Hi Christoph, Quoting Christoph J. Scherr (2025-01-24 12:13:16) > On Fri, 2025-01-24 at 11:07 +0100, Jonas Smedegaard wrote: > > Quoting Otto Kekäläinen (2025-01-24 01:32:34) > > > If you don't like using Salsa or don't like reviewing Merge Requests, > > > then this call is probably not for you. However, if you want Debian to > > > grow and you want to welcome new contributors, or in general work in a > > > collaborative way towards ending single-maintainer packages, reviewing > > > MRs posted by others a great way to help out. > > > > That reads very strange to me: > > > > * If I want Debian to grow, then I want Salsa code reviews. > > * If I want to welcome new contributors, then I want Salsa code reviews. > > * If I want to work collaboratively, then I want Salsa code reviews. > > > > Conclusion: I must drink the Salsa cool-aid, or I am effectively caring > > about neither the project, my peers nor about collaboration. Not fully > > embracing Salsa makes me a selfish and conservative person. > > > > Please explain to me how I am failing to read correctly what you meant > > by that last paragraph I cite above, Otto, because I cannot believe that > > you are really arguing the above - I must be mistaken. > > > > Please help me assume good faith. > > > > - Jonas > > > > Hello, > > As someone just starting out with Debian, I'd like to share my perspective on > this discussion. > > I only recently contacted the welcome team and have been following the mailing > lists while waiting for my salsa account approval. From what I've seen so far, > Debian's development process can be quite challenging to understand as a > newcomer. > > In my opinion, having a more intuitive web interface through a code forge like > GitLab would lower the barrier to entry for potential contributors. I believe > that normalizing merge requests would particularly benefit contributors from > younger generations, who are more familiar with these modern development > workflows. Exploring the BTS is, for me at least, more confusing for me than > exploring a git repository with issues and merge requests on salsa. > > This is my first email to the lists. I hope these thoughts are relevant and > helpful to the discussion.
Welcome! You certainly make a relevant point, and I believe that I understand how that point is central for this discussion. What troubles me, however, is if that is the only point deemed central to this discussion. Yes, it is easier to use tooling that we are used to. Yes, it helps collaboration around our preferred tooling if user interfaces are as user friendly as possible. I think we can all agree on that, in isolation. I think we can also all agree, that the BTS is not as globally familiar as Github issue tracking facilities, nor as pleasing and welcoming and intuitive to use especially for people oriented towards web interfaces. I don't challenge any of those observations - I agree with them. What I have a problem with is collaboration optimized *only* towards the needs of newcomers. I find the BTS highly valuable *despite* it being unwelcoming, not because I come from a different time where its design is somehow a bliss to work with. I find non-webby git interactions highly valuable *despite* it being less intuitive than web-based user interfaces and workflows. We each have a comfort zone, and an understanding of benefits and qualities of the tooling we are familiar with, and when we engage in collaboration we may get challenged about that. But finding the ideal ways to collaborate is a complex assessment, not one that benefits from reducing the options to a binary "does it raise the bar for newcomers?" question, in my opinion. I would love to collaborate with you, but when our ways of working are different, I would like to look at how our different toolings are helping each of us (the comfort zones of you and me), our product (the packages etc. that we are working on concretely) and our project (how our ways of working may affect others in Debian). It feels to me that this conversation reduces that conversation to "what is best for newcomers is best for Debian" and I am not convinced that that is a sensible reduction. Hope that makes sense. - Jonas -- * Jonas Smedegaard - idealist & Internet-arkitekt * Tlf.: +45 40843136 Website: http://dr.jones.dk/ * Sponsorship: https://ko-fi.com/drjones [x] quote me freely [ ] ask before reusing [ ] keep private
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