Re: [bangerth@ticam.utexas.edu: GCC review process: how to handle external submissions]

[Christopher Faylor <cgf at redhat dot com>]

On Sun, Mar 09, 2003 at 04:05:59PM -0800, Jason Molenda wrote:
>>From: Wolfgang Bangerth <bangerth at ticam dot utexas dot edu>
>>To: gcc at gcc dot gnu dot org
>>Subject: GCC review process: how to handle external submissions
>>Date: Sat, 8 Mar 2003 00:40:09 -0600 (CST)
>>
>>I think we have a serious problem here.  We are not only losing the
>>contributions from these people, we are also scaring them away, and I
>>don't think this is wise.
>>
>>Can we at least discuss the reasons for this, and maybe come up with
>>suggestions about how we could improve this process?  I think it would
>>be tremendously helpful if there were someone who
>
>And to further demonstrate that we're all discussing the same problem
>at the same time, this came up on the subversion-dev list last week.
>Their approach is to have humans do it by hand.  cf
>
>http://subversion.tigris.org/servlets/ReadMsg?list=dev&msgNo=32389
>
>It's an interesting approach -- it takes advantage of the idea that
>there are many volunteers interested in helping a project but aren't
>hacker gods.  On the other hand, it assumes that the volunteer won't
>disappear or let things drop on the floor if he runs short on time...

We use what sounds like a similar process over in cygwin-land to handle
things like package submissions.  We have a package submission tracker
who keeps track of who's submitted what and what state it's in.  We have
someone who keeps track of patches for the cygwin setup utility also.

Patches for cygwin itself stay in my inbox until they are reviewed.
Hmm.  Where did I hear about someone using a similar scheme somewhere?

I wonder if there is anyone in gdb-land who would be willing to be a
patch tracker and maybe operate as a polite nagger for unreviewed
patches.  It seems to work pretty well for cygwin.

cgf