Re: Reporting bugs: there is nothing to gain in frustrating reporters

[Scott Robert Ladd <scott dot ladd at coyotegulch dot com>]

Daniel Berlin wrote:
> Maybe you should start naming names, so we can take stock of the
> problem.

Because of Acovea and my reviews of GCC (there are two more coming, one
in a print magazine), a lot of people write me privately. This happens
with commercial compilers as well... and combining those e-mails with
conversations in IRC and other mailing lists, I have ample evidence that
many people feel that the GCC developer community is not very welcoming.

Why do people write me? I've been doing compiler reviews, and working on
compilers (other than GCC), for more than 15 years. Perhaps people just
think they know me, and are more comfortable talking to a "person" who
has publicly expressed concerns similar to thiers.

I am not the only voice in these threads, though. Several people have
expressed feelings herein that are similar to mine.

> How do you  expect things to adapt and change if you won't give us
> examples?

We've made productive suggestions. People have cited specific examples.
For example,

1) Bugmasters could be less perfunctory and pejorative in their
comments. Examples have been given.

2) A mentoring system could help bring along new GCC developers. I'm not
talking about hand-holding, I'm suggesting that having some place for
people to ask a few questions, one on one, to get over certain
conceptual humps.

3) To keep Steven's bloodpressure down, I suggest a new mailing list,
gcc-design, where engineers like myself can propose designs and concepts
without upsetting those who find such discussions annoying.

As it is, I now have enough information to proceed with a couple of
patches related to these dicussions. We'll see how it goes.

..Scott