This is in response to some of the frustrations offered in the
thread staring with
http://forum.dlang.org/post/[email protected]
I share some of those frustrations, and I've been vocal about
such things myself. However, in the last 2 months, at least in
terms of the DMD repository, things may be starting to change for
the better.
Recent Promising Progress
-------------------------
A few of us are working hard to revive old PRs and either see
them across the finish line, or give them a quick path to
closure. 2 months ago the DMD PR queue stood at about 190. Now
it's hovering between 140 and 150. So, we're getting better;
take a look at the graphs here for evidence:
https://auto-tester.puremagic.com/chart.ghtml?projectid=1. Notice
the spike in PR submissions in December, and we're still 40 PRs
less than we were 2 months ago.
2 months ago, the oldest PR was dated 2012, believe it or not:
https://github.com/dlang/dmd/pull/1145. Our oldest is now 2013,
which is still pretty bad, but it was partially revived recently
at https://github.com/dlang/dmd/pull/7503. Unfortunately, it's
probably the most difficult PR we have.
I'll take the risk of arguing that we've widened the review
bottleneck recently for straight-forward PRs. However, for
difficult, complex, or controversial PRs, it still looks like we
lack contributors with the right skills that are willing
volunteer their time, and tolerate some inconveniences.
There has also been a lot of work done on improving
infrastructure for testing (e.g. Adding the Appveyor CI for
testing Windows) and automating some of the mundane tasks (e.g.
https://github.com/dlang/dmd/pull/7507).
A Few Observations About Our Talent
-----------------------------------
IMO, one of the most worrisome issues we have is a talent
retention problem (at least for DMD). It appears many of those
with the talent to review and fix difficult compiler bugs are no
longer active, or just pop in from time-to-time. I'm not sure
why that is. I know a few have left or don't participate much due
to dissatisfaction in the way D is managed. Others, I think,
were working on D as students and now have blossoming careers
outside of D to maintain. I also know of at least one that found
Rust to be a better alternative. But, I can also understand how
someone would just grow sick and tired of working on the same
thing for months or years.
Walter seems to pop in daily, and occasionally reviews PRs, and
his PRs of late are mostly just refactorings rather than fixing
difficult bugs. We desperately need his help on the more
difficult issues (e.g. https://github.com/dlang/dmd/pull/7568 and
https://github.com/dlang/dmd/pull/7566), but I don't know if he's
well-aware of those items and just busy with other things, or if
those items are simply not on his radar. If it's the latter, and
it would help, I'll publish a digest periodically.
Andrei pops in unpredictably, and sometimes goes on a PR review
rampage. The infrequency, however, makes it difficult to
follow-up and maintain momentum on individual items that need his
judgement (e.g. https://github.com/dlang/dmd/pull/7099)
That being said, there are some very talented software engineers
active on this forum that are only seldom active in the PR queue.
I don't know why that is; perhaps it's simply a matter of time
and energy, or perhaps it's frustration. As others have said,
you don't need to have commit access to be a helpful reviewer.
And, after showing a willingness to participate, demonstrating
your abilities, and earning the confidence of the leadership, you
might be asked to join the team, and then you'll really be able
to make things happen.
Final Words
-----------
Due to recent changes, if you have a straight-forward,
non-controversial PR, it will likely be merged in a week or two;
usually less, and sometimes even within a few hours. If the PR
is difficult, complex, or controversial, then it may languish in
PR purgatory for some time, unfortunately. I don't know what can
be done about that at this time without skilled,
frequently-active talent.
My two-cents,
Mike
