Re: Commitfest II CLosed

On 10/21/2013 11:59 AM, Tom Lane wrote:
> Josh Berkus <josh(at)agliodbs(dot)com> writes:
>> Either you're proposing a solution, supporting someone else's solution,
>> or you're saying the problem isn't important. There is no fourth
>> alternative.
>
> Nonsense. Pointing out that a proposed solution isn't workable is not
> saying that the problem isn't important. Or are you trying to establish
> a rule that we can't complain about a proposal unless we have another one
> to make? Sorry, I won't accept that.

In some cases the other solution is "we need to search for a better
solution". But if you say "the proposed solution is bad" without even
proposing criteria for a better solution, then you are *de facto* saying
that the problem isn't important, whether or not you would like ot
pretend that you're saying something else. If a problem is important,
then it is worth solving. If it's not worth solving, then it's not
important.

This is just as true of bugs in our process as it is of bugs in our
code; if we release without fixing a bug, then we are making a concrete
statement that the bug is not important. For the past two years, we've
proceeded without fixing the bugs in our process, which is a material
statement that most contributors don't feel that the process is buggy.
Heck, the whole discussion about reviews got cut from the Developer's
Meeting agenda this year, and if that's not a statement of unimportance,
I don't know what is.

When I came up with the idea of CommitFests they were supposed to be an
incremental improvement for us to build on. Instead it's remained
frozen in amber, and steadily becoming less and less effective. I've
suggested a number of improvements and changes over the years, and
largely been rewarded with denial, attacks, ridicule, and general
sandbaggery. I'm done. If the community doesn't think there's a
problem, then clearly I'm in error for proposing fixes.

Not sure who you're going to get to do CF3, though. I'm not going to be
CFM again, and I'm pretty sure nobody else wants the job either.

--
Josh Berkus
PostgreSQL Experts Inc.
http://pgexperts.com