[Opensync-devel] Fixing the OpenSync core development BUS factor

[Daniel G. <go...@b1...>]

Hi,

we have a pretty low BUS factor [1] for OpenSync core development. Which is, i 
guess, the primary reason why the OpenSync development is so slow ...

Everytime when Björn or I disappear for some weeks the development is kind of 
frozen.

This is frustrating the OpenSync community ...

And for developers it's pretty hard to start with OpenSync core developer due 
to missing documentation or comments completely. So in the past Björn and I 
tried this:

We tried to fix all the tickets which are oustanding for the next development 
milestone. If there where any question from other developers we tried to 
answer them in time ... later thing didn't work as often as it should be. 
Especially if there were certain questions only I was able to reply ... and 
haven't, due to lack of time ... i'm sure i also missed some question to 
answer the last month, because i was so busy with private things that i was 
away from development for weeks.

So how should we solve the problem?
Should i declare OpenSync as dead? Or should i stop mainting the project and 
hand it over to someone else? If anyone thinks this would help ... please let 
me and the others know. Currently I'm certianly not the best choices as a 
maintainer due to the lack of time i can spent on this project. But maybe i 
still have some understanding how OpenSync in detail works, which could be 
very valuable to finally complete this project ...

I want to suggest now that we _all_ should try something new:

We look for volunteers who are interested in becoming OpenSync core 
contributors and assign special components of the core to them. There is no 
deep knowledge in OpenSync core development required today ... just the 
willing to help the OpenSync development and maybe some very basic C 
programming is required (i leanred C also while programming on OpenSync ... so 
don't hesistate to start here as well).

My role will be just kind of a mentor, and i just try to be available for 
question as much as possible and will do only developing and debugging if 
there is no pending questions from the other core developers.

Are there any volunteers for following components?

 - Application API
   * main objective: API review and keeping it stable
   * documentatoin
 - (Sync) Plugin API
   * main objective: API review and keeping it stable
    * documentation
 - Format Plugin API
   * main objective: API review and keeping it stable
   * documentation
 - Synchronization Engine (workflow of the Synchronization: connect, 
   get_changes, ...)
   * documentation
   * cleanup
   * maintenance
   * bugfixing
   * profiling
 - Format Conversion (abstract logic to convert formats, e.g. conversion 
   pathes, ...)
   * review of the conversion path building process
   * profiling
   * documentation
 - Mapping Logic (abstract logic to compare and map similar/same entries)
   * review of the logic
   * documentation
   * bugfixing
 - Capabilties, Merger and Demerger
   * completing capabilities merger/demerger implementation
   * documentation
 - IPC
   * maintenance
   * (porting work to different platforms)
   * documentation




The idea primary idea is not that you took the component you need to fix 
anyway because your plugin xyz is currently not working because of xyz. The 
primary idea is just to start to contribute to OpenSync core ... and since 
we're primarily lacking on documentation we should start with reviewing the 
code and document how things work .. to make it easier for other developers to 
understand and contribute code.


[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_factor

Best Regards,
Daniel

-- 
Daniel Gollub                        Geschaeftsfuehrer: Ralph Dehner
FOSS Developer                       Unternehmenssitz:  Vohburg
B1 Systems GmbH                      Amtsgericht:       Ingolstadt
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EMail: go...@b1...          http://www.b1-systems.de

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