Re: review process (was: C++ PATCH: Unify name lookup 2/n)

[Daniel Berlin <dberlin at dberlin dot org>]

On Sunday, March 30, 2003, at 11:14  PM, Fergus Henderson wrote:

> On 30-Mar-2003, Mark Mitchell <mark at codesourcery dot com> wrote:
> > Gabriel Dos Reis <gdr at integrable-solutions dot net>:
> > > However, a point remains: We need a better process than we currently 
> > > has.
> >
> > I'm not going to disagree; process can always be improved.
>
> Here are some possible suggestions (I'm just brain-storming here):
>
> 	- appoint more C++ maintainers (e.g. would it be appropriate
> 	  to make Gabriel Dos Reis a maintainer for the C++ front-end)?
>
> 	- define a new category of "self-approve" developers?
> 	  These developers would be permitted to approve their own patches
> 	  in particular areas.  This could be qualified further, e.g. by
> 	  requiring that the patch be reviewed by at least one
> 	  other person (though the other person need not be
> 	  an official maintainer), and/or that the patch not be
> 	  committed until a week after it had been posted to gcc-patches.

Um, i've got an extension of this idea.

If our problem is really in reviewing significant patches (ie i'm 
assuming we aren't dropping 3 line patches on the floor, and that 
people just approve these while reading through email regularly), we 
could track those that aren't approved in a day through bugzilla.

Among other things, you can have custom flags for products, and one of 
the neat things is that you can request *others* set flags (though you 
can say that any of a group can actually set it).

IE we can have an approved? flag, and request that the maintainer in 
question set it.
 (like in this case, an approved? flag).

The maintainers can see what is being requested of them at a glance 
with "My requests" link at the bottom of all pages, and it gives them 
an easy way to manage requests without having to sift through tons of 
email.

I can even work up some code so that requests approved this way get an 
email generated to gcc-patches stating that the patch was approved.

--Dan