while i'm a novice at using ANY code review tools, having some persistent tooling for patch reviews would be really great! theres a lot of good feedback that otherwise only exists in an email somewhere!
On Fri, Jun 6, 2014 at 12:05 AM, Austin Seipp <aus...@well-typed.com> wrote: > Hello all, > > Recently, while doing server maintenance, several of the > administrators for Haskell.org set up an instance of Phabricator[1], > located at https://phabricator.haskell.org > > For those who aren't aware, Phabricator (or "Phab") is a suite of > tools for software development. Think of it like a polished, > semi-private GitHub with a lot of applications and tools for all kinds > of needs. We've been using it to do issue tracking for Haskell.org > maintenance and like it a lot so far. > > One very nice aspect of Phabricator though is it has a very nice code > review tool, called 'Differential', that is very useful. For people > who have used a tool like Review Board, it's similar. Furthermore, it > has a very convenient userland tool called 'Arcanist' which makes it > easy for newcomers to post a review and get it merged when it's ready > all from the command line. > > I'd like to see if people are interested in using Phab _strictly_ for > code review of GHC patches. It is a dedicated tool specifically for > this, and I think it works much better than Trac or inline GitHub > comments. > > Also, Phab can also support post-commit reviews. So if I touch > something in the runtime system and just push, perhaps Simon or Edward > would like to look, and they can be alerted right when I do this, and > then yell if I did something stupid. > > Before I go much further, I'd like to ask: is there *any* interest in > this? Or are people satisifed with Trac? The primary motivations are > roughly, in no particular order: > > 1) Code review is good for everyone, a good way for people to learn > the code and ask questions, and useful to give feedback to newcomers. > And even experienced GHC hackers can learn things from reading code, > as we all do regularly, or find things that need cleanup. > > 2) Phabricator in particular makes it very easy to submit patches for > review. To submit a patch, I just run the command 'arc diff' and it > Does The Right Thing. It also makes it easy to ensure people are > *alerted* when a patch might be relevant to them. > > 3) They can be uploaded and created from the command line, and merged > easily afterwords the same way. This is particularly useful for > newcomers, and for me. :) > > 4) Differential is dedicated to code review, and much better at it > than just reading patches on Trac IMO. > > 5) It supports both post-commit code review, as well as pre-commit > review. Post commit would be especially useful for us too, I think. > > Point #2 and #3 are mostly relevant for me, because I mostly handle > incoming patches. But I think in general it would be nice, and make it > a lot easier for newcomers to submit patches, and us to look over > them. > > Here's an example of a Differential code review: > > https://phabricator.haskell.org/D4 > > This is a demo using my 'wip/ermsb' patch. You'll need to create an > account to login, but it shouldn't be much trouble, you can login > several ways. I'll fix the login requirement soon. Feel free to read > the code, comment on it, and play around. It's more of a > demonstration, but real code review would be welcome too. :) > > If people are interested in doing this, I can add notes to the wiki > pages for newcomers, and I'll send another email about Phab so people > can understand it a little better. But I want to ask first. > > There is an argument that our team is so small, code review has > unnecessary burdens. But I think Phab could help a lot with tracking > outside patches and getting good reviews for incoming patches, and > it'll make it easier for newcomers. And experienced pros can probably > learn a thing as well. > > Again, to be clear, I don't propose we migrate anything to Phabricator > from, say, Trac. There's no real pressure to do so and it would be > tons of work. I only propose we use it for code review, which is > perfectly fine, and how other projects like LLVM do code review (they > use Bugzilla). > > I also don't think the usage of Phabricator should be mandatory > (unless we decide that later because we like it), but I would like to > see people use it if possible. > > [1] http://phabricator.org > > -- > Regards, > > Austin Seipp, Haskell Consultant > Well-Typed LLP, http://www.well-typed.com/ > _______________________________________________ > ghc-devs mailing list > ghc-devs@haskell.org > http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/ghc-devs >
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