[LLVMdev] Usability of phabricator review threads for non-phab-users

[Alp Toker]

On 01/07/2014 21:28, Alp Toker wrote:
> Specifically the problem I've been seeing is that people using the 
> website are unable to CC mailing list-based developers. As a result I 
> don't get copied in on responses to my review comments, and rarely get 
> any kind of direct mail with threading. You end up having to dig up 
> historic responses in the mailing list archive which becomes tedious.
>
> Often the CC on website reviews will include arbitrary names of people 
> who have website accounts, while excluding the actual code owners and 
> recent committers who you'd expect would be relevant. This leads me to 
> guess that the website is actively blocking the email addresses of 
> LLVM developers from getting added to the CC list unless they open an 
> account on the service.

To back this up, I get about a dozen mails a month saying "I can't find 
you on Phabricator", to which I usually reply "Just enter my committer 
name / email address".

  AFAICT people rarely do that, or the site blocks the email address and 
tries to make me create an account which I'm not planning to do at present.

The net result is that other people else ends up CC'ed because they do 
have an account on the website, and they attempt to review the code even 
though someone else requested the changes. At that point it becomes a 
matter of dealing with the fallout and things get pointlessly awkward :-/

Alp.

>
> In fact as far as I can tell, mailing list-based developers are 
> *completely* excluded from the CC list visible on the website. This 
> creates a really poor workflow with responses often getting missed, 
> and the right people not seeing patches (and conversely, it looks like 
> people who aren't really relevant end up getting pressured into 
> reviewing a patch in some area).
>
> Alp.
>
>
>
> On 01/07/2014 14:11, Manuel Klimek wrote:
>> Alp noted that the current setup on how phab reviews land on the list 
>> are not working for him. I'd be curious whether his setup is special, 
>> or whether there are more widespread problems. If this is more widely 
>> perceived as a problem, please speak up, and I'll make sure to 
>> prioritize the fixes (note that this is unrelated to the "lost email" 
>> problem - those are always highest priority and as far as I'm aware 
>> we diagnosed and fixed all of them within 1-2 business days).
>>
>> If you have the feeling that the phab email workflow makes it hard 
>> for you to jump into reviews, keep track of reviews, or understand 
>> reviews if you're not a phab user, please reply to this thread. You 
>> don't need to provide details, "+1", "please fix", or "doesn't work 
>> well for me" are all acceptable replies here - I want to get a 
>> feeling for the magnitude of the problem.
>>
>> Thanks,
>> /Manuel
>>
>

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