David Van Couvering wrote:
+1. If we aren't responsive to new contributor patches, then we won't
have a lot of new contributors hanging around :). I for one will
*try* to work on 2 patches a week -- it depends on whether the patches
submitted fall within my range of expertise.
That should not be a constraint in helping patches along.
Right now someone who knew nothing about the code could review the patch
list, try out patches and see if they are current. That would reduce
the list a lot I think! See
http://wiki.apache.org/db-derby/PatchListMaintenance
Beyond that, just trying patches to see if they work, reviewing the code
for just general good java practice, comments etc is valuable. I think
a big part of the problem is that there is a myth that a committer with
expertise in a certain area needs to be the *first* to look at a patch,
but they only need to be the last. The work can be distributed across
the community. As a committer I am sure you have run derbyall enough
times and seen it fail to know just running tests on patches is
extremely valuable.
Here are a couple examples of efforts I made recently to try to address
patches from independent contributors even though I am no expert:
DERBY-578 (patch posted April 24)
- Pinged Rick and begged him to review which he did.
- Synched up Manish's patch, ran tests, added comments and submitted
a new patch.
- Committed and unchecked patch available.
DERBY-1208 (posted April 15)
- Tried out the patch and threatened to commit it so someone
qualified would feel compelled to jump in before I did it.
- Unchecked patch available after Dan's review.
DERBY-974 (Fix suggestion posted Feb 13. No formal patch)
- Looked at the proposed change and suggested we get a Derby
reproducible case and invited Michael Hackett to become active in the
community again and promised to not make him wait months before
responding if he did.
Plus hopefully provided tools to move things along by adding content to
http://wiki.apache.org/db-derby/PatchListMaintenance
http://wiki.apache.org/db-derby/PatchAdvice
We all can contribute no matter our skill level in a particular area.
Kathey
