Re: Concerns about community contributor support

[Timothy <tecosaur@gmail.com>]

Thomas S. Dye <tsd@tsdye.online> writes:

>> Follow up: What should be the response to "noise", because I don't think
>> it should be a cold shoulder.
>>
> Agreed.  I'm trying to put myself in the maintainers' shoes.  They volunteer
> lots of highly skilled time, which I admire greatly.  I can imagine a situation
> where a patch falls outside a maintainer's interest and they have difficulty
> finding the time to understand it and offer a meaningful critique.
>
> Historical note: when Carsten took his leave and announced Bastien would
> maintain Org mode, I jumped in noisily to suggest that a committee approach
> might be better.  I couldn't imagine a world with two Carstens!  It appears
> there is a committee of sorts now, though I'm in the dark how it is organized.
> Assuming there is a committee, perhaps addition of an Initial Patch Reviewer
> might be a good idea?

I desperately need to head to bed, so I'll make this quick, but I think
the unclear structure doesn't help.

Often I'm at a loss as to whether a patch has been left for Bastien to
take a look at, overlooked, rejected without comment, or what.*
Crucially, in any of those cases I think the contributor deserves to
know.

I think responding to a first-time contribution with silence is more
likely to push someone away than any other effect.

Org development may be slowing down/refocusing, but I don't think that
means we should disregard new volunteered effort.

A clearly layed out structure and set of roles sounds like it could be
helpful to me.

> All the best,
> Tom

--
Timothy

* I happen to be currently feeling this with the set of patches I
  recently sent in. One was responded to and merged, another had a burst
  of replies but seems to be left in limbo/waiting for Bastien?, and
  then I have 4 others which I am just *hoping* will eventually be
  noticed / responded to. It's not a good feeling, and it's part of
  whats prompted me to send the original email.