Tim,
After enthusiastically accepting Jimbo's offer to provide me with "developer access", I quickly soured on having any hands-on participation.
It was as I feared: no requirements documents, nothing about architecture or detailed design. The hardest-working, most universally respected developer(s) kept basically saying "just read the code".
So I've kept on the sidelines. I've been a cheerleader and catalyst (for speed tweaks) and for many months a sort of chief sysop (carrying out bans and promotions).
As for your request for suggestions, I think the best thing would be to adopt some sort of "best practices" methodology. I don't care if it's XP, CMM, or just a checklist of common- sence guidelines from Steve McConnell's "Rapid Development". Adopt some mutually agreeable (and useful!) guiding principles, and follow them: that's what I suggest.
Ed Poor Highly Paid Professional Software Engineer
Poor, Edmund W wrote:
Tim,
So I've kept on the sidelines. I've been a cheerleader and catalyst (for speed tweaks) and for many months a sort of chief sysop (carrying out bans and promotions).
"Senior" sysop sounds better. It avoids the possibly contentious implications of the word "chief". :-) We would hate to have people jump to conclusions.
Ec
From: Ray Saintonge Sent: Friday, October 31, 2003 2:56 PM To: Wikimedia developers Subject: Re: [Wikitech-l] Need developers
Poor, Edmund W wrote:
Tim,
So I've kept on the sidelines. I've been a cheerleader and catalyst (for speed tweaks) and for many months a sort of chief sysop (carrying out bans and promotions).
"Senior" sysop sounds better. It avoids the possibly contentious implications of the word "chief". :-) We would hate to have people jump to conclusions.
"Sysop with developer access" sounds better. Ed is neither chief nor senior.
On Friday, Oct 31, 2003, at 06:47 US/Pacific, Poor, Edmund W wrote:
It was as I feared: no requirements documents, nothing about architecture or detailed design. The hardest-working, most universally respected developer(s) kept basically saying "just read the code".
I hate to say it, Ed, but if nobody writes the documentation there isn't going to be any.
Complaining is great and all, and it sounds even better when the complaints are about real problems, but it doesn't get things done in a volunteer project.
If you feel documentation is what this project needs, and you want to help, then *write some*.
-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
Brion Vibber wrote:
On Friday, Oct 31, 2003, at 06:47 US/Pacific, Poor, Edmund W wrote:
It was as I feared: no requirements documents, nothing about architecture or detailed design. The hardest-working, most universally respected developer(s) kept basically saying "just read the code".
I hate to say it, Ed, but if nobody writes the documentation there isn't going to be any.
Complaining is great and all, and it sounds even better when the complaints are about real problems, but it doesn't get things done in a volunteer project.
If you feel documentation is what this project needs, and you want to help, then *write some*.
Sooo... suppose a random noob writes PHP Document Generator comments for all the code. Would it then be included?
BL
"Brion Vibber" brion@pobox.com wrote in message news:C48D19A6-0BDD-11D8-BCB7-000A95DAA284@pobox.com...
On Friday, Oct 31, 2003, at 06:47 US/Pacific, Poor, Edmund W wrote:
It was as I feared: no requirements documents, nothing about architecture or detailed design. The hardest-working, most universally respected developer(s) kept basically saying "just read the code".
I hate to say it, Ed, but if nobody writes the documentation there isn't going to be any.
Complaining is great and all, and it sounds even better when the complaints are about real problems, but it doesn't get things done in a volunteer project.
If you feel documentation is what this project needs, and you want to help, then *write some*.
The unfortunate thing about writing documentation is that it requires a high level of familiarity with the code. But anyone with familiarity is also highly in demand for the other necessary tasks. So writing documentation is a very expensive task. But judging by the opinions expressed in this thread, it may well be worth spending a significant amount of time on.
In the meantime, it would be nice if new code additions were more heavily commented.
-- Tim Starling.
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