[Freeciv-Dev] Re: AI - cleaning (Was: Re: [UPDATE] Corecleanup_08 patch)

["Ross W. Wetmore" <rwetmore@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 06:12 PM 01/10/09 +0100, Gregory Berkolaiko wrote:
> --- Raimar Falke <hawk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: 
>> On Tue, Oct 09, 2001 at 03:32:15AM -0400, Ross W. Wetmore wrote:
>> > At 05:44 PM 01/10/05 +0100, Gregory Berkolaiko wrote:
>> >
>> > I really don't see this changing without some major shakeup in the
>> way 
>> > Freeciv maintainers handle things. It needs to move from a despotic 
>> > "Boss" mode to a state where there is a Magna Carta document or Code
>> of 
>> > Laws that sets out appropriate rules and responsibilities for both
>> > submitters *and* maintainers. Trent pointed out a number of
>> contributors
>> > whose names have been blacklisted and scrubbed from Freeciv, or whose
>> > code has been rejected only to reappear a little later in buggy
>> mutated
>> > form. This is *very* unprofessional, but typical of an immature
>> system.
>> 
>> It would be helpful if you can come up with a list of what kind of
>> things such a Magna Carta should contain.
>
>yes please

You can start with a basic Golden Rule.

Its relevance takes many forms ...

Someone who puts together a patch and spends the time and energy to
get it working deserves to have the work treated with a modicum of
respect and professional integrity. There are code reviews that 
constructively improve the code and there are inane suggestions or 
riders that seek to use the work to foster private agendas and petty 
needs. And there are people who simply use or abuse other's work with 
neither proper credit nor attention to the author's input or wishes.

Someone who submits a patch should provide documentation, install
and test instructions and reasonable aids to make it as easy as 
possible for others to come up to speed to give it a proper review. 
They should also respect both the existing coding standards and goals 
of the Freeciv, as well as the suggestions of others in how better to 
meet them. If reviewer's are following the previous good practices, 
then their comments are generally for a purpose and worth a good look.

Review patches based on their stated goals and functions. Decide
early in the process if they are compatible and do proper thorough
reviews if they are. The concept of having people resubmit a patch
repeatedly with one new trivial change each day because that is the 
level of effort reviewers are willing to make is both inefficient
and petty, especially petty when it used as a threat. Treat patches 
as a unit of work and apply them as finally approved or not at all 
without *any* further change. Changes can always be applied in 
subsequent patches if the need arises, but in general such followup 
patches unless indicated during the review denote a failure of the 
reviewers and review process.

In short ...

Follow basic rules of common sense that provide both the submitter 
and those responsible for maintaining Freeciv with incentive to 
participate in the process and move it quickly and effectively to
worthwhile conclusions.

A proper review process with prereqs and appropriate conditions for
advancing to the next stage is a useful way to keep the process 
orderly and uniformly fair to all involved.

The author should always have the deciding say over the code in the
patch. 

The maintainer should always have the deciding say in whether it is 
applied to CVS or not.

And make sure that people that are constantly saying "I won't allow
<blort>" where <blort> is the spontaneous excuse of the moment to
show their petty power are quickly castrated or removed from any
point where they can seriously impact the constructive processes.
Egos and personal agendas need to be relegated to the development 
dustbin. Concensus from discussion will quickly sort out the "I"s
from the "us"es.

You can probably do a ten commandments or similar to frame the 
appropriate deadly sins for developer and maintainer alike. I
would suggest you take suggestions at large and pass the proposed
flavours around for discussion and final vote if this is the
way you choose to go.

>Best,
>G.
>____________________________________________________________
>Do You Yahoo!?
>Get your free @yahoo.co.uk address at http://mail.yahoo.co.uk
>or your free @yahoo.ie address at http://mail.yahoo.ie

Cheers,
RossW
=====