Okay. Looking at the statistics again, I think 7 is not too bad. So I am
not as against this policy as before. As a contributor, the more intense
periods have a greater weight in your memory than the more quiet stretches.

Could you confirm if this will affect draft PRs? And of course, a closed PR
can be reopened once a new 'slot' is free?

On Mon, 21 Sept 2026 at 21:13, Jarek Potiuk <[email protected]> wrote:

> My take: 7 is about right :)
>
> On Mon, Sep 21, 2026 at 10:10 PM Jarek Potiuk <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> > Happy to provide more datapoints. It's sooooooo easy with AI nowadays -
> > here are your weekly stats for last year.
> >
> >
> >
> ┌────────────────────┬──────┬───────────────────────┬────────────────────┬──────┬──────────────────┐
> > │        Week        │ Open │                       │        Week
> │
> > Open │                  │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2025-09-29 → 11-24 │ 0    │ (no PRs yet)          │ 2026-03-23
>  │
> > 10   │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +4 −0 │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2025-12-01         │ 1    │ ▇ +1                  │ 2026-03-30
>  │
> > 10   │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +2 −2 │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2025-12-08         │ 1    │ ▇ +1 −1               │ 2026-04-06
>  │
> > 10   │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +2 −2 │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2025-12-15         │ 0    │ −1                    │ 2026-04-13
>  │
> > 9    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ −1     │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2025-12-22         │ 1    │ ▇ +2 −1               │ 2026-04-20
>  │
> > 8    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ −1      │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2025-12-29         │ 2    │ ▇▇ +1                 │ 2026-04-27
>  │
> > 7    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ −1       │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2026-01-05         │ 3    │ ▇▇▇ +1                │ 2026-05-04
>  │
> > 6    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇ +2 −3     │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2026-01-12         │ 2    │ ▇▇ −1                 │ 2026-05-11
>  │
> > 7    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +4 −3    │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2026-01-19         │ 4    │ ▇▇▇▇ +2               │ 2026-05-18
>  │
> > 8    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +3 −2   │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2026-01-26         │ 4    │ ▇▇▇▇ +3 −3            │ 2026-05-25
>  │
> > 7    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +2 −3    │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2026-02-02         │ 7    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +4 −1         │ 2026-06-01
>  │
> > 6    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇ +2 −3     │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2026-02-09         │ 8    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +3 −2        │ 2026-06-08
>  │
> > 4    │ ▇▇▇▇ +1 −3       │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2026-02-16         │ 8    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +5 −5        │ 2026-06-15
>  │
> > 7    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +5 −2    │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2026-02-23         │ 10   │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +2         │ 2026-06-22
>  │
> > 9    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +3 −1  │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2026-03-02         │ 15   │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +7 −2 │ 2026-06-29
>  │
> > 10   │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +4 −3 │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2026-03-09         │ 13   │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +3 −5   │ 2026-07-06
>  │
> > 6    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇ +1 −5     │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │ 2026-03-16         │ 6    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇ +4 −11         │ 2026-07-13 → 07-20
> │
> > 6    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇           │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │                    │      │                       │ 2026-07-27
>  │
> > 3    │ ▇▇▇ +1 −4        │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │                    │      │                       │ 2026-08-03 → 08-10
> │
> > 5    │ ▇▇▇▇▇            │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │                    │      │                       │ 2026-08-17
>  │
> > 4    │ ▇▇▇▇ −2          │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │                    │      │                       │ 2026-08-24
>  │
> > 6    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇ +2        │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │                    │      │                       │ 2026-08-31
>  │
> > 7    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +2 −1    │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │                    │      │                       │ 2026-09-07
>  │
> > 9    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ +3 −1  │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │                    │      │                       │ 2026-09-14
>  │
> > 8    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ −1      │
> >
> >
> ├────────────────────┼──────┼───────────────────────┼────────────────────┼──────┼──────────────────┤
> > │                    │      │                       │ 2026-09-21
>  │
> > 6    │ ▇▇▇▇▇▇ −2        │
> >
> >
> └────────────────────┴──────┴───────────────────────┴────────────────────┴──────┴──────────────────┘
> >
> > Summary: first PR 2025-11-27, so the whole history is 43 weeks. 90 PRs
> > authored, 81 merged, 3 closed, 6 open now. Weekly average 6.4 open, peak
> 15
> > (week of 2026-03-02), and the queue drained hard the following fortnight
> > (−11 in the week of 03-16, the largest single-week clearance).
> >
> > On Mon, Sep 21, 2026 at 9:42 PM Sameer Mesiah <[email protected]>
> > wrote:
> >
> >> Hi Jarek,
> >>
> >> Thank you for pulling up the statistics. It really helps us understand
> the
> >> situation better. But I think these point-in-time numbers can sometimes
> >> mask the natural deviations in activity for most contributors. Since you
> >> took me as an example of someone who would hardly be affected by this
> new
> >> policy, I think we need to look at the maximum number of PRs I had open
> >> over my history of contributing. My memory is not 100% accurate of
> course
> >> but I recall having 15-20 open PRs at one point. And right around the
> time
> >> of the summit, I am fairly sure I had 10 open PRs (some in draft though
> I
> >> am not sure if this policy applies to draft PRs) which then went down
> to 6
> >> as the maintainers returned to start reviewing and merging my PRs
> again. I
> >> do not fault the maintainers of course as I understand the review queue
> is
> >> going to deprioritised during that period due to intense summit
> >> preparations.
> >>
> >> I would say I’m opening fewer PRs nowadays (unfortunately other
> >> commitments just get in the way even when you really want to contribute
> as
> >> a volunteer). So the 6 open PRs statistic might have caught me in a low
> >> point.
> >>
> >> I do not wish to make this thread about myself but I suspect other
> >> contributors’ activity might have similar patterns. Periods where they
> >> have
> >> lots of open PRs and then periods where they only have a handful. You
> can
> >> clearly see this in the statistics of people in bucket A who you seem to
> >> categorize as ‘good’ contributors.
> >>
> >> If you are insistent on this policy, I think a 10 PR limit might be a
> more
> >> reasonable middle ground. It will prevent bots and bad faith
> contributors
> >> from spamming 50 PRs but it won’t be excessively restrictive.
> >>
> >> On Mon, 21 Sep 2026 at 20:23, Jarek Potiuk <[email protected]> wrote:
> >>
> >> > Correction: Thursday the 24th at 7:00pm CEST. - which is 72 hrs from
> the
> >> > beginning of that thread,
> >> >
> >> > And one more comment: I thought for a long time about the metrics
> >> "Threads
> >> > vs. PRs". For me this is **embodiment** of community-aware, empathic
> >> > contributor - on the way to become a commmiter. And I **knew** -
> >> because I
> >> > checked it before - that practically **all** committers have a very
> high
> >> > number here.
> >> >
> >> > I deliberately never mentioned it in our discussions. As we all know,
> >> > anything you set as a goal stops being a useful metric. There are
> always
> >> > ways to game the system.
> >> >
> >> > That's why I waited for quite a while to accumulate the data and
> showed
> >> > completely different numbers - and never discussed the thread vs. PRs
> >> idea
> >> > - to ensure this particular metric remained totally unbiased.
> >> > And - just for the record - this is the last time this metric will be
> >> > unbiased—now that we will publicly say we "care" about it.
> >> >
> >> > And here is Claude's analysis on those top-20. And my thinking is that
> >> we
> >> > should care about the needs of groups in this way: A > B > C.
> >> >
> >> > ------------
> >> >
> >> > Three buckets, all 24 (top-19 + the five-way tie at 6 open PRs)
> >> >
> >> > Bucket rule, stated up front so the borderline calls are visible:
> >> > engagement = others' threads per open PR (≥1.5 counts as engaged),
> >> quality
> >> > = all-time merge rate (≥40% healthy). I picked these thresholds to
> match
> >> > where the data actually clusters - there's a real gap between 1.7 and
> >> 0.8
> >> > on engagement, and between 40% and 31% on the merge rate.
> >> >
> >> > ---
> >> >
> >> > A. Net reviewers — they give back more than they ask for (9 people,
> 103
> >> > open PRs)
> >> >
> >> > ┌─────────────────┬──────┬─────────────────┬─────────┬─────────┐
> >> > │     Author      │ Open │ Threads/open PR │ Reviews │ Merge % │
> >> > ├─────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ SameerMesiah97  │ 6    │ 60.3            │ 350     │ 90%     │
> >> > ├─────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ shivaam         │ 6    │ 13.0            │ 55      │ 67%     │
> >> > ├─────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ Vamsi-klu       │ 10   │ 10.8            │ 58      │ 38%     │
> >> > ├─────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ Andrushika      │ 9    │ 4.6             │ 33      │ 79%     │
> >> > ├─────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ yuseok89        │ 12   │ 3.8             │ 49      │ 77%     │
> >> > ├─────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ steveahnahn     │ 14   │ 3.2             │ 40      │ 59%     │
> >> > ├─────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ ColtenOuO       │ 23   │ 2.6             │ 70      │ 59%     │
> >> > ├─────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ stephen-bracken │ 6    │ 2.3             │ 16      │ 56%     │
> >> > ├─────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ fat-catTW       │ 17   │ 1.7             │ 33      │ 50%     │
> >> > └─────────────────┴──────┴─────────────────┴─────────┴─────────┘
> >> >
> >> > Vamsi-klu is the odd one: 108 threads and 58 reviews (bucket-A
> >> engagement)
> >> > on a 38% merge rate. Placed here because the review effort is
> >> unambiguous.
> >> > fat-catTW and stephen-bracken are the borderline entries - drop the
> >> > threshold to 2.0 and fat-catTW moves out.
> >> >
> >> > B. Shippers, not reviewers - volume with normal merge rates (6 people,
> >> 115
> >> > open PRs)
> >> >
> >> > ┌───────────────┬──────┬─────────────────┬─────────┬─────────┐
> >> > │    Author     │ Open │ Threads/open PR │ Reviews │ Merge % │
> >> > ├───────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ Eason09053360 │ 35   │ 0.3             │ 13      │ 52%     │
> >> > ├───────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ 1fanwang      │ 34   │ 0.8             │ 36      │ 40%     │
> >> > ├───────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ rjgoyln       │ 27   │ 0.7             │ 34      │ 53%     │
> >> > ├───────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ Samin061      │ 7    │ 0.4             │ 4       │ 58%     │
> >> > ├───────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ jeff3071      │ 6    │ 0.3             │ 7       │ 46%     │
> >> > ├───────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ YAshhh29      │ 6    │ 0.2             │ 1       │ 45%     │
> >> > └───────────────┴──────┴─────────────────┴─────────┴─────────┘
> >> >
> >> > The work lands—merge rates here are ordinary, some above
> >> committer-adjacent
> >> > levels—but the top three are carrying 96 open PRs between them while
> >> having
> >> > commented on 56 of other people's threads in total. 1fanwang sits
> >> exactly
> >> > on the 40% line.
> >> >
> >> > C. Low engagement and low merge rate (9 people, 82 open PRs)
> >> >
> >> > ┌───────────────────┬──────┬─────────────────┬─────────┬─────────┐
> >> > │      Author       │ Open │ Threads/open PR │ Reviews │ Merge % │
> >> > ├───────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ bujjibabukatta    │ 16   │ 0.2             │ 5       │ 11%     │
> >> > ├───────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ anmolxlight       │ 12   │ 0.4             │ 12      │ 31%     │
> >> > ├───────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ dheerenmohta      │ 10   │ 0.2             │ 0       │ 28%     │
> >> > ├───────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ namanjain24-sudo  │ 8    │ 1.1             │ 1       │ 11%     │
> >> > ├───────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ Kunal8954         │ 8    │ 0.8             │ 6       │ 20%     │
> >> > ├───────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ bramhanandlingala │ 8    │ 0.0             │ 1       │ 22%     │
> >> > ├───────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ zozo123           │ 7    │ 0.1             │ 6       │ 17%     │
> >> > ├───────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ GayathriSrividya  │ 7    │ 0.0             │ 9       │ 22%     │
> >> > ├───────────────────┼──────┼─────────────────┼─────────┼─────────┤
> >> > │ nagasrisai        │ 6    │ 0.7             │ 6       │ 29%     │
> >> > └───────────────────┴──────┴─────────────────┴─────────┴─────────┘
> >> >
> >> > bramhanandlingala and GayathriSrividya have commented on zero threads
> >> they
> >> > didn't author. This bucket is 82 open PRs with an aggregate merge rate
> >> > around 21% - roughly four reviews spent per PR that eventually lands.
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > J.
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > On Mon, Sep 21, 2026 at 9:09 PM Henry Chen <[email protected]>
> >> wrote:
> >> >
> >> > > Thanks Jarek and Vincent for the detailed data and perspective that
> >> > > context is really helpful. Seeing the actual numbers (especially
> that
> >> > even
> >> > > the top contributors rarely hit 5 open PRs), a cap of 5 makes sense
> >> to me
> >> > > as a starting point. Happy to go with it and adjust later if we find
> >> it's
> >> > > too tight in practice.
> >> > >
> >> > > Thanks
> >> > > Henry
> >> > >
> >> > >
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
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> >> > > For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected]
> >> > >
> >> > >
> >> >
> >>
> >
>

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