[python-committers] What is a CPython core developer?

[Victor Stinner]

2017-09-22 18:48 GMT+02:00 Antoine Pitrou <antoine at python.org>:
>> * Long term commitement. (...)
>
> Unfortunately we can't evaluate that in advance.  Even the person being
> promoted often does not known whether they'll still be there in 5 or 10
> years.  Hopefully that's on their horizon, but many factors can interfere.

To be clear, I disagree with the "long term commitement", but I tried
to summarize what I heard from other core developers. I think that it
would be wrong to at least not mention it. If most core developers
disagree with this requirement, we should remove it. If there is no
consensus, I prefer to mention it *but* also explains that it's not
strictly a "requirement", but more a "whish".

I will try to clarify expectations in term of time, evenings, weekends
and holidays :-)

> I, personally, can only think of a couple of cases where a person being
> promoted core developer vanished a few months after that.  It's not a
> big deal in the grand scheme of things, though it *is* frustrating to
> spend your time mentoring and promoting someone (which also engages your
> own responsability, since you're the one vouching that they'll be up to
> the task) only to see that person produce little to no work as a core
> developer.

While it's sad, I don't think that we can prevent this. It's hard to
"force" someone to work for free on a free software during nights and
weekends.

>> * Review patches and pull requests. While we don't require not expect
>> newcomers to review, we expect that core developers dedicate a part of
>> their time on reviews.
>
> Yes, I believe this is the most important part of being a core
> developer.  What it means is that core developers care about the quality
> of the whole code base (and also the non-code parts), not only their own
> contributions to it.

I completed my list. I'm lazy, I copied/pasted what you wrote (not
only this paragraph) :-)

https://cpython-core-tutorial.readthedocs.io/en/latest/what_is_a_cpython_core_developer.html

>> * Know the CPython workflow. Be aware of the pre-commit and
>> post-commits CIs. How ideas are discussed. It's not only about writing
>> and pushing patches.
>
> This part is also required from regular contributors, at least the
> experienced ones.

Ah yes, I didn't say that these requirements are specific to CPython
core developers. Most items are "expected" from regular contributors.
I wrote it explicitly before my list :-)

> Two things I would add:
>
> - Know to be nice (...)
> - Show a bit of humility (...)

Oh, you're right. Thank you for being explicit on these points.

I think that we already expected this from promoted core developers,
just that it wasn't written down previously.

Victor