"prefetch" <prefetch_member@pathlink.com> wrote in message news:de0kl0$ml2$1@digitaldaemon.com...
> hm.
>
> so let me translate:
>
> 1. "this is a one man show."

who responds to email (eventually or usually) and sometimes responds to newsgroup threads.

> 2. "if you want the one man to do something, you better figure out how to
> get
> his attention."

For localized things I've had luck posting about changes, getting feedback, making the changes, making the unittests, updating the doc and emailing Walter with a link to the discussion. For bigger changes I'm at a loss how to proceed.

> 3. "anything you do to help becomes private property of the one man show."
>
> is this correct?

Various parts of phobos have non-Walter (or non-DigitalMars) copyrights. Some of it is in the public domain. I like to put my stuff in the public domain since I don't plan on selling it and I don't care if I lose interest and/or someone else starts selling it. You can also make your own libraries with whatever copyright/license you want.

> i snooped around and couldn't find much licensing info - except the
> compiler
> comes with a license.txt file that implies that it is owned by Digital
> Mars and
> Symantec.  i wonder what symantec has to do with anything...??

Different parts come with different licenses. For example poke around in the etc phobos directory and I think none of it is DigitalMars.

"prefetch" <prefetch_member@pathlink.com> wrote in message news:de0fam$ivb$1@digitaldaemon.com...
> In article <1bl4gtbuuy6ek.12qm3vcv0nnxa$.dlg@40tude.net>, Derek Parnell says...
>
>>Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but digitalmars.D.bugs *is* the bug tracking 'system'. Fortunately, Thomas Kühne is helping us with the 'tracking' part.
>
> holy crap batman, who is driving this boat?? ;-)
>
> how on earth can you expect to develop a language and runtime library
> without a
> bug tracking system?  i mean, this is just plain stupid.  we all know,
> there are
> a whole bunch of free, web based bug trackers.
>
> don't get me wrong, i've really enjoyed learning about D, and i think it's
> a
> stellar language, but COME ON PEOPLE - let's get it together here.
> somewhere on
> the list of "how to start a super successful grassroots technology" is
> 'setup a
> web based bug tracking system so the community can help identify and fix
> bugs
> for the primary developer(s).'
>
> are my expectations just way to high or something?  shouldn't this project
> reflect the quality of the language concept?  i mean, it's a great
> concept - but
> how about we help it not fade into obscurity before it even gets going by
> building tools (docs, bug tracker, etc.) that can allow the community to
> grow?

One issue with the community fixing bugs is that many of the bugs are in the
compiler and those we can't really help with - and besides I think probably
only David Friedman (author of gdc) knows compiler stuff well enough to
help. About phobos and the doc the community can definitely help but I see
several reasons why there hasn't been more progress:
1) the process for making changes isn't well communicated - eg - post
proposal, write unittests, update doc, etc
2) the scope of what Walter expects isn't communicated - what is he willing
to change? I think he has said phobos is temporary - what's the plan for it?
Who should fix the doc?
3) the community likes to do what they want - there are several different
libraries that are fairly complete with overlapping features with phobos but
different philosophies so little effort is being put into phobos and the
doc. Individuals will either submit a new module or submit some bug fixes
but it's fairly quiet. Personally I'm waiting on hearing more about item 2
before really helping on phobos.

Ben Hinkle wrote:

> 
> One issue with the community fixing bugs is that many of the bugs are in the compiler and those we can't really help with - and besides I think probably only David Friedman (author of gdc) knows compiler stuff well enough to help. About phobos and the doc the community can definitely help but I see several reasons why there hasn't been more progress:
> 1) the process for making changes isn't well communicated - eg - post proposal, write unittests, update doc, etc
> 2) the scope of what Walter expects isn't communicated - what is he willing to change? I think he has said phobos is temporary - what's the plan for it? Who should fix the doc?
> 3) the community likes to do what they want - there are several different libraries that are fairly complete with overlapping features with phobos but different philosophies so little effort is being put into phobos and the doc. Individuals will either submit a new module or submit some bug fixes but it's fairly quiet. Personally I'm waiting on hearing more about item 2 before really helping on phobos. 
> 
> 

I should stay out of this, because usually when I open my mouth in this regard, I get myself in trouble.  Yet, I wanted to mention what I've observed.

It seems that Walter has been very hesitant to include code/bug fixes in phobos from the community if the submitter doesn't clearly indicate the "openness" of the submitted code.  He appears to fear future litigation or the submitter demanding code rights later or something to that effect.

Perhaps many of the bug fixers are not putting his mind adequately to rest.  I'm not quite sure.  That or it's just the huge burden he carries, and he's only able to audit so many fixes.

-JJR