[llvm-dev] RFC: Improving the experience of first-time contributors

[Hal Finkel via llvm-dev]

----- Original Message -----

> From: "Paweł Bylica via llvm-dev" <llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org>
> To: "Alex Bradbury" <asb at asbradbury.org>, "llvm-dev"
> <llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org>
> Sent: Tuesday, November 1, 2016 12:02:12 PM
> Subject: Re: [llvm-dev] RFC: Improving the experience of first-time
> contributors

> On Tue, Nov 1, 2016 at 2:17 PM Alex Bradbury via llvm-dev <
> llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org > wrote:

> > Hi all,
> 

> > Some discussions the night before prompted me to do a short
> > lightning
> 
> > talk on 'improving the experience of first-time contributors' at
> > the
> 
> > LLVM Cauldron back in September. I intended to write it up as an
> > RFC,
> 
> > but have only just got round to doing so. I've tried to make this
> 
> > email self-contained, but you may still want to look at the slides
> > or
> 
> > recording of the lightning talk.
> 

> > Slides:
> > https://speakerdeck.com/asb/can-we-improve-the-experience-of-first-time-llvm-contributors
> 
> > Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32fmbEI9WrM
> 

> > # The problem
> 
> > As a first-time contributor, it's easy to be put off during the
> > patch
> 
> > submission process. e.g. the patch may sit unreviewed for weeks.
> 
> > Typically people new to the project haven't yet reviewed 'review
> 
> > currency', and so their patches are less likely to be picked out by
> 
> > others scanning through llvm-commits. Obviously nobody is doing
> 
> > anything wrong here, it's just likely to be off-putting to
> > newcomers.
> 
> > Even if feedback is negative, it's valuable to know someone has at
> 
> > least looked at your code.
> 

> > # How do other projects solve this?
> 
> > I've always been impressed at how Rust has been able to attract a
> 
> > steady stream of new contributors. They have a simple but seemingly
> 
> > effective tool for helping people land their first patch: the
> > highfive
> 
> > bot. Upon a user making their first pull request, it posts a
> > welcome
> 
> > message and assigns someone to review it.
> 

> On GitHub there is a project called "mention bot" [1] by Facebook
> that assigns reviewers by analysing the history of the files touched
> by the patch. Recently I was welcomed by a message: "thanks for your
> PR! By analyzing the history of the files in this pull request, we
> identified @A, @B and @C to be potential reviewers."

> [1] https://github.com/facebook/mention-bot
That sounds really nice! 

-Hal 

> > # A proposal
> 
> > I propose that we form a group of people who specifically volunteer
> > to
> 
> > help review first-time patches. A simple phabricator bot could
> > assign
> 
> > someone randomly much like Rust's highfive.
> 

> > One potential pitfall I'd like to highlight is that many patches
> 
> > really require the sign-off of the code owner. It could be equally
> 
> > frustrating for newcomers if people helpfully tell them to tweak
> > their
> 
> > variable names, fix their formatting, and make other cosmetic
> > changes
> 
> > only to find that time was wasted when the code owner step in a
> > week
> 
> > or two later to say a completely different approach needs to be
> > used.
> 

> > # Next steps
> 

> > Does anybody have any views here? My 'raise your hand' poll at the
> 
> > LLVM Cauldron did seem to think many felt things could be improved.
> 
> > I'll be at the LLVM Dev Meeting this week and would love to discuss
> 
> > further. Perhaps the BoF on raising the next generation of LLVM
> 
> > developers would be an appropriate venue?
> 
> > http://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/2016-October/106658.html
> 

> > Best,
> 

> > Alex
> 
> > _______________________________________________
> 
> > LLVM Developers mailing list
> 
> > llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org
> 
> > http://lists.llvm.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/llvm-dev
> 

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-- 

Hal Finkel 
Lead, Compiler Technology and Programming Languages 
Leadership Computing Facility 
Argonne National Laboratory 
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