Submissions to guix-patches keep increasing, but the rate at which they’re closed doesn’t quite keep up:
https://debbugs.gnu.org/rrd/guix-patches.html (see “All bugs ever opened”)
How do #FreeSoftware projects encourage committers to review? Any insight to share?
#Guix thread: https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guix-devel/2021-10/msg00114.html
(HT to zimoun)
@civodul The only direct help I know is to delegate to the CI as much as possible.
Having some feeling of friendship or kinship helps. It’s not just a common goal, it’s a group of people who like each other and feel that the review helps the others, too.
Other than that, and rather experimental: Aligning messaging to the core drivers of as many people as possible: https://www.1w6.org/english/tables#org4edffdc
If you feel that reviewing supports something that gives you strength, that helps to become stronger.
@civodul One thing I also see is that it helps to have a web-based tool to flag something as ready to merge. That’s what I actually use on GitHub when I have a few minutes to review something: Read the diff, add tag ReadyForMerge.
@civodul That can especially help for small patches like this openjdk patch: https://issues.guix.gnu.org/51443 / https://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=51443
What I’m missing here:
- CI information (do all packages still build? Is the coding style OK? — that could already be automatic feedback by email)
- if with patch: latest diff
- link to the issues-link in the acknowledgement email (the one to debbugs is in there) to make it easier to ask a friend for review
- button to mark a patch as ready for merge (with login).
