REVU - Cleanup of the "Needs Review" section

[Scott Kitterman]

On Sun, 2 Nov 2008 09:42:46 +0000 Kasper Peeters 
<kasper.peeters at aei.mpg.de> wrote:
>> I'm pondering on running a script to move all those which don't have
>> "jaunty" in debian/copyright to the "Needs work" section, leaving a
>> comment asking to change it to "jaunty", check the standards version
>> and some general recommendations (or perhaps just a link to a new wiki
>> page), so that we get ride of all those packages whose author isn't
>> coming back or which still need work anyway. I do understand that this
>> could be annoying for some users, though, so I'm asking here to hear
>> some more thoughts. Does anyone have strong objections to this?

I'm still in favor unless someone has a better idea on how to find out what 
packages still have interest from the packager.

>I think this is a very bad idea, which does not actually solve the
>problem anyway: the fact that there simply are not enough
>reviewers/MOTUs.

That is a problem, but not one we are solving here.  The problem is it's a 
waste of that limited asset (MOTU review time) to review a package that the 
packager has lost interest in.  As I see it we can flush the queue in some 
way (and RainCT's proposal is the gentlest one I've seen) or MOTU will have 
no idea what's current and waste time or maybe don't bother with REVU at 
all.

>In my own experience, it is _very_ hard to get a new package into
>Ubuntu, or Debian for that matter. I have tried for many months with
>some of my own software, and the lack of any kind of feedback can be
>pretty frustrating (I understand the reason, and I am not blaming
>anyone). Auto-expiring REVU packages does not improve that situation
>at all.

Sure it does.  It gets stuff no one cares about out of the way so you have 
less competition.

>What should have the focus is getting more reviewers and more MOTUs,
>e.g. by making the process to become a MOTU simpler and simplifying
>the packaging guides so new packagers have a higher chance of needing
>less help. That's the real problem, IMHO.
>

Ideas for making becoming a MOTU easier without lowering standards are 
certainly welcome (I'd suggest a new thread).

I think that more than better docs, we need to discourage new people from 
starting with new packages.  Making new packages is an advanced effort.

Scott K