Re: [boost] Shouldn't both logging proposals be reviewed in the same formal review?

Subject: Re: [boost] Shouldn't both logging proposals be reviewed in the same formal review?
From: Zachary Turner (divisortheory_at_[hidden])
Date: 2009-11-18 01:42:27

On Tue, Nov 17, 2009 at 10:45 PM, John Phillips <phillips_at_[hidden]
> wrote:

> Zachary Turner wrote:
>
>> On Mon, Nov 16, 2009 at 4:38 PM, Andreas Huber <
>>
>>> ...
>>>
>> I definitely support this effort.   I mean, how stupid would we feel if we
>> review the first one, and then a little bit later we review the other one
>> and find out it's a strict superset of the first, and also completely
>> superior?  Things like this need to be unquestionably prevented,
>> regardless
>> of the logistics that need to go into making it happen.  I understand that
>> a
>> dual-review was tried before and nobody liked it.  Instead of just
>> concluding "therefore parallel reviews don't work", I think the conclusion
>> should be "we need to address the concerns people had with parallel
>> reviews
>> at the time".
>>
>> also, i think it should be mandatory for each library author to review the
>> other author's library.
>>
>> Zach
>>
>
>  I believe my statement was that I'm not inclined to do it unless someone
> can tell me why this time will be different. So, if you can explain what the
> process needs to be to make reviewing them together work well, I'm all ears.
>
>                        John
>
>
It's difficult to do that because I wasn't involved the last time such a
review happened and it didn't go well, so I'm not in touch with all the
issues.  That being said, certainly each person needs to review the other
person's library.  Did that happen the first time a parallel review was
attempted?

Maybe it is just my naivete in not being familiar with the issues from last
time, but I'm having a hard time understanding why doing a parallel review
isn't hands down the obvious choice.  Or rather, I'm having a hard time
understanding why knowingly going into a review of a library with another
very very very similar library only slightly further along in the review
queue is even an option.  I can't see any possible benefit to doing reviews
this way, aside from "it's logistically easier than doing it the other way",
and I also can't see any downsides to doing a parallel review, other than
"it has some issues that need to be ironed out".  On the other hand, the
converse is definitely true -- that there are serious (and more importantly,
long lasting) problems with not doing a parallel review.

If Andrey's review is going to be first, and that's just the way it is, I
can accept that -- but then delete the other library from the queue and just
say there's no room for it at this time (assuming Andrey's gets accepted).
How is the community served by having two virtually identical libraries?
What if both of these libraries get accepted, and then 6 months later, I
decide to submit YALL (yet another logging library) for review?  Is it
possible to have 3 logging libraries in boost?  Where do we draw the line
for "maximum number of virtually identical libraries allowed in boost"?

Zach