On Sat, 17 Jul 2010 17:57:34 +0300 Tal Einat <talei...@gmail.com> wrote: > > However, in the long run just allowing "heavy" contributors such as > myself commit rights won't be enough. There's definitely a need for > one or more active maintainers of IDLE who can take care of incoming > bug reports and patches. We may hope that at least one serious > contributor who is given commit rights will take up this position > naturally, but perhaps a more active approach would be beneficial?
Well, the general problem can be solved stepwise. Here (since this discussion happens both on python-dev and idle-dev), I think we are firstly interested in how python-dev can allow IDLE development and maintenance to happen again. Hence my proposal for IDLE contributors to become committers. Then, idle-dev can do further proposals (for example, a dedicated IDLE development FAQ or manual, etc.). > I also think that there is a need for a guiding hand for IDLE, as > Guido is for Python. It took a bit of time until I "got" the goals and > principles of IDLE (e.g. easy to learn, minimal and obvious interface) > by having KBK explain them in detail and explain the drawbacks of > certain proposed changes. Having some kind of central authority is > especially important in order to keep IDLE on track because the active > development of IDLE is slow and done by various contributors -- there > is currently no central group of active developers making such > decisions. This doesn't have to be one person who also takes care of > bugs, patches and testing, it could be someone who is just readily > available via the idle-dev mailing list and keeps up with development > of IDLE. Or it could be several persons. "The IDLE maintainers", or "the IDLE committers". > Going along these lines of thought, I reach my original conclusion: > IDLE is somewhat a project of its own. Perhaps considering IDLE a > daughter-project of Python is appropriate, and continuing to develop > it as part of the Python codebase could be reasonable, if more active > maintainers can be found. I certainly support continuing to package it > as part of the standard distribution. The thing is, if we package it as part of the standard distribution: - IDLE development has to follow the release schedule (bugfix-only period, code freeze, etc.) - IDLE issues have to be considered Python issues, in that they affect the overall quality of Python (as perceived by users) Therefore, it would probably be counter-productive for IDLE to have a totally separate development environment (VCS, issue tracker) where the only communication with python-dev takes places before a new Python release. Regards Antoine. _______________________________________________ IDLE-dev mailing list IDLE-dev@python.org http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/idle-dev
