this
> was attempted, quickly becoming stale. Over time we'll come the same
> conclusion about it as we did last time.
 
True, but people seem to want _some_ way of claiming maintainership of
spells. Doing that in the section MAINTAINER file as it's done in the
mail section has the same problem though.

-- 
Arwed v. Merkatz                              Source Mage GNU/Linux developer
                                                    http://www.sourcemage.org