Re: [boost] Languishing review requests

From: John Phillips (phillips_at_[hidden])
Date: 2007-06-05 12:52:27

John Fletcher wrote:

> I would like to second the suggestion of trainee review managers. 
> Perhaps that could be on a smaller library, not less important, but less 
> in scope to look at.
> 
> John Fletcher
> 
> Jarrad Waterloo wrote:
> 
>>There is a [mis]conception that using boost is easy but contributing to
>>boost is hard. I am not sure if there is any truth to it or not. I would
>>like to be a review manager but I don't know all that is involved /
>>required. Worse still I don't how! I have similar problems with contributing
>>code. Is there any good tutorials out there and maybe boost should consider
>>apprenticeships where there may be multiple review managers; an experienced
>>one training an inexperienced one. Anyway to make this process, transfer of
>>experience, as easy as possible and your shortage of review managers could
>>be a thing of the past.
>>

   As Jake mentions in another post, one natural place to go for 
description and assistance is the Review Wizards. In my experience, they 
are very pleasant and helpful.

   Another easy source is the documentation of the role at the boost 
website. However, even after this, you may want another point of view. 
I'll happily volunteer to share my experiences with anyone who thinks 
they would be helpful.

   My first suggestion is that you participate in a review as a reviewer 
(if you haven't already) and try to follow the complete review 
discussion of the library closely. Identify which issues are important 
and which are secondary. Are there any show stoppers? How does the 
library author respond to constructive criticism? Are any of the 
reviewers resorting to non-constructive criticism? How could you sum up 
the issues in this review? Is the opinion of the reviewers positive, 
neutral or negative?

   A look at my review reports compared to some others will show that I 
am, if anything, over complete in my summations of the reviews. This is 
intentional on my part, as I like to have a single post to look through 
to understand the flow of the review and the issues raised for the 
library. However, it is not required. Some fine reviews have been summed 
up in far less text.

   Once you have participated a couple of times, and you understand the 
process you are ready to try managing. Always try to pick reviews where 
you understand the basic issues involved. For example, if you have never 
tried meta-programming, a library that uses metaprogramming to provide 
much of its functionality is probably not a good idea for you to manage. 
No one in boost is an expert in everything (though some people are very 
impressively broad), and the review manager needs to know enough about 
the topic to understand the plusses and minuses of the points that are 
discussed during the review. If need be, don't feel bad about checking a 
couple of references for some details, but know the topic well enough to 
read the references closely.

   For the review, and the week or so following set aside some time. 
Managing a review is no where near as time consuming as submitting a 
library, but it does take up some time. It will be far less of an issue 
if you budget for the time before you start. An active review may 
produce a few hundred posts with a wealth of details, so reading them 
closely enough to make an informed decision is time consuming.

   I hope that helps, and feel free to ask me (and everyone else on the 
list who wants to help) whatever questions come to mind.

                        John

>