Re: passing the baton onwards (was Re: The relation between CPAN Testers and quality (or why CPAN Testers sucks if you don't need it))
On Fri, Sep 05, 2008 at 04:07:43PM +0100, Nicholas Clark wrote: On Thu, Sep 04, 2008 at 02:19:26PM -0400, Greg Sabino Mullane wrote: Careful attention and responsiveness to CPAN testers and to rt.cpan.org is the best cure for this. Alternatively, I could just not upload code to CPAN, and not have this problem. You're right that it's a problem. I'm not convinced that your cure will work with all real world volunteers. The best cure is that if someone wishes to use a piece of software and finds that it has gone rotten, he can take over maintenance of it. That's how I ended up with Data::Compare. -- David Cantrell | Godless Liberal Elitist Aluminum makes a nice hat. All paranoids will tell you that. But what most do not know Is reflections will show On the CIA's evil landsat.
Re: passing the baton onwards
On Sat, Sep 6, 2008 at 3:15 AM, brian d foy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I'll do the work to handle the ones the authors give up without a maintainer, and my first idea was that a virtual user than we advertised as free modules (free as in kittens) would move modules int willing homes faster. But then, maybe not. Use case 1: I have two modules I would like to give up. Occassionally I might still update it (e.g. if someone sends me a good patch) but in general I'd like to put it in the take this module basket. IMHO this means the module needs to stay in my pause id or it will get back there if I upload a new version but it should be visible that this module needs a new primary maintainer. Use case 2: (quite similar) I see a module that seems to be unmaintained and needs a fix but something I don't really want to maintain. I can ask the author and if she is not responsive then you to take it over. Once I got the module I upload my fix but I'd also would like to *easily* set the this module needs a new primary maintainer flag. Use case 3: Someone passes away or just disappears for a long period. The CPAN maintainers should set the flag this module needs a new primary maintainer. IMHO Instead of encouraging people to upload new modules we should encourage them to take over existing ones. Gabor
Re: passing the baton onwards
On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 10:54:40 -0700, brian d foy [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: Or, Andreas could change PAUSE, which is a bit more involved :) Do you not know the abandoned flag? Or not considering it appropriate? On the Edit Module Metadata page the DSLIP status has under Support Level: developer mailing-list comp.lang.perl.* none abandoned unknown -- andreas
Re: passing the baton onwards
On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 17:15:04 -0700, brian d foy [EMAIL PROTECTED] said:
In article [EMAIL PROTECTED], (Andreas J. Koenig)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 10:54:40 -0700, brian d foy [EMAIL PROTECTED]
said:
Or, Andreas could change PAUSE, which is a bit more involved :)
Do you not know the abandoned flag? Or not considering it appropriate?
*I* know about it, but you also have to register the module, don't you?
Yes, but this is probably a good thing.
Beyond that, is there a way for everyone to see the list of those
modules?
Currently you'd need to write a few lines of code to get at the list,
like, say:
% perl -e '
use CPAN;
for $m (CPAN::Shell-expand(Module,/./)){
next unless $m-dslip_status-{S} eq a;
print $m-id, \n;
}
'
CPAN: Term::ANSIColor loaded ok (v1.10)
CPAN: Storable loaded ok (v2.15)
Going to read /home/sand/.cpan/Metadata
Database was generated on Sat, 06 Sep 2008 05:03:24 GMT
CPAN: YAML::Syck loaded ok (v0.71)
Going to read /home/sand/.cpan/build/
DONE
Found 320 old builds, restored the state of none
Agent
Algorithm::ScheduledPath
Apache::Sandwich
Be::Query
Business::OnlinePayment::InternetSecure
Crypt::RC6
Crypt::Serpent
Lingua::EL::Poly2Mono
Math::Brent
Module::MakefilePL::Parse
Mozilla::Backup
Parallel::Performing
R3
Tamino
WWW::BF2Player
WWW::BF2S
WWW::GameMonitor
Win32::Share
That's what I meant about you changing pause, much like you
did for 06.perms.
Anybody can set up a website to publish this list. It should probably
also on PAUSE. Yes, will do, that way it is always uptodate.
It would also be nice to see that bit set somewhere like CPAN Search,
maybe with a button that says I want to take over maintenance.
I hope Graham listens:)
--
andreas
Re: passing the baton onwards
Hi, brian d foy wrote: Beyond that, is there a way for everyone to see the list of those modules? That's what I meant about you changing pause, much like you did for 06.perms. It would also be nice to see that bit set somewhere like CPAN Search, maybe with a button that says I want to take over maintenance. None of this happens any differently than before. Either we need fore-knowledge that the author has decided to move on in life, or our waiting period for public notification. I think the number of those modules wouldn't be that high. That's because people just gradually disappear and don't sit down to decide that they're suddenly going to give up all their CPAN code. And that's good: If we advertised too much that there's no need to maintain your stuff, there'd be quite an incentive to upload things and then set the I don't want tedious work flag. I'll do the work to handle the ones the authors give up without a maintainer, and my first idea was that a virtual user than we advertised as free modules (free as in kittens) would move modules int willing homes faster. But then, maybe not. I think having a separate PAUSE ID would be too much work and potentially fragile. Gabor gave a couple of examples of when it would be sub-optimal. Ideally, we'd have a flag for all modules (not only those on the list) which search.cpan can then interpret at leisure. Best regards, Steffen
Re: passing the baton onwards
In article [EMAIL PROTECTED], (Andreas J. Koenig) [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 17:15:04 -0700, brian d foy [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: In article [EMAIL PROTECTED], (Andreas J. Koenig) [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Fri, 05 Sep 2008 10:54:40 -0700, brian d foy [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: Or, Andreas could change PAUSE, which is a bit more involved :) Do you not know the abandoned flag? Or not considering it appropriate? *I* know about it, but you also have to register the module, don't you? Yes, but this is probably a good thing. I'm thinking that someone who doesn't want to maintain the module probably won't do the extra work to register it then set the flag. I'm not thinking about what people should do, just what they won't do. I'll look at making that list of abandoned modules, and for now I'll go through the list I have and set their flags, etc.
Re: passing the baton onwards (was Re: The relation between CPAN Testers and quality (or why CPAN Testers sucks if you don't need it))
In article [EMAIL PROTECTED], Nicholas Clark [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Thu, Sep 04, 2008 at 02:19:26PM -0400, Greg Sabino Mullane wrote: I recognize that CPAN is a volunteer effort, but it does seem to me there is a implicit responsibility on the part of the author to maintain the module going forward, or to pass the baton to someone else. Call it a Best Is there an easy central visible way to flag up a module as up for adoption? What should have been the right list to ask that question on? A couple of the PAUSE admins have been talking about that, but we haven't really decided anything about how it should happen. There would probably be some virtual PAUSE ID that people could pass primary maintainership too and once those modules are there, someone could request maintainership of them without a waiting period. That's the way that would work with what is already in place, although someone has to upload a new dist for it to show up in the new account. I was thinking we'd want to do that anyway to at least modify the docs to note its status. Or, Andreas could change PAUSE, which is a bit more involved :)
