Re: next CommitFest - Mailing list pgsql-hackers

On Thu, Nov 12, 2009 at 11:50 PM, Bruce Momjian <bruce@momjian.us> wrote:
> Robert Haas wrote:
>> >> We just wouldn't assign round-robin reviewers to such patches. ?If
>> >> someone wants to volunteer, more power to them, but we would encourage
>> >> people to focus their efforts on the patches of people who were
>> >> themselves reviewing. ?It's important to keep in mind that "valid" is
>> >> not a boolean. ?Some patches are perfect the day they roll in, but not
>> >> too many. ?It takes work to get them committable, and I don't see why
>> >> anyone should have an expectation that they can have that help for
>> >> themselves without doing the same thing for other people.
>> >
>> > OK, but the problem I see there is that the reviewers are there to
>> > assist the committers; ?if no one reviews something, it just makes more
>> > work for the committers.
>>
>> That wasn't my intention.  I really was assuming that we would just
>> let those patches drop on the floor, and that they would not be picked
>> up either by reviewers or committers.  I don't think this would cause
>> as many problems in practice as perhaps you fear, because I think it
>> will just motivate people to act as reviewers.  Writing a patch is
>> typically more time-consuming than reviewing one, at least IME, with
>> some exceptions of course.  I wouldn't spend 20 hours writing a patch
>> and then let it fall out because I wasn't willing to spend 2 or 3
>> hours reviewing someone else's patch, and I don't think other regular
>> contributors will either.
>
> OK, but that is certainly a different system than we have now.  In your
> system, committers would be told to ignore patches that were submitted
> by repeated patch submitters who never review, or even we just never put
> on the commit fest page.

I think they would probably get added to the CommitFest page and then
marked Rejected with a suitable explanation.

> I am just trying to nail down exactly how that would work --- that's a
> pretty Draconian system.

I don't really agree, but obviously I respect your opinion, and
clearly, this is not a policy that can be implemented without some
degree of consensus.  I fear, however, that if we don't motivate
regular contributors to also review, then we will have a shortage of
reviewers, especially highly-qualified reviewers.  If there is no
stigma attached to submitting patches and never volunteering to
review, then even people who have reviewed in the past may eventually
decide it isn't worth the effort.  I am personally quite tired of
reviewing patches for people who don't in turn review mine (or
someone's).  It makes me feel like not working on this project.  If we
can solve that problem without implementing a policy of this type,
that is good.  I would much prefer to run by the honor system rather
than having to threaten to drop patches, but only if the honor system
actually works.

...Robert