On Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 10:56:58PM -0600, Gunnar Wolf wrote: > Wouter Verhelst dijo [Tue, Mar 16, 2010 at 01:45:33AM +0100]: > > The numbers are easy. The amount of Debian Developers has been > > approximately steady at about 1000 for the past ten years. Over that > > same time, the amount of packages in our distribution has been steadily > > increasing. By definition, that means the ratio of Debian Developers per > > package has been doing down, and thus also that the core infrastructure > > has less contributors. Having more packages does not necessarily mean > > that only fringe packages are added; useful new software is written all > > the time, and the fact that useful new software is written does not make > > useful old software disappear. > > > > I believe the problem is not that less people are interested in Debian's > > core infrastructure; the problem is that less people are interested in > > *Debian*. We need to work on that. As we say in Dutch, "stilstaan is > > achteruitgaan" -- "standing still is the same as going backwards" -- and > > the number of DDs has not been going up for quite a while now. > > Umm, yes, but during the seven years I have been part of this project, > we shifted from a collections of mostly solo-maintained to a good > number of team-maintained packages. And we have opened the DM scheme > (imperfect but still much better than not having it IMO), which brings > in important numbers of new contributors. Certainly. But there's still a difference between a Debian Developer and a DM. Nobody can do a sponsored upload, except a DD. Nobody can do an NMU, except a DD. Nobody can maintain a buildd host, except a DD. This implies that there are some fairly important jobs that can only be done by DDs. And since reaching Debian Developer status is usually a sign of gaining a certain level of experience with Debian and Free Software in general, this means that most of the core contributors to Debian are those same DDs. So while I agree that the situation isn't as dramatic as a simple look at the number of DDs would seem to suggest, I think it could easily become that if we don't act. [...] -- The biometric identification system at the gates of the CIA headquarters works because there's a guard with a large gun making sure no one is trying to fool the system. http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/01/biometrics.html
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