4 ms·

I don't think that projects actually attract serious contributors by moving to GitHub.

by sfk 12y ago

iagooar 12y ago
Would you elaborate? What is a serious contributor in your opinion?
- sfk 12y ago
  Someone who cares about the project and the code rather than peripheral issues like the choice of VCS, the hosting location or "social coding".
  - Alupis 12y ago
    Github allows for people to discover projects to be passionate about that they may not have discovered otherwise. Before Github, the primary means individuals discovered projects was just by stumbling upon random websites... often times ones that hadn't been updated in who-knows-how-long. Github clearly shows the health of a project by providing at a glance how long ago the most recent commit was, how many people have contributed to the project, how many people are "following" the project, how many contributions via Pull Requests are pending, etc.
  - iagooar 12y ago
    I think that given the popularity of Github, there is a good chance of finding serious contributors.
  - detaro 12y ago
    i wouldn't call them "peripheral" if they have in parts led to a fork of the project already (See discussion of of vim contribution process and it's pains otherwise in this thread)
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
brunosutic 12y ago
Even if it attracts "just" serious code-reviewers that provide detailed bug reports that's a big win.
Alupis 12y ago
I disagree. I've been loosely involved in 2 open source projects which were previously hosted on self-hosted SVN repos. After a move to Github, not only did the projects pick up new developers, but also gained a bit of visibility. Github is something unique in my experience... it really is the "place to be" for developers wanting visibility (for any reason). A lot of folks use it as sort of a resume of skill and activeness in the community, and having public projects contributed to under their account serves to bolster that reputation.
- sfk 12y ago
  And is it a good thing to outsource one's resume to a company that somehow, at some point has to justify a $100.000.000 investment by Andreesen & Horowitz? How are they going to do that? By selling private repos?
  - Alupis 12y ago
    > How are they going to do that? By selling private repos? Well, yes. Github makes most of their revenue from Github Enterprise ($5,000+ per year) for large organizations.
    - sfk 12y ago
      And that revenue is large enough to justify the investment?
to3m 12y ago
It's possible. But if they just attract drive-by patches that people like, that's fine too. Contributions from a wider range of people, that add features they're looking for (no matter how minor) will make the project more appealing to more people. The GitHub workflow for this - submitting a patch to a project you're not heavily involved with - is very good, and probably a large contributor to the way GitHub is eating everything. No need to subscribe to a mailing list, and no need to get involved with discussions you might not be interested in. But you can easily commit to staying subscribed to your pull request/issue thread. Of course, that may not suit all changes - but as a default, I think this arrangement a good one.
floatboth 12y ago
Yeah. Why would anyone on GitHub contribute to the original Vim when there's Neovim?
- pydave 12y ago
  Vim is still usable for day-to-day work: it works on Windows, it has a gui binary, it's a stable build and not a beta. People are going to have bug reports/fixes for what they're using. Also, fixes seem to be flowing from vim to neovim.
josinalvo 12y ago
I'll offer you a 10$ to 5$ bet: Take 10 migrated github repos at random (1) If they did not increase(2) the number of serious(3) contributors, I lose 10$. If they did, you lose 5$. (1) random sampling: take a repo by using the last digits of a public number (like, say, the nasdaq index). Eliminate repo if "too small" or "not migrated", until you have 10 (2) compare 1 year before github to 1 year after. This gives you three numbers: at start of first year(A), at start of migration(B), at end of migration(C). N1=B/A, N2=C/B. If avg(N1) not > avg(N2), you win (3) serious means 20 contribs in the year (further terms will be settled upon if you want to bet, before you accept) --- (btw, I think it might not mean much to VIM that it moved =P)
- sfk 12y ago
  You misunderstand completely. Of course small random projects like flappy-bird-in-cobol may benefit from a migration. I'm talking about well established projects. Also, the metrics you propose are quite meaningless. There are contributions that actually waste core developer's time but are grudgingly accepted either for political reasons or to shut up the proponent. These kinds of contributions are certain to increase by a migration to GitHub.
  - josinalvo 12y ago
    Ok. How would you quantify "meaningfull contributions" ?

I don't think that projects actually attract serious contributors by moving to GitHub.

by sfk 12y ago

I don't think that projects actually attract serious contributors by moving to GitHub.

iagooar 12y ago

Would you elaborate? What is a serious contributor in your opinion?

sfk 12y ago
Someone who cares about the project and the code rather than peripheral issues like the choice of VCS, the hosting location or "social coding".
- Alupis 12y ago
  Github allows for people to discover projects to be passionate about that they may not have discovered otherwise. Before Github, the primary means individuals discovered projects was just by stumbling upon random websites... often times ones that hadn't been updated in who-knows-how-long. Github clearly shows the health of a project by providing at a glance how long ago the most recent commit was, how many people have contributed to the project, how many people are "following" the project, how many contributions via Pull Requests are pending, etc.
- iagooar 12y ago
  I think that given the popularity of Github, there is a good chance of finding serious contributors.
- detaro 12y ago
  i wouldn't call them "peripheral" if they have in parts led to a fork of the project already (See discussion of of vim contribution process and it's pains otherwise in this thread)
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]

brunosutic 12y ago

Even if it attracts "just" serious code-reviewers that provide detailed bug reports that's a big win.

Alupis 12y ago

I disagree. I've been loosely involved in 2 open source projects which were previously hosted on self-hosted SVN repos. After a move to Github, not only did the projects pick up new developers, but also gained a bit of visibility. Github is something unique in my experience... it really is the "place to be" for developers wanting visibility (for any reason). A lot of folks use it as sort of a resume of skill and activeness in the community, and having public projects contributed to under their account serves to bolster that reputation.

sfk 12y ago
And is it a good thing to outsource one's resume to a company that somehow, at some point has to justify a $100.000.000 investment by Andreesen & Horowitz? How are they going to do that? By selling private repos?
- Alupis 12y ago
  > How are they going to do that? By selling private repos? Well, yes. Github makes most of their revenue from Github Enterprise ($5,000+ per year) for large organizations.
  - sfk 12y ago
    And that revenue is large enough to justify the investment?

to3m 12y ago

It's possible. But if they just attract drive-by patches that people like, that's fine too. Contributions from a wider range of people, that add features they're looking for (no matter how minor) will make the project more appealing to more people. The GitHub workflow for this - submitting a patch to a project you're not heavily involved with - is very good, and probably a large contributor to the way GitHub is eating everything. No need to subscribe to a mailing list, and no need to get involved with discussions you might not be interested in. But you can easily commit to staying subscribed to your pull request/issue thread. Of course, that may not suit all changes - but as a default, I think this arrangement a good one.

floatboth 12y ago

Yeah. Why would anyone on GitHub contribute to the original Vim when there's Neovim?

pydave 12y ago
Vim is still usable for day-to-day work: it works on Windows, it has a gui binary, it's a stable build and not a beta. People are going to have bug reports/fixes for what they're using. Also, fixes seem to be flowing from vim to neovim.

josinalvo 12y ago

I'll offer you a 10$ to 5$ bet: Take 10 migrated github repos at random (1) If they did not increase(2) the number of serious(3) contributors, I lose 10$. If they did, you lose 5$. (1) random sampling: take a repo by using the last digits of a public number (like, say, the nasdaq index). Eliminate repo if "too small" or "not migrated", until you have 10 (2) compare 1 year before github to 1 year after. This gives you three numbers: at start of first year(A), at start of migration(B), at end of migration(C). N1=B/A, N2=C/B. If avg(N1) not > avg(N2), you win (3) serious means 20 contribs in the year (further terms will be settled upon if you want to bet, before you accept) --- (btw, I think it might not mean much to VIM that it moved =P)

sfk 12y ago
You misunderstand completely. Of course small random projects like flappy-bird-in-cobol may benefit from a migration. I'm talking about well established projects. Also, the metrics you propose are quite meaningless. There are contributions that actually waste core developer's time but are grudgingly accepted either for political reasons or to shut up the proponent. These kinds of contributions are certain to increase by a migration to GitHub.
- josinalvo 12y ago
  Ok. How would you quantify "meaningfull contributions" ?