Travis Kemen wrote: > There are ongoing discussions about both transparency in the OpenWrt > community, and how to involve/attract people in/to the development work > in the project. > > I have been wondering about this for some time, and a discussion with a > developer from the Gentoo project made me think. The Gentoo project > organizes an activity called 'Bug-Day' - which is a monthly "day" (24 > hours during a weekend) focussed on fixing "bugs" in both distro and > packages. > > http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/bugday/index.xml > > In practice it takes place on IRC, and the aim is to make it possible > for everyone to participate in fixing a "bug" (independent of skills and > experience). There is an official list of "bugs" which is posted before > the day starts, and various developers/committers help people who take > part with learning how to do this (this was the very short version). > > > I think that this is a good idea but the communication should take place > on the mailing list so that people in different timezones will not miss > anything. Also should be advertised on the mailing list, irc, and in a > stickied forum thread so that the most amount of people will see it. >
The Gentoo 'bug-day' runs across 24 hours - so I think there should be amble time for people (independent of time zones) to participate. It is a problem with missing certain things so the use of mailling-list could be a good solution. On the other hand, it might also result in a lack of focus on the specific time/place? A combination could be to have one or more members post running updates during the 24 hours on the mail-list, while keeping the activities on irc? The advertizing aspect could be a combination of the mentioned - and added to this, and I think this would be very important, is that someone writes a short summary of what happened and that this is posted forexample in the forum? > I would like to suggest that something similar was introduced as part of > the activities of OpenWrt? Though, I have to admit that I believe the > concept itself would have to be changed somewhat. > > It can be difficult to identify what a "bug" is, when it comes to > OpenWrt - is it in the software or the hardware, or a combination of > both. Gentoo is mainly a distribution aimed at the more 'classic' > pc/server architecture - whereas OpenWrt is an embedded system. It is my > experience that you have to become quite confident with direct tinkering > with hardware, to become a skilled user/developer - when it comes to > OpenWrt (tell me if I'm wrong?) > The category of hardware with WIP status (Work-In-Progress) is quite > wellknown, but also mysterious. > > It is my suggestion to use the focus on the WIP status, as a way of > organizing a parallel to the Gentoo Bug-Day. This would bring focus to > the following: > > 1. OpenWrt is no longer "just" aimed at Linksys routers (or just > routers > in general). > > 2. A long list of platforms are of interest: > https://dev.openwrt.org/wiki/platforms - and various developers are > interested in these/work on them. > > 3. It is not difficult to take part in practical terms - and the OpenWrt > project is open and public. > > By organizing a day (monthly, or more often) it would become possible to > promote these platforms and present the individual > developers/committers > of them - hereby both create a way of making information accessible and > help people participate in the development process. > It would be needed that the various developers "handling" the platforms > would be willing to spend a day (24 hours) guiding and helping - but > this would hopefully not be a problem? It would anyway be on some sort > of rotation. > > > I would say monthly, I don't think the resources are there to do it more > often. Monthly is a good starting point. > > Practical example: A WIP-Day could look as the following: > > The focus is on the Fritz-Box - people who are interested in upgrading > their Fritz-Box or porting OpenWrt compile a list of problem/bugs before > 'WIP-Day' - then they gather on a defined IRC #Channel and start > working > on the list (with helping each other and new-commers). > > > I don't think the day should be focused on a particular box as much as > having developers online to cover a platform (AR7-2.6), it may be better > to have enough developers online to cover most platforms and work on > packages. The first WIP-Day could focus on Pre1 bugs, particularly > packages that do not compile and the couple of remaining tickets in trac. > I agree - and I think my initial suggestion in regard to this was somewhat unclear (as to how I understood hardware and platforms) --> I was thinking that it should be based on platforms. > This would hopefully result in a 'power-boost' to the work with the > Fritz-Box, as well as support the community is a positive way. > > Some continuations of this idea --> > > 1. Hopefully members would begin helping out with the practical > organizing or such a WIP-Day - as well as perhaps work on general > documentation could be spawned (and a re-working of the existing). > > 2. It would be possible to extend WIP-Day into 'real world' - using > various settings to organize practical OpenWrt workshops. People could > attend and get introduced both to members/developers and learn new > skills. > One such workshop could focus on learning to interact with embedded > hardware - from tftp, over serial, to jtag, basic soldering and so > forth. If you'r not experienced with these things, it's difficult to > learn it by yourself. > Again, such 'real world' activities would also help make OpenWrt more > accessible. > > > These would be great for people to learn but need to be arranged by the > community. Maybe there could be a easy way to advertise such meetings so > that people that are interested would be able to attend. > I fully believe that it should be up to community members to organize both WIP-Day and other activities - though it seems (at least to me) that there is a need for someone to give it a little push. And I'm here not saying that the present developers should do this (take the initiative to "push"), just be part of this discussion and support what ever the conclusion will be to the extend everyone is able to do so? Gregers -- Gregers Petersen, Anthropologist [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.wireless-ownership.org [EMAIL PROTECTED] _______________________________________________ openwrt-devel mailing list [email protected] http://lists.openwrt.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/openwrt-devel
