On Tue, Apr 20, 2010 at 01:06:32PM +0100, Peter Kay (Syllopsium) wrote: >> From: "J.C. Roberts" <list-...@designtools.org> >> The developers *CONSTANTLY* *ASK* *FOR* *YOUR* *HELP* with testing, but >> this "dull and heavy" work is somehow below most people who just talk >> about wanting to become developers and are looking for shortcuts to >> becoming one. >> >> Since validity is critical, if you cannot test properly and hopefully >> help in the debugging, then you'll never be any good at writing code. > You're not wrong, but that's a rather black and white way of looking at the > world.
It's called experience in the open source community. > When someone starts a new activity - whether that's coding for OpenBSD, > baking cakes or similar, it's usually necessary to have a visible 'quick > win' or > at least sign of progress that encourages the person to carry on and try a > little harder. Decoding the human genome wasn't easy yet they embarked on it. LHC, anyone? > Testing does not usually fit into that category - it is indeed 'dull and > heavy' > and usually something people expect to be paid for. Oh and coding is free? this is *exactly* how the community can help but apparently they need to be paid for it. > I understand and mostly agree with the viewpoint that the best way is to > download code, decide on what needs fixing and keep plugging at it > until success is achieved. > > That's also fine if the OpenBSD community wants to perpetuate the type > of people that code for it and the size of the community. Open source development requires a certain level of self-starting ability. It also requires a lot of up front time learning and understanding things such as computer hardware, programming, the interaction between those two etc. These are non-trivial skills. Not everybody will be a great programmer. > If (and it is an if) the OpenBSD community wants more resource - both > coding and testing, there probably needs to be a degree more flexibility. The code lives in CVS, people reply to email with patches and test data. What more flexibility do you need? > Or, in short, we need to not deter people straight away, and accept that > perhaps sometimes decent programmers start from ones that make lots > of mistakes. That means they are not ready yet for OS development and should spend more time on their own learning some more. > Perhaps a ports TODO similar to the NetBSD ports TODO might help; it > doesn't require quite the same level of kernel or userspace hacking and > provides very visible feedback and thanks once completed. Or perhaps it wouldn't. > Neither would I completely rule out a central TODO list linked off > OpenBSD.org. Sure, it might well be ignored, but the possibility remains > that someone might take up the task. NetBSD isn't doing too badly with > Google's Summer of Code initiatives, either. I have to see the day that anything useful comes out of the GSC. Why waste time on writing a todo list that will be ignored? You see this is all work on the guy/gal that is already doing the work for free! > It might not even be a bad idea to puff up new developers a bit : > 'new developer Fred Bloggs decided to solve PR7738 squashing an > annoying bug in the ipz(4) driver. John Smith is very grateful for this > as it enabled him to use his new ServBladePro NZ20 server' Again, more work for the people that are doing all the work. Part of being a developer is developing a thick skin to put up with a community that wants everything for free without contributing any work. I have seen plenty of people come and go because they don't want to put up with it and they were perfectly capable of finding work on their own. > With specific reference to the ISA 486, if there are specific test cases > that > can be run without taking up hours of interactive time, I have a suitable > VLB/ISA 486 that could run them. It's not something I'm interested in > using on a regular basis though - I've got other machines that > are far easier to work with. > > PK
