Re: another reason why requiring NMs to be sponsored is a bad idea
On Wed, Jan 16, 2002 at 02:44:12PM -0900, Britton wrote:
> The current sponsorship system has serious potential to damage the
> succession process for specific areas of expertise.
I'm not sure about that. The problem seems to be matching up sponsors
with developers willing to take on the job. If you have discovered an
applicant who is packaging something important who is not getting attention,
why not do some asking around for the applicant to see if you can land him
a sponsor? I have done that in the past with some success.
> Sponsorship doesn't buy any more trust in developers than the old signing
> scheme. I don't see what use it is. If a new maintainer's packages are
> broken and useless, just cheerfully dump them, they are only in unstable.
The principal benefit of sponsorship, is that a certain amount of mentoring
comes with the job. And perhaps that's why it is hard to find sponsors.
It can be a tougher job than packaging the sponsored package yourself, as it
demands that you stop and think through how you do things and then convey
those ideas back to the applicant.
I highly recommend this style of sponsorship to all developers. I have
honed my own packaging skills and strengthened relationships within the
developer community through the experience.
Ben
--
nSLUG http://www.nslug.ns.ca synrg@sanctuary.nslug.ns.ca
Debian http://www.debian.org synrg@debian.org
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