Re: New maintainer

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: John Wiegley <address@hidden>
> Date: Sat, 03 Oct 2015 12:19:57 -0700
> 
> >>>>> Eli Zaretskii <address@hidden> writes:
> 
> > How would such an arrangement differ from having just that head as a single
> > maintainer? What can the co-maintainer do that the rest of us cannot?
> 
> The co-maintainer is usually given full maintainership over pieces of the
> puzzle he (or she) has expertise with, until such time that the head
> maintainer feels a unified direction is no longer being pursued.

That's the situation with every non-maintainer here: they are free to
do whatever they feel like in the areas they are interested in, with
the head maintainer keeping an eye on their commits and asking them to
make changes where he/she doesn't like the results.

I don't see how what you describe is any different.

> If there is commonality of thought between them, they typically act
> in concert and most people wouldn't realize that one of them has
> final decision.

Of course, they will realize: if nothing else, that fact is announced
up front.  And even if someone misses that announcement, it becomes
crystal clear very soon.

Anyway, if there are never any differences of opinions (and I think
it's naïve to expect that), then you have in effect a single person,
not 2 or 3.  In which case there's no real meaning to being the head,
is there?

> Ensuring that one person sets the tone and vision for progress ensures that
> things are never paralyzed by in-fighting or disagreement. If the
> co-maintainer has issues with the maintainer, he resigns; if the maintainer
> has issues with the co-maintainer, he asks him to step down.

I don't think this could ever work well in a project such as Emacs.
How can the head set the tone and vision, when he/she is not expert
enough in at least a few of the core areas?  If you want to set the
tone and vision in the development of the area of my expertise --
let's take the support for bidirectional editing as a good example --
don't you need me to first teach you enough about that, so you could
make up your own mind, instead of just trusting me?  And if you are
afraid of "issues" between us (i.e. you don't really trust me 100%),
why would you believe that I'll make an unbiased presentation of what
you need to learn, rather than bias it a bit to ensure that you agree
with me?

I think this method will encourage in-fighting and "bad blood", not
play them down.