Alexander Wrote: <snip> > > You have vast amounts of possible volunteers on these lists, which if > > managed well could take some of the burden of your shoulders. I can see > > that individual developers are taking part in managing these resources, > > but I don't see an overall strategy. But then maybe I am expecting too > > much of a BSDish approach... > > All the possible volunteers on this lists are great, but the fact is > that if I have to personally hand-hold them I won't have time for > anything else, which might be a net loss to the project. Its very much a > fact that volunteers in free software projects have to be very driven > self-starters. It might be an unfortunate fact, but its been true for as > long as I've done free software, and I don't see it changing. > I think this is the real issue. It took me many years of using open source to even attempt to make a contribution. I think what people are hoping for here is some guidance as to how to make it easier to get people started with the project. I think that's what Jef's been trying to do with triage days, and for my own part, I'm trying to make the Extra's QA process more straightforward with my quickstart guide. If fedora can come up with a set of simple tasks, that nonetheless provide real help, the barrier for entry will be drastically lowered. Expecting everybody to actually "fix a bug" means you eliminate many potential contributors due to the sheer background knowledge required. The trick IMHO is figuring out ways to give input that are easy AND useful. --erik
