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Gentoo is a rapidly growing distribution, with that growth comes |
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a number of problems. The workload on the core development team |
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is increasing all the time and if something is not done to address |
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it the development of Gentoo will suffer. |
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|
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It is clear that there are many dedicated individuals involved in |
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Gentoo who are not involved as part of the development team. Its |
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only necessary to monitor one of the mailing lists or browse |
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through the support forums to realize that. A lot of these people |
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may not be qualified to be a full-fledged member of the core |
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development team but they still have skills/time to offer back to |
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the community. |
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|
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Therefore I propose that a public ToDo list be created along with |
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a list coordinator so that the talents of these people can be used. |
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Tasks would be posted on the public list and assigned to specific |
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individuals who volunteer. Tasks should be kept specific rather |
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than open-ended and have a scheduled completion date, if necessary |
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tasks can be broken up into smaller independent tasks to achieve |
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these goals. |
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|
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By the creation of such a list we could help free up the core |
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developers to do other things, and at the same time speed up the |
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completion of many of the necessary but routine tasks that seem to |
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take up so much time. By taking some of the workload off of the |
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developers we can allow them to do what they do best, and that is |
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to develop and refine the features that have attracted us to Gentoo |
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in the first place. |
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|
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Some tasks that might be suitable for inclusion on the list: |
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- Creation and proofreading of new translations of the |
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documentation. |
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- Monitoring of the package list for version changes. |
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- Creation of a troubleshooting guide based on the Q & A from |
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the mailing lists and forums. |
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- Testing of the ebuild scripts/compilation on less common |
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platforms. |
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- Creation of new ebuild scripts base on user requests. |
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- Updating/testing of ebuild scripts when new versions of |
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packages are developed. |
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- The role of ToDo list coordinator(s) |
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|
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The core developers should be in control of the contents of the |
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list to prevent a loss of focus and would have veto powers over the |
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tasks to be assigned and the results of the completed tasks. |
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|
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I now having said my piece I open it up for public discussion. |
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|
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Fred Van Andel |