Re: Commitfest problems - Mailing list pgsql-hackers

On 12/18/2014 04:53 AM, Torsten Zuehlsdorff wrote:

>> Having your name in a list of other names at the bottom of the release
>> notes page, without any indication of what you helped with, would work
>> better?  Perhaps it would but I tend to doubt it.
>
> Out of my personal experience in Germany: yes, it helps. It is not very
> logical, but many people need a "simple way" (Website against git log)
> to "see" something.
>
> (I've rarely seen that something like that is considered not trustable
> even if there are strong indications that its faked.)
>
> But i think it is a good point that the release notes should not become
> to big.

I think a lot of hackers forget exactly how tender their egos are. Now I 
say this knowing that a lot of them will go, "Oh give me a break" but as 
someone who employs hackers, deals with open source AND normal people :P 
every single day, I can tell you without a single inch of sarcasm that 
petting egos is one of the ways you get things done in the open source 
(and really any male dominated) community.

The problem is, most of our long term contributers don't need to be 
petted quite so often because they have a long list of: I don't need my 
ego stroked, do you see the length or value of the contributions I 
provide? And simply, there are some that just don't care.

However, doing crappy work and let's not be shy about it, there is 
NOTHING fun about reviewing someone else's code needs to have incentive. 
Just like when we were kids, we were much more likely to rake the leaves 
with at least a half smile if we got that extra 10 bucks or if we were 
able to go to that party on Friday.

Finding a way to provide incentive and credit (and they may be the same) 
will increase the value of the non-self value work of reviewing patches. 
In the the Pg world, the most obvious way is to have attribution in a 
public space.

Perhaps an email that goes out to -announce (and planet) for each 
release that is a thank you to contributors? That way we don't touch the 
release notes at all.

Sincerely,

Joshua D. Drake



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