[gentoo-project] [RFC] Making "stabilization" a prerequisite to become a Gentoo Developer

[Christopher Díaz]

Hello everyone,

I would like to propose to the community a new policy in the process of
"becoming a developer". Here is the initial draft, do not hesitate to
point out anything that needs to be discussed.

Abstract

Given the necessity of testing and stabilizing software in Gentoo Linux
and the ammount of testers is not enough to test all the packages on
the given architectures, this GLEP proposes to make the "testing" and
"stabilization"  processes a required stage to become a Gentoo Linux
Developer.


Motivation

The necessity of manpower in Gentoo Linux is obvious and several
projects need more people to be able to achieve their goals. One
critical project is the Arch testers project, which needs people to be
able to know the procedure to test and mark as stable a given package, 
this impacts on the whole community because if arch testers are not
capable to test all the needed packages, all the other projects can't
go further with their goals.

At this point, the process to become a Gentoo Developer does not
explicitly require testing and stabilization. As this part is crucial
to better understand how to fix ebuilds, each future developer should
know the procedure to test and stabilize not only their own packages,
but to help other developers in the stabilization work.

The AT Project was created on January 2005 to reduce the developer's
load and the amount of open keywording bugs for the amd64 porting team.
Since then many users have volunteered to become ATs and after that
became full developers. GLEP 41 already tried to give arch testers a
"staff" status in the community, but rather than creating a new status,
this new "stage" in the "becoming developer" procedure should be
considered as a test of perseverance. At the same time, this is a great
way to teach gentoo users how portage works and how to debug their
future ebuilds.

Prepare the next generation of developers to be able to test and
stabilize their own packages, and help other devs in stabilization,
would benefit the whole community and give all mentors, recruiters and
users wanting to become a official gentoo developer a starting point
with endless work to do, and at the same time mentors and recruiters
would have a place to look for prospectives developers.


Specification

In order to stablish this new policy, we need to complete this list of
tasks (minimun required in my opinion):

-As test and stabilization is arch-based, we need all AT teams to try
to prepare an "official" procedure (all of them have very good
guidelines right now).

-Mentors and recruiters should encourage recruits to test as much as
they can, on all the given arch they are interested to, or have access
to.

-The official ebuild-quiz already has an specific "arch testing"
question, maybe as a Proof of Concept, the recruit should add bugs
where he/she could proof that he knows the testing procedure.

-As many users starting in gentoo will start by testing and
stabilization, AT teams would need to remember that they would interact
with maybe not so experienced users and try to make the procedure as
clear as posible to follow.


Rationale

This solution aims to solve a more long-term problem, which is the
necessity of having developers prepared to start a stabilization
process if needed and not depending on an arch tester. The reality is
that most current Gentoo Developers and Projects are overwhelmed with
the ammount of work, but if all developers could help by testing
another's package, maybe this could reduce the work or at least the
time spent waiting for stabilization.


Copyright

This work is lecensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 
3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit https://cre
ativecommons.org/licences/by-sa/3.0


Christopher Díaz Riveros ChrisADR