Git Migration Needs YOU!

[Aaron J. Seigo]

On March 2, 2010, Tom Albers wrote:
> Op Tuesday 2 March 2010 16:37 schreef u:
> > while there are certainly those who
> > aren't in favor of a move to git, it's pretty clear there is a good
> > amount of consensus on the matter.
> 
> Really? Does that also include translators?

yes. i have spoken with various leading members of the i18n team a while ago 
about this (more than a month, perhaps even late last year?) and i know that 
the amarok transition even before that straightened out l10n related workflow 
issues.

> I know they will be using svn,
> but as time moves on, sooner or later they will have to move too. And then

there is nothing that says they have to move. i think we owe it to the 
translators to allow them to work on their own terms. we really lose nothing 
if the l10n effort continues using svn indefinitely. or am i missing 
something?

> > this was discuss at Akademy in the past as well.
> 
> After Akademy I poked around and everyone assured me there was no decision
> taken yet. I'm surprised you refer to that event now.

i don't think the decision happened at Akademy, though it should have. i don't 
want to discuss the "should haves" of the last Akademy, though. reality is 
that it has been discussed and discussed and developers are voting with their 
feet. they have been for over a year now, in fact, if we care to simply watch 
what people are using.

for complete transparency: personally, i'm all for a move to git, but i'm also 
happy living with svn. both have their frustrations for me and i value inertia 
;) still, the community is moving whether we personally like it or not and in 
the name of keeping our community together we owe it to each other to not 
pretend that we're sticking with svn.

> > as is the part
> > about how we will split up the main modules (we won't). we're at the
> > point that we need to simply recognize that there's commitment to this
> > and then help each other do it Right(tm).
> 
> This all smells a lot like the cvs->svn change. All kinds of promises
> (cheap branching, we *need* that, right...), while in practice we might
> have well skipped svn.

impossible; there was nothing remotely mature enough yet when we moved to svn. 
and yes, svn brought a LOT of benefit over cvs, if only for proper moves which 
our workflows have come to be built on.

> I suggest we skip git and jump on the next
> generation revision control system.

hehe.. there isn't one that we know of. i do think you have a good point here, 
however: we need to commit in our minds and hearts to sticking with git for a 
LONG time. e.g. this should be considered, quite seriously, as our "last" rcs.

> In all this discussions, my biggest problem is the complete focus on the
> technical issues and the complete lack of solutions for the impact of the
> community it will have.

i agree; with your (and other's) help we can ensure these issues are 
highlighted and brought into focus, however. i can't do it on my own, and 
probably you can't either. together, we can.

i think we need to accept some axioms here as starting points: we are moving 
to git, the modules are not being broken up, we need to have an actual 
schedule to follow, we need documentation to allow a soft landing for all our 
developers, we need to make the move together in a coordinated fashion.

from there we need to answer the "hows" as well as know the "whys". and the 
community aspects are very important. with documentation and getting 'all' 
parts of our community actively communicating their needs within the above 
axioms (e.g. witness how the kdepim people are adding to the conversation) we 
can do this well.

> But I've played this record before a couple of times, so I'll stop now.

well, perhaps let's try playing it on a different record player. it's really 
frustrating for me as well because the LAST thing i wanted to do was to have 
anything to do with the git migration. i have more on my plate than i care to 
have already. i have projects that are going neglected. i know i'm not unique 
in that, too. but i currently feel that unless i help us all step up and DO 
things as opposed to TALK about them, it will all just slip into the ditch and 
we'll have a really "funny" failure on our hands.

it's not hard to start pages on techbase.
it's not hard to tell others "i don't understand, please tell me more of what 
you know until i do".
it's not hard to step up and say, "we need a schedule, let's gather the 
information we need for that now."

there are a lot of "it's not hard"s here. from talking with the l10n people to 
getting the gitorious.org negotiations finished (one way or another) ... so 
let's get to them.

if instead of stopping your record playing you can do just one small "not 
hard" item in a way that makes this meet your needs better, you will have 
helped us all out more than we might be able to imagine :)

-- 
Aaron J. Seigo
humru othro a kohnu se
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KDE core developer sponsored by Qt Development Frameworks