Re: [Savannah-users] what are the usefulness criteria for submitted code?

[john smith]

> Answer is : no to all. Having only 2 projets hosteds for approximately 10
years.

Great, so we can actually discuss my code without me suspecting a conflict
of interest.

> You should split your project by tasks, <snip>

By making this suggestion you indicate you would like to contribute some
ideas to my project, and I really appreciate it. But I must ask you to move
this topic into a private channel; best of all, email me:
address@hidden (john smith is merely a workaround for a spam asassin
somewhere). Not only the in-depth discussion of my code is completely out
of place in this forum, but I am also afraid that it would distract us from
discussing pretty much the only question I posed to the Savannah project
team, and which went completely unanswered so far.

I want to take this opportunity to clarify one more time that the purpose
of this inquiry is *not* to get my project accepted, even thought accepting
it would change the course of this discussion. The purpose of my questions
to this forum is to get some statements about the apparent Savannah project
policy whereas submissions are judged and not accepted/rejected by
individual members of the Savannah team based solely on their personal and
subjective opinions. My submission is merely an example of such a thing
going on, and that is a fact we can all verify. Nothing people said about
my code so far has been at all relevant to the questions I am asking or the
claims I am making.

In particular, I am not claiming that the Savannah project should accept my
submission; I am not even claiming that the Savannah project must stick to
objective criteria for rejecting submissions. All of this is entirely
within the purview of the Savannah project, and I am definitely not a part
of it in any way. All I want is a policy statement about applying
subjective tests to submissions, or at least some opinions from the members
of the Savannah other than my reviewer. To this I believe I am entitled as
an FSF member, since we are endorsing the Savannah project as a "hosting
service". Being a hosting service, I presumed, should automatically exclude
any attempts from the Savannah team to assume creative control over
submissions: either tacitly, by refusing to accept them without reason, or
explicitly, as is the case with my submission.

Finally, I want to ask you, Tom, a question which I believe will elucidate
the issue. What would you personally do given the following hypothetical
scenario:

Tomorrow you wake up to find one of your own Savannah-hosted projects
suspended/removed. Upon inquiring why, you get the following reply from a
single Savannah project member:

"This project does not seem to be generally useful. This is my personal
subjective opinion, and it does not coincide with yours."

What's your next move?

And here's another hypothetical scenario, starts the same way, and the
message you get is:

"The formatting of the non-functional whitespace indentation in your code
is too ugly. You could fix it, for example, by making sure that the
indentation levels are uniform throughout: 2 spaces for the first level, 4
for the second, and so on."

What's your next move?

Before you point out that your code is too obviously pretty and useful
compared to mine for it to be blacklisted, I want to stress that it's most
definitely not in the court of subjective personal opinions.

On Wed, Mar 1, 2017 at 4:32 PM, Thomas Harding <address@hidden>
wrote:

> Answer is : no to all. Having only 2 projets hosteds for approximately 10
> years.
>
> In fact, they are parts done as personal job for an hardware database I
> written, wich fitted the needs at work and has been superseded 7 or 8 years
> later. I would never upload it to Savannah.
>
> The other one is PHP::PRINT::IPP. I primarily hosted it on "PHP classes",
> but didn't one the "need to register" process and was unsure at time of any
> other repository (who owns ?). Also PHP was trend-setting web programming
> and frameworks not yet. It has been forked by unknowns on some code
> repositories in order to be integrated in some frameworks, but no one wants
> to do the job :-/
>
> Ecosystem is full of "Personal job", and sysadmin scripting is PJ by
> destination. You will most likely face maintainance alone, with too few bug
> reports from rare users.
>
> Le 1 mars 2017 18:49:48 GMT+01:00, john smith <address@hidden>
> a écrit :
> >Dear Thomas Harding,
> >
> >I would like to address your concerns, but in order to give a
> >meaningful
> >reply I first need you to clarify one thing for me:
> >
> >Are you a mere *user* of the Savannah hosting, using it as a platform
> >to
> >share your own projects, such as "PHP code128 barcode", or are you a
> >contributor to the Savannah project proper?  In other words, are you
> >affiliated with the Savannah project? Yet another way to answer my
> >question
> >is to see if you can answer "yes" to any of the following:
> >
> >Do you have access to the Savannah project infrastructure which is
> >above
> >that of a mere user? Are you responsible for any part of day-to-day
> >operations of the Savannah hosting service? Are you responsible for any
> >part of the code review process, which results in decisions to
> >accept/reject/suspend/revoke hosted projects? Are you responsible for
> >the
> >design and implementation of Savannah project policies, or the overall
> >vision for the Savannah project?
> >
> >On Wed, Mar 1, 2017 at 6:10 AM, Thomas Harding
> ><address@hidden>
> >wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> You should split your project by tasks, as most likely no one would
> >> /another/ bunch script set especially for sysadmin task.
> >>
> >> And wonder for each one if it is /generally/ useful, flexibile
> >enough, etc.
> >>
> >> If you look at any administrative interface, she most likely rely on
> >one
> >> distribution and depends on a programs/versions set. It have to be
> >> integrated.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Le 1 mars 2017 02:57:03 GMT+01:00, john smith
> ><address@hidden>
> >> a écrit :
> >> >Dear Savannah hackers,
> >> >
> >> >My name is Ivan Zaigralin, and my email is address@hidden I
> >am
> >> >using this gmail
> >> >account because messages sent to this list from my own domain seem
> >to
> >> >disappear into
> >> >a black hole.
> >> >
> >> >I am currently in the process of submitting a project to the non-GNU
> >> >part
> >> >of Savannah. I seem
> >> >to have hit an unexpected barrier: unexpected to me, but may be
> >that's
> >> >just
> >> >because my
> >> >expectations were out of line with reality, so I hope you can help
> >me
> >> >to
> >> >resolve this issue.
> >> >
> >> >What I submitted was ~ 120 KiB of bash code + licensing information.
> >To
> >> >my
> >> >surprise, my
> >> >submission is not being accepted, and the reasons stated I will
> >simply
> >> >quote:
> >> >
> >> >"These are person-specific scripts"
> >> >
> >> >"It doesn't seem to me that they could be generally useful."
> >> >
> >> >"Yes, this is my opinion that doesn't coincide with yours."
> >> >
> >> >"All this makes sense for personal scripts, but not for general use.
> >> >They
> >> >are just not written with
> >> >such use in mind."
> >> >
> >> >"I don't think there are real objective criteria for things like
> >e.g.
> >> >simplistic package. We have to
> >> >use our judgement."
> >> >
> >> >I want to draw your attention specifically to the fact that the
> >> >reviewer is
> >> >using nothing but his
> >> >subjective judgment in order to decide whether my submission is
> >> >"generally
> >> >useful". I also want
> >> >to make it absolutely clear, I have no complaints about this
> >particular
> >> >reviewer, and nothing in
> >> >this post should be interpreted as a criticism of that person or any
> >of
> >> >his
> >> >actions so far.
> >> >
> >> >The reason I find this surprising is this: FSF endorses Savannah as
> >a
> >> >"hosting service":
> >> >
> >> >"There are many services that will host your project's source code"
> >> >
> >> >"Savannah is a community project, providing code hosting for your
> >free
> >> >software project"
> >> >
> >> >This endorsement is explicit in claiming that Savannah will host
> >*my*
> >> >project, which I
> >> >understand as me preserving the creative control over the code I
> >> >submit.
> >> >
> >> >To contrast, the GNU project does and should make subjective calls
> >as
> >> >to
> >> >what constitutes
> >> >useful GNU software, just as the KDE project members make subjective
> >> >calls
> >> >as to what
> >> >constitutes contributions useful to KDE. This makes sense because
> >these
> >> >are
> >> >software
> >> >projects, and when I submit code to them from the outside, it is
> >> >implied
> >> >that they have the
> >> >creative control (or at least a greater share of it), and will make
> >> >subjective calls in line with their
> >> >unique and subjective vision of what their project should be and how
> >it
> >> >should get there. Most
> >> >such projects also have very detailed descriptions of their
> >subjective
> >> >visions; for example, KDE
> >> >is defined as "advanced graphical desktop, a wide variety of
> >> >applications
> >> >for communication,
> >> >work, education and entertainment and a platform to easily build new
> >> >applications upon", and
> >> >much much much more, which really narrows down the scope of the
> >> >project,
> >> >and makes it
> >> >perfectly clear that only the code implementing that vision will be
> >> >accepted. There is also
> >> >absolutely no surprise when senior members of the KDE team, who
> >share
> >> >the
> >> >creative control
> >> >over their project, reject code based on their personal and
> >subjective
> >> >notions of quality and/or
> >> >usability.
> >> >
> >> >So I was taken aback, to be frank, when I was told by the reviewer
> >that
> >> >my
> >> >project is not
> >> >accepted based on nothing but personal and subjective criteria
> >having
> >> >to do
> >> >with general
> >> >usefulness. After a lengthy inquiry, I still cannot locate any
> >official
> >> >Savannah description of any
> >> >usefulness tests applied to submissions. I was fully expecting
> >> >objective
> >> >criteria (besides
> >> >licensing), such minimal & maximal size in bytes, but I cannot find
> >any
> >> >listed anywhere.
> >> >Indeed, I cannot even find any official subjective criteria, which
> >> >would
> >> >make sense if Savannah
> >> >was in fact a software project. So it looks to me like my submission
> >is
> >> >being held up based on
> >> >a personal subjective usefulness test which was applied to my
> >project
> >> >only,
> >> >effectively singling
> >> >it out. So with the information I have now, the only way to
> >interpret
> >> >what
> >> >is happening is that
> >> >Savannah is de facto a software project, whereas Savannah hackers
> >> >assume a
> >> >share of creative control right from the start, from the moment of
> >> >submission.
> >> >
> >> >Just like any community project, Savannah is fully entitled to make
> >the
> >> >rules, but as an FSF
> >> >member I see an issue with endorsing Savannah as a "hosting
> >service",
> >> >unless it actually is a
> >> >hosting service in a manner I described above, which brings me to my
> >> >questions for the
> >> >Savannah community:
> >> >
> >> >Does or does not the Savannah project demand, allow, or abide by
> >> >filtering/censoring/rejecting
> >> >projects based solely on subjective opinions of its members
> >(Savannah
> >> >hackers)? If yes, what
> >> >is the goal for such practice? If no, does the Savannah project
> >> >expressly
> >> >forbid such practices
> >> >internally?
> >> >
> >> >Thanks for your time :)
> >> >
> >> >References:
> >> >
> >> >FSF endorsement: https://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/savannah
> >> >My Savannah submission: https://savannah.gnu.org/task/?14370
> >>
> >> --
> >> Envoyé de mon appareil Android avec K-9 Mail. Veuillez excuser ma
> >brièveté.
> >>
>
> --
> Envoyé de mon appareil Android avec K-9 Mail. Veuillez excuser ma brièveté.
>