Proposal: Marking "Work In Progress" explicitly

[Leo Franchi]

On Thu, Feb 11, 2010 at 9:30 AM, Bart Cerneels <bart.cerneels at kde.org> wrote:
> On Thu, Feb 11, 2010 at 15:16, Mark Kretschmann <kretschmann at kde.org> wrote:
>> On Thu, Feb 11, 2010 at 2:51 PM, Ian Monroe <ian.monroe at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> On Thu, Feb 11, 2010 at 7:06 AM, Mark Kretschmann <kretschmann at kde.org> wrote:
>>>> lately it has happened that in some cases people had accidentally
>>>> removed code that others were working on, not with any evil intent,
>>>> but just because of a misunderstanding. I think that's mostly just a
>>>> matter of communication. Here's one simple idea for solving this:
>>>>
>>>> If we create classes/methods that are work in progress, how about
>>>> marking them with a comment like this:
>>>>
>>>> /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
>>>> // THIS CLASS IS WORK IN PROGRESS. Please do not touch for now.
>>>> /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
>>>>
>>>> I think that this simple method might solve such issues easily and
>>>> without much hassle.
>>>
>>> I just worry about these comments staying there forever.
>>>
>>> Just check the git log to see if a file is being messed with at the moment.
>>
>> The "git log" proposal is not enough. I'm referring to a mishap that
>> happened last night, but it's no use pointing fingers at anyone. Was
>> just a misunderstanding.
>>
>> Anyway, if people are so forgetful that they would forget about
>> removing this header, would they also forget about getting dressed in
>> the morning?
>>
>>
>> If someone is _that_ forgetful, all sorts of things could happen. Such
>> people probably shouldn't touch any code at all ;)
>>
>> --
>> Mark Kretschmann
>> Amarok Developer, Software Engineer at Collabora Ltd
>> Fellow of the Free Software Foundation Europe
>> http://amarok.kde.org - http://www.fsfe.org - http://collabora.co.uk
>> _______________________________________________
>> Amarok-devel mailing list
>> Amarok-devel at kde.org
>> https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/amarok-devel
>>
>
> It's still better to ask if it was not already clear from general
> communication that the feature is abandoned. It can also serve as a
> reminder to the lazy forgetful developer to complete it.
>
> And if you end up removing a feature while refactoring, at least make
> the remove one, simple to revert commit.

FWIW If I were in the developer's position, I would have done the same
thing. Sure, I have heard whispers that you are working on playlist
related stuff. But the fact that you have mentioned in the past that
you are working on one of the massive pieces of amarok is *not* the
same as me knowing that you want people to not touch code in there.

Reverting is cheap. Discussions after the fact are easy. Knowing
beforehand what another developer wants you to do is not. So, we can
just deal with the issue afterwards in a calm and straightforward
manner, rather than complaining that "people touch code they shouldn't
without talking to people they should have known to talk to." We're
all adults here, and should be able to manage a civilized discussion
about what caused problems for whom.

leo

-- 
_____________________________________________________________________
leonardo.franchi at tufts.edu         Tufts  University 2010
leo at kdab.com                                 KDAB (USA), LLC
lfranchi at kde.org                             The KDE Project