Re: [gentoo-dev] Attracting developers (Re: Packages up for grabs...)

[Peter Stuge]

Jeroen Roovers wrote:
> For once someone suggests a single good case where git beats CVS for
> portage tree changes: easily checking suggested changes ...

Did you look at Gerrit one of the many times I mentioned it already?

That is what it is for, and it is pretty great.


> A shiny new workflow doesn't magically make Gentoo development easier.

Actually it does. It doesn't make hard things easy, but it does make
things which are currently hard but which *should* actually be easy
indeed be easy. Such as contributing commits for tested bumps, and
tested bugfixes.

Even if you might not think so, there is quite significant overhead
for patches which sit in bugzilla compared to a Gerrit in front of a
git repo. You really need to try it, and really want to learn Gerrit,
to discover just how well it works.

End result:

Contributors can work independently and then send their work in with
*zero* overhead. Do not underestimate the importance of this.

Developers with portage tree write access review commits and can
apply them to portage, or discard them, with a single click or with
a single SSH command.


> The hard bits aren't usually related to interactive repo access methods.

It was argued that the hard bits are only learned by mentoring. I
think this makes sense, and I think it has nothing whatsoever to do
with commit workflow. There are PLENTY of TRIVIAL NO-BRAINER
contributions which are NOT GETTING INTO PORTAGE. Let's not worry
about optimizing the really difficult problems until all the really
simple problems have all been solved.


> We can't get rid of the quizes just because we all now use $shiny.

Actually we can.


> Proxy commits should work exactly like recruit/mentor commits: you
> review patches and give the nod and then the commits get done. This
> workflow is only slightly less convenient with CVS than with git.

I really recommend spending some time on learning Gerrit if you
haven't used it already.


//Peter