discuss: Dealing with poor maintenance by maintainers
Subject:
Re: Dealing with poor maintenance by maintainers
From:
Tabatha Persad ####@####.####
Date:
13 May 2002 19:08:14 -0000
Message-Id: <20020513190747.DOIU25294.rwcrmhc52.attbi.com@there>
Yes! This is exactly what I meant!
To me, the idea of being published in the LDP does give an author a place to
showcase their writing abiities and benefit the community at the same time.
When I incorporated the FAQ (previously the only source of information) at
The Linux Counter into my HOWTO, I credited the author of the FAQ in my
credits section. Since he got credit for his original work, he was pleased.
Of course, it helps to point out that before I got started I did ask the
author of the FAQ if he had created a howto or any additional help
documentation, and he handed the job over to me since he didn't have time, or
anymore beyond the faq.
We also now credit authors of press clippings who mention The Linux Counter
to encourage people to write about it, so they will have more incentive to
use and write about the statistics. Hey if they're going to mention our
name, we should mention theirs too!
My verbose point is that showing authors upfront how their document will be
handled, should they choose to stop maintaining it, should either encourage
them to maintain it, or consider an alternative if they choose not to. I
suppose it would help to mention the benefits in there somewhere before the
detriments (if you can call it that). Above all, these authors chose to list
their documentation with the LDP, and with that there are standards.... after
all, there's not an Author's Guide for nothing!
I like the ideas I'm hearing ... especially bug tracking!
Tab
On Monday 13 May 2002 13:40, David Merrill wrote:
> IMO, only the active maintainers should be listed as maintainers in
> the meta-data and therefore on the main page. Former maintainers are
> listed in the credits section. With some judgement applied...
>
> The fame and kudos of being a published author at the LDP is something
> we should encourage people to see as a benefit to them for doing the
> work. But to keep your name in lights, you maintain the document.
>
> Not that I would arbitrarily drop their name as policy or anything.
> But new maintainers should consider moving it to a credits section
> once the document has moved far beyond the original maintainer's
> document. That just makes sense, but should be left at the new
> maintainer's discretion. In the Linux FAQ, for instance, I continue to
> list Robert because I have not made major changes as yet. When I do
> make major changes, I will move him to the credits with the dozen odd
> other former maintainers.
