Hey Daniel,I am in the same boat as you, I have decided to try my hand at documentation first, I went into JIRA and will try to help date some curent wiki descriptions of one of the algorithms. I figure this is a good first step as any to get familiar with some of the algorithms before devoting more time to create a large code patch. I agree for a newcomer its a bit daunting to figure out which parts of the code/docs need the most attention. Regards
> From: mpe...@apache.org > Date: Mon, 25 Mar 2013 20:13:18 -0700 > Subject: Re: Call to action – Mahout needs your help > To: dev@mahout.apache.org > > Something that the Mahout PMC might want to do is share the (rough) > criteria for becoming a Mahout committer. In many projects, this is quite > vague and leaves a lot of leeway up to the PMC, which is desirable for a > variety of reasons. However the reason I mention it is that up until now, > others I've spoken to within the Hadoop community have felt that large new > algorithm contributions are basically what will earn someone committership > on Mahout. Based on this thread, consensus seems to be forming that that is > *not* what is desired. So what's your rough ideal committer at this point > in the life of Mahout if they are not contributing new algorithms? I guess > it's things like code reviews, correctness fixes, perf improvements, and > refactorings / enhancements? > > Regarding attribution, I saw it mentioned elsewhere in this thread and I > noticed it myself so I thought I'd throw in my 2 cents. While it seems like > a small thing, I wonder whether instituting the Hadoopish "Contributed by > so-and-so" in commit messages to assign credit for patches by > non-committers would be help make contributors feel more appreciated for > their work. Especially if you want to encourage people to contribute lots > of small patches on their way to committership. Alternatively, putting > "(Joe Newbie via Jim Veteran)" into every commit also acknowledges the > committer/reviewer, which is not an easy job and can help people feel > appreciated for that work as well. > > Finally, if there are places where the current committers know Mahout needs > work, or has holes, have those been articulated in any specific way? If not > I think that would be awesome. I know that in general, several of the docs > are out of date on the wiki. I suppose that's one. I wonder what else tops > the to-do list. Is there something other than just the open JIRA list < > https://issues.apache.org/jira/issues/?jql=project%20%3D%20MAHOUT%20AND%20status%20%3D%20Open%20ORDER%20BY%20priority%20DESC > >? > > Hope this helps. > > Regards, > Mike > > > > On Mon, Mar 25, 2013 at 7:12 PM, Daniel Longest <dlong...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > I've been a lurker on this list for a few months and trying to figure > > out a way to contribute. I'm very interested in ML but am not a > > professional in it. I am a fulltime .NET developer by trade, but have > > used Java academically (undergrad and grad school). I would love the > > opportunity to contribute in a testing or optimization capacity if > > someone could help point me in the right direction. > > > > Regards, > > Daniel > > > > > > > > > > As a side note on GSoC: At least at German universities the general > > concept of > > > GSoC isn't particularly well known which makes me think that reaching > > out to > > > students could be helpful. I'm aware of two PhD. students on this list > > who > > > probably know students with good coding skills - it might be worth the > > effort > > > reaching out to those directly for testing and optimisation tasks. > > > > >
