Too much bureaucracy or not enough interest? (Re: [ACTION REQUIRED] Retiring packages for F-17)

[Michael Schwendt]

On Sun, 15 Jan 2012 20:37:16 +0100, MV (Mattia) wrote:

> I'm just entered the world of Fedora packagers and I see a few points 
> that can be optimized in my opinion.
> 
> 1. I saw a package that need to be upgraded. I opened a bug in bugzilla, 
> after some time whit no response from the maintainer I asked in pkgdb 
> permissions for that package: I'm still waiting, after two weeks, that 
> the maintainer gives me such permissions.

That package is "skychart" according to the bugzilla searching I've done.

The bugzilla ticket ( http://bugzilla.redhat.com/769454 ) raises a couple
of questions. It could be that the assignee is confused so far (and the
ticket has been opened on Dec 20th, btw).

You wrote:

  | I'm not a packager, but I would like to became a co-maintainer.

This could be confusing enough for the assignee to wait with approving your
commit access request in pkgdb. Have you talked to him privately before,
also about your pkgdb requests? Sometimes, pkgdb mails get filtered into
special folders by users.

An upgrade request in bugzilla with an immediate request to become a
co-maintainer could be understood as some form of assault. I mean, not
only would you (and the current co-maintainer) need to agree on the
packaging anyway, you would also need to agree on how to team up in
general (e.g. with regard to monitoring upstream commits and evaluating
a new release). You've not commented on any changes in the new release.

  | I need a review of this package and a sponsorship, if possible.

This is another confusing point. At least, I don't understand it yet
either. The "skychart" packager cannot sponsor you if he's not a sponsor.
He could apply forwarded spec changes, however. Submitting them as a
unified diff (against current git, for example) could save some time.
On the other hand, pkgdb lists two packages for your account, ... but
as I said, this is confusing.

> So why I can take an orphaned 
> package with automatic procedure and I cannot apply as co-maintainer in 
> the same manner?

An orphaned package would be unmaintained, that is "first come first
served" for whoever is fastest to take it again.

For packages with existing maintainers, you are supposed to talk to them
about becoming a co-maintainer. Sometimes it just needs a private mail
(and for others, IRC is even faster) to point them at pkgdb requests.

> 2. In review requests I see some of them are requests for existent 
> packages that should be renamed. Why bothering reviewers (that are not 
> so much, I think, looking at the long list of reviews pending) with this 
> extra-work only to rename an existing package?

Well, this is some form of unneeded bureaucracy. The

  http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Package_Renaming_Process
 
page is brief. It mentions "proper Obsoletes and Provides", however,
which might be a primary reason for expecting packagers to follow
this process.