Policy for Abandoned Extensions - Mailing list pgsql-hackers

From David E. Wheeler
Subject Policy for Abandoned Extensions
Date
Msg-id 952AFDA4-7723-4E88-8263-D0E7792D462C@justatheory.com
Whole thread
Responses Re: Policy for Abandoned Extensions
Re: Policy for Abandoned Extensions
List pgsql-hackers
Hello Hackers,

A couple times in the last year, people have hit me up to ask about taking ownership of abandoned extensions on PGXN.
Inneither case was I able to track down the original owner, not for lack of trying. Then this past week I was alerted
topotential superuser escalations in two more abandoned extensions on PGXN. 

PGXN has no policy around this. In the first case I eventually transferred ownership after discussing it with other
developers.The second I added the inquiring developer as a co-owner, meaning the original owner could come back and
stillmanage it on PGXN, make releases, etc. But this isn’t great, IMO, and not scalable. 

So I think it may be time for a policy on this. What do you recommend? I have a few thoughts and options, some of which
wouldrequire additional work on PGXN at some point. 

* Set up a committee of some kind to investigate abandoned extensions and find vet and find replacement developers when
possible.

* Cease transferring extensions without permission from long-gone developers and instead suggest that people fork
extensionsand give them new names. 

* Add an annotation to apparently abandoned extensions and mark them as such on pgxn.org, along with relevant pointers
toreplacement extensions and contact information for the original developer to get in touch and reclaim access. Or
maybeit goes away if they create a new release. 

What do you think?

Best,

David


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