October 17, 2016
On Monday, 17 October 2016 at 06:43:21 UTC, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
> On 10/17/2016 01:02 AM, Walter Bright wrote:
>> [...]
>
> I understand your frustration and please bear with us while we're arranging the DIP process to guarantee timely response.
>
> [...]

I must say, I finally read this DIP after Amaury protested and had pretty much exactly this response, though I didn't check to see how often the DIP had been edited or worked on.  I don't know enough to comment on the merit of the underlying idea, but the proposal needed work.

I hope we can set up some kind of DIP review process where Mihails and other well-known community members, like Jonathan, Timon, Steven, or Amaury himself, can whip DIPs into shape before Walter and Andrei have to spend their valuable time reviewing them.

I can help a little with reviewing, though only for minor things like typos or argumentation, and will start doing so.
October 17, 2016
On 10/17/2016 12:45 AM, ZombineDev wrote:
> https://github.com/dlang/DIPs/pull/16

Thanks. I hadn't seen it earlier because I had neglected to look in the closed list.
October 17, 2016
On 10/17/2016 12:58 AM, Joakim wrote:
> I hope we can set up some kind of DIP review process where Mihails and other
> well-known community members, like Jonathan, Timon, Steven, or Amaury himself,
> can whip DIPs into shape before Walter and Andrei have to spend their valuable
> time reviewing them.

That process is what Mihails is in charge of. It's a difficult and thankless job, as it attracts criticism from all sides. We are lucky that Mihails has taken on the challenge. He has my full confidence and support.

October 17, 2016
On Monday, 17 October 2016 at 08:29:27 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
> On 10/17/2016 12:58 AM, Joakim wrote:
>> I hope we can set up some kind of DIP review process where Mihails and other
>> well-known community members, like Jonathan, Timon, Steven, or Amaury himself,
>> can whip DIPs into shape before Walter and Andrei have to spend their valuable
>> time reviewing them.
>
> That process is what Mihails is in charge of. It's a difficult and thankless job, as it attracts criticism from all sides. We are lucky that Mihails has taken on the challenge. He has my full confidence and support.

I know of the new DIP process and that Mihails is running it:

https://github.com/dlang/DIPs

That's great, but I'm referring to the community helping Mihails more.  Here are the counts for how many DIP PRs the above well-known community members commented on:

Mihails: 12 https://github.com/dlang/DIPs/pulls?utf8=✓&q=is%3Apr%20dicebot
Jonathan: 0 https://github.com/dlang/DIPs/pulls?utf8=✓&q=is%3Apr%20jonathan
Timon: 0 https://github.com/dlang/DIPs/pulls?utf8=✓&q=is%3Apr%20timon
Steven: 1 https://github.com/dlang/DIPs/pulls?utf8=✓&q=is%3Apr%20steven
Amaury: 2 https://github.com/dlang/DIPs/pulls?utf8=✓&q=is%3Apr%20deadalnix

This is not meant as a criticism of those people: it's merely a random sample of outspoken forum members, to show that Mihails could use some help.  My own count is 0, I'll try to change that.

More people from the forum who feel strongly about changes should chip in and help Mihails, that's all I'm saying.
October 17, 2016
On Monday, October 17, 2016 01:29:27 Walter Bright via Digitalmars-d wrote:
> On 10/17/2016 12:58 AM, Joakim wrote:
> > I hope we can set up some kind of DIP review process where Mihails and other well-known community members, like Jonathan, Timon, Steven, or Amaury himself, can whip DIPs into shape before Walter and Andrei have to spend their valuable time reviewing them.
>
> That process is what Mihails is in charge of. It's a difficult and thankless job, as it attracts criticism from all sides. We are lucky that Mihails has taken on the challenge. He has my full confidence and support.

Yeah. The DIP process hasn't worked very well overall, and many of the complaints about it are justfied, but what Dicebot has been up to is the attempt to fix that, and while the process still needs work, it has already improved the situation considerably. So, in that respect, now is a really weird time to be complaining about how horrible the DIP process is, since something is actually being done about it right now.

- Jonathan M Davis

October 17, 2016
On 10/17/16 4:57 AM, Joakim wrote:
> On Monday, 17 October 2016 at 08:29:27 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
>> On 10/17/2016 12:58 AM, Joakim wrote:
>>> I hope we can set up some kind of DIP review process where Mihails
>>> and other
>>> well-known community members, like Jonathan, Timon, Steven, or Amaury
>>> himself,
>>> can whip DIPs into shape before Walter and Andrei have to spend their
>>> valuable
>>> time reviewing them.
>>
>> That process is what Mihails is in charge of. It's a difficult and
>> thankless job, as it attracts criticism from all sides. We are lucky
>> that Mihails has taken on the challenge. He has my full confidence and
>> support.
>
> I know of the new DIP process and that Mihails is running it:
>
> https://github.com/dlang/DIPs
>
> That's great, but I'm referring to the community helping Mihails more.
> Here are the counts for how many DIP PRs the above well-known community
> members commented on:
>
> Mihails: 12 https://github.com/dlang/DIPs/pulls?utf8=✓&q=is%3Apr%20dicebot
> Jonathan: 0 https://github.com/dlang/DIPs/pulls?utf8=✓&q=is%3Apr%20jonathan
> Timon: 0 https://github.com/dlang/DIPs/pulls?utf8=✓&q=is%3Apr%20timon
> Steven: 1 https://github.com/dlang/DIPs/pulls?utf8=✓&q=is%3Apr%20steven
> Amaury: 2 https://github.com/dlang/DIPs/pulls?utf8=✓&q=is%3Apr%20deadalnix
>
> This is not meant as a criticism of those people: it's merely a random
> sample of outspoken forum members, to show that Mihails could use some
> help.  My own count is 0, I'll try to change that.

TBH, I haven't paid much attention to DIPs. The one I did comment on is just because it was mentioned in the newsgroup. I haven't signed up for all notifications of DIPs, so it's not something that gets to the front of my todo-list ever.

I should set aside some time to go over all the DIPs to see where they stand and how I feel about them.

As a response to Amaury, I think there are definitely places where you have to have tougher skin, and this is one of them. Yes, it is sometimes infuriating that people with influence or in power can sidestep a process that us peons have to follow. But this is just the way it works when one or two people are in charge of something. It works anywhere there is a "Boss", the boss just doesn't have to deal with getting boss approval. Someone has to make the hard decisions, and they can't just approve every change.

I would say the better attitude to have is that you may not expect results to always go your way, and put out your best effort. If it doesn't work, that's the way it is, move on to something more interesting and/or satisfying. The sour grapes attitude isn't helpful. And really, putting "4-5" years of effort into a wiki article doesn't sound all that taxing. I respect your contributions and knowledge, and I agree with a lot of your views on D and what should be allowed in D. Let the process work out the way it is supposed to, and suggest improvements if you think there should be. IMO, reading the history of your PR, there hasn't been a categorical rejection of the idea, I don't know why you would already give up on it. If anything, your DIP really was lost in the noise of the wiki, and really this should be considered a "new" proposal, not one that is 4-5 years old. Nobody was paying much attention to the DIPs before dicebot started this process, so I'm glad things are being examined more closely.

-Steve
October 17, 2016
On Monday, 17 October 2016 at 13:02:20 UTC, Steven Schveighoffer wrote:
> I would say the better attitude to have is that you may not expect results to always go your way, and put out your best effort. If it doesn't work, that's the way it is, move on to something more interesting and/or satisfying.

Also, consider the creator of C++'s recent 0/3 track record of getting his proposals into C++17:

http://www.cplusplus.com/forum/general/195226/#msg938814

I was surprised that even his scaled-back UFCS proposal didn't get in:

https://isocpp.org/blog/2016/02/a-bit-of-background-for-the-unified-call-proposal

Note the comments after the OP there: he wants full UFCS but will settle for at least one-way.  I guess even that didn't get in.

October 17, 2016
On 10/17/2016 02:58 AM, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
> Looking at https://wiki.dlang.org/?title=DIP27&action=history, I'm
> seeing 10 approved DIPs.

Copypasta error, I meant https://github.com/dlang/DIPs/blob/master/DIPs/archive/README.md - thanks Timon for the correction. -- Andrei
October 17, 2016
On Sunday, 16 October 2016 at 22:17:15 UTC, deadalnix wrote:
> [...]

FWIW ;)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wzc7a3McOs&feature=youtu.be?list=PLHTh1InhhwT7J5jl4vAhO1WvGHUUFgUQH&t=3757
October 17, 2016
On Monday, 17 October 2016 at 06:58:59 UTC, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
> On 10/17/2016 02:39 AM, Jacob Carlborg wrote:
>> On 2016-10-17 04:08, Dicebot wrote:
>>> Listen, I understand you are not interested in spending loads of time on
>>> boring polishing of formalities. We all do this in our spare time so
>>> that is to be expected.
>>>
>>> But what you say here only shows that process is working as intended
>>
>> Well, the designed of the DIP process if flawed.
>
> What steps do you think we could take to improve it? Since Dicebot took the reins things are showing real promise. I'm sure he'd be interested in taking suggestions.

Looking at other languages that have similar process. Python's PIPs are probably the closest to DIP. Two observations:

1. Python as clean tooling around PIPs. We should render PIPs from the dlang/DIP nicely at dip.dlang.org (My understanding that repository is now favored over wiki entries).

2. Python DIPs are Guido's main focus of work. Maybe we can write a bot mailing current in-process DIPs on a weekly basis to the mailinglist as digest to remind Walter, Andrei and others to reviewed. The list should ordered by last comment/review on it. I am not 100% aware of all the edge cases of the process and have a terrible track record of implementing things I say i will implement, but I can give such a mailing bot a try, by scaping dlang/DIP.

3. It would be great to be clear if the people who can accept a DIP reviewed it and what the current suggested improvements are so we can make constant head-way.