On 2006/04/05, at 20:37, Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho wrote:
JC Helary wrote:It is not a mistaken belief, it directly comes from: http://www.debian.org/devel/join/newmaintIt is a mistaken belief. That page is just poorly worded in this regard, if it makes you believe otherwise.
Poorly worded or not it is a status page. If the status does not mean what it reads then it must be reworded.
(Quote from the abovementioned page:)Some ways of contributing (translating, writing documentation and reporting bugs) can be done by everyone and don't require developer status.What that's trying to say is, applying for developership should not be the first thing to do in Debian; there are a lot of things you can do before you apply. Nowadays, showing prior work is required for an applicant to get anywhere in the NM process.
I don't know what it is _trying_ to say. I know what it says and it is says the page is about becoming a debian developer. It does not say that it "should not be the first thing to do in Debian".
If maintaining _requires_ developer statusIt doesn't, it just makes it easier.
Read the quoted paragraph again:
Some ways of contributing (translating, writing documentation and reporting bugs) can be done by everyone and don't require developer status
"Some way of contributing [...] don't require developer status" which follows that some do. Since the page is specifically about "maintainers" one can easily be led to think that maintainers can contribute in full capacity only when they have become developers.
A consequence is that non maintainers won't feel any need to become developers which follows that they von't have a voice in the decision making process. etc.
Jean-Christophe Helary