On Fri, Dec 11, 2009 at 5:02 AM, Jake Mannix <[email protected]> wrote: > I really feel like I should respond to this, but seeing as I live on the > west coast > of the US, going to bed might be more advisable. > > On a very specific topic of SVMs, I can certainly look into this, but David, > were you interested in helping bring this into Mahout and help maintain it? > You are often rather quiet on here, yet happened to jump in as this topic > came up?
Yeah, the first semester of the PhD program has been far more busy than I imagined, and I've been overwhelmed. (Now it's finals week.) Online optimization has kind of caught my eye of late, with Pegasos being something I had been thinking about implementing. I would be glad to get this up and running, though I'd like more to help curate a patch. Pegasos or no. -- David > > -jake > > On Fri, Dec 11, 2009 at 4:40 AM, Sean Owen <[email protected]> wrote: > >> This is a timely message, since I'm currently presuming to close some >> old Mahout issues at the moment and it raises a related concern. >> >> There's lots of old JIRA issues of the form: >> 1) somebody submits a patch implementing part of something >> 2) some comments happen, maybe >> 3) nothing happens for a year >> 4) I close it now >> >> At an early stage, this is fine actually. 20 people contribute at the >> start; 3 select themselves naturally as regular contributors. 20 >> patches go up; the 5 that are of use an interest naturally get picked >> up and eventually committed. But going forward, this probably won't >> do. Potential committers get discouraged and work goes wasted. (See >> comments about Commons Math on this list for an example of the >> fallout.) >> >> I wonder what the obstacles are to avoiding this? >> >> 1) Do we need to be clearer about what the project is and isn't about? >> What the priorities are, what work is already on the table to be done? >> This is why I am keen on cleaning up JIRA now; it's hard for even us >> to understand what's in progress, what's important, >> >> 2) Do we need some more official ownership or responsibility for >> components? For example I am not sure who would manage changes to >> Clustering stuff. I know it isn't me; I don't know about that part. So >> what happens to an incoming patch to clustering? While too much >> command-and-control isn't possible or desirable in open source, lack >> of it is harmful too. I don't think the answer is "just let people >> commit bits and bobs" since it makes the project appear to be a >> workbench of half-finished jobs, which does a disservice to the >> components that are polished. >> >> >> I have no reason to believe this SVM patch, should it materialize, >> would fall through the cracks in this way, but want to ask now how we >> can just make sure. So, can we answer: >> >> 1) Is SVM in scope for Mahout? (I am guessing so.) >> 2) Who is nominally committing to shepherd the code into the code base >> and fix bugs and answer questions? (Jake?) >> >> >> I'm not really bothered about this particular patch, but the more >> general question. >> >
