Did I opened a Pull Request correctly?

[Yakov]

Hello,

couple days ago I opened a Pull Request [1]. Is it done correctly? Has the core team recieved some notification about it?

Also, I opened a thread [2] in the Dev group previously, but nobody among core devs commented it, so I'm still not sure if there's any opinion regarding whether this should go to the core or not. (in the request, there are some extra differences, see also the comment on the page) Any comments?

Best regards,

Yakov.

[1] https://github.com/TiddlyWiki/tiddlywiki/pull/112

[2] https://groups.google.com/forum/?hl=en.&fromgroups=#!topic/tiddlywikidev/yFNObuerUw8

[chris...@gmail.com]

On Tue, 11 Dec 2012, Yakov wrote:

> Also, I opened a thread [2] in the Dev group previously, but nobody among
> core devs commented it, so I'm still not sure if there's any opinion
> regarding whether this should go to the core or not. (in the request, there
> are some extra differences, see also the comment on the page) Any comments?

Out of curiosity could you enumerate who you think the core devs are?

--
Chris Dent http://burningchrome.com/
[...]

[Yakov]

Well, :)

in more narrow meaning, that's those who have the right to change the master branch, not sure if that's only Eric, or some other people too;

more generally, that's people who studied and contributed to the core, that's Jeremy, Colm, Martin, Jon, John Hind (that's people that I can enumerate looking at [1]), BidiX (although, he doesn't do much with js but rather with Java, as I understand), probably some others (not sure if you work on TiddlySpace only, or on TW core as well), including guys from Osmosoft. May be I missed someone, sorry. There are also some guys contributed a while ago, probably FND (Fred, right?) and others which are also remarkable, but I wouldn't expect comments from them :) (and by "core devs" I mean mostly people, engaged currently, more or less).

[1] https://github.com/TiddlyWiki/tiddlywiki/tree/master/js

вторник, 11 декабря 2012 г., 15:47:17 UTC+4 пользователь Chris Dent написал:

[chris...@gmail.com]

On Wed, 12 Dec 2012, Yakov wrote:

> Well, :)

Thanks, the reason I asked is because in these sorts of things
perception and reality are often quite different and often not what
one would expect (either way).

> in more narrow meaning, that's those who have the right to change the
> master branch, not sure if that's only Eric, or some other people too;

These days Eric is, indeed, the keeper of the master branch on
TiddlyWiki classic. As far as I know he is the only active committer.

Other people certainly have code in the core, and some probably have
the power to make commits on master, but I'm not sure who that is
these days.

Jeremy can probably commit on TiddlyWiki but is active on TiddlyWiki5.

I can't, and I'm focused on TiddlyWeb (and thus TiddlySpace as well).
I don't generally use TiddlyWiki.

The other people you mention may have at some point, but no longer do,
having moved on to other interests or responsibilities.

It's an interesting state of affairs and you might have seen me
posting my concerns about the state of the community here or in some
of the other tiddler-related groups. If the core pieces of a few
purportedly open source projects only get commits from one person
each, are they actually open source?

The answer must be "yes", there are plenty of open source projects that
are driven by one person that are visibly successful (mod_wsgi being
one such example).

And there is clearly a very sizable population of people developing
plugins in the tiddler universe, and providing bug reports and
otherwise engaging in a technical fashion.

However, can these projects be called robust or in "rude health"?

I think the answer is "no" and I'd like to figure out how to fix it. The
answer would become yes if some of the following happened:

* There were more core committers and/or more pull requests
* There were volunteer webmasters (to use an old and generally
horrible term) who maintained web presences (including things like
blogs) for the projects
* There were volunteer documentors who made and kept up to date
repositories of FAQs, Tutorials, Introductions and API documentation

For the record the projects I'm thinking of here are all four of:

* TiddlyWiki
* TiddlyWiki5
* TiddlyWeb
* TiddlySpace

The flip side of this is that the _products_ can be called robust and
in rude health. People are excited to see what will happen with
TiddlyWiki5 and use of the other three continues to move along very
nicely.

It's interesting to observe and consider.

[Yakov]

 

However, can these projects be called robust or in "rude health"?

I think the answer is "no" and I'd like to figure out how to fix it. The
answer would become yes if some of the following happened:

* There were more core committers and/or more pull requests
* There were volunteer webmasters (to use an old and generally
   horrible term) who maintained web presences (including things like
   blogs) for the projects
* There were volunteer documentors who made and kept up to date
   repositories of FAQs, Tutorials, Introductions and API documentation

For the record the projects I'm thinking of here are all four of:

* TiddlyWiki
* TiddlyWiki5
* TiddlyWeb
* TiddlySpace

The flip side of this is that the _products_ can be called robust and
in rude health. People are excited to see what will happen with
TiddlyWiki5 and use of the other three continues to move along very
nicely.
 

Well, I think that's right, the community needs docs, some sort of insiring/leading blogs and more active participants, but there's also a some specificity about the community and about the development which hinders that. TiddlyWiki is a very complex tool and it feels like without studying it deeply, one couldn't be able to write docs consistently (looks like all the doc projects either describe a little or do this with a bunch of tiddlers organized mostly by tags) or contribute considerably to the core (I look at this from a point of non-professional developer like myself -- for instance, I haven't sorted out how wikifier works yet which I need for at least one plugin). And among those who studied TiddlyWiki much enough (or TiddlyWeb, which seems to be even less likely) which is already not many people (I guess), most of the guys just don't have enough time to contribute constantly, as the do lots of intellectual work already (due to their cast of mind).

So we can wait for someone who finds enough room for writing consistent docs on the one hand; on the other hand, I can only speak for myself and I can say that writing consistent documentation requires of me at least established workflow and instruments for turning my notes into solid texts for public (ideally multilangual). I'm planning to do this anyway (create tools and publish smth via TW), but I'm afraid that I'll be ready only in about a year or 1,5. May be we need also another type of contributors, who, instead of knowing the core, can agitate people, may be announce some contests (of plugin development etc) or arrange meetings or write a blog, or even promote TW in some educational communities.(in this aspect Mans promote TW quite nicely, but to a younger generation). But I personally don't have much contacts in the IT world (and even don't know how this works in other communities), so I'd hardly suggest such a person.

Things are in the way they are. Let's keep working unless we achieve our breakthrough.

Yakov.