On Fri, Dec 10, 2010 at 11:40:03AM +0100, Johan Tibell wrote:
Here's a proposal: don't have mailing lists maintain libraries. Calling libraries@ a maintainer is a bit of a misnomer:
* libraries@ doesn't clean up the code. * libraries@ doesn't write tests. * libraries@ doesn't consider APIs for completeness. * libraries@ doesn't polish documentation.
Libraries maintained by the mailing list are only maintained thanks to individuals (the Simons, Ian, other people with commit access) do some spring cleaning outside the libraries process.
A fair number of people, including you and I, have commit access. There is nothing to stop any of us from cleaning up the code, writing tests or polishing documentation, and most of us would be happy to commit such changes from occasional contributors. The only thing the current setup prevents us from doing is changing interfaces without getting wider agreement -- I think that's a feature.