Think of this issue in terms of community.Apache tries to build communities that own code bases. The appearance of @author tags can defeat this purpose, if people who see the tags become less inclined to contribute.
If contributors want recognition, there are other ways than @author tags to get it.
Craig On Mar 31, 2008, at 10:50 AM, Harry Metske wrote:
I think we shouldn't dictate right now, how to deal with those conflictingsituations. Is it very likely to occur ?If it's not strictly necessary to make the choice now, I think we should letit free.But if anyone else on the list has a good reason to choose for an all-on orall-off, please speak up. regards, Harry 2008/3/31, Janne Jalkanen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:Then what do we do with new people if some of them insist to have the @author tag and some don't? /Janne On 31 Mar 2008, at 19:58, Harry Metske wrote:Although I'm not a committer I'd like to comment : I think both of you are right, there is code that is submitted initially fairly complete, and is not patched much afterwards, and if it is patched,it is only small bug fixes. In those cases you would want to keep the@author tags. On the other hand there is code that is initially submitted as a simple first prototype, and is afterwards greatly enhance by others. In those cases you should remove the @author tags. If it is not exactly mandated by ASF how to deal with, let everyone decide for himself how to handle it, and you don't have to handle every piece of code the same, for some pieces keep your @author tag, for others remove them ? How about that, everybody happy ? regards, Harry 2008/3/31, Janne Jalkanen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:Case in point: The author of LuceneSearchProvider has not contributed anything in what, two years? Yet he still stands in as the @author. Would you go to him to ask for help, or should you go to the mailing list?I'd ask the list, but I would likewise *know* that the author hasn'tbeen seen for two years, information that would be lost if the tag had been removed.The @author tag does not encode that information. Therefore, nothingwould be lost, if it were removed (and it might probably be a good idea to remove it at that stage). The code should really stand on its own legs.You're saying you have your name on code you don't understand?Yes. Other people have modified code for which I am still the @author, and I can't really claim that I know what that code does anymore... And I'm pretty sure I have modified a lot of the codethat other people claim to be @author of, and they no longer have anyidea what is going on. That's how it goes with projects that have been running for nearly seven years now. /Janne-- met vriendelijke groet, Harry Metske Telnr. +31-548-512395 Mobile +31-6-51898081-- met vriendelijke groet, Harry Metske Telnr. +31-548-512395 Mobile +31-6-51898081
Craig Russell Architect, Sun Java Enterprise System http://java.sun.com/products/jdo 408 276-5638 mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] P.S. A good JDO? O, Gasp!
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