[Scummvm-devel] Understaffing (Was: What is happening to the ScummVM team?)

[Johannes Schickel]

Max Horn schrieb:
>> I guess this is the least important point. If all other developers  
>> test
>> their code properly we do not need too much managing seeing that our
>> code base is mature enough for most tasks. Maybe we should add some
>> guidelines / tips on various work processes.
>>     
>
> I don't think it's that simple. For starters, people in general can't  
> test their code properly: engine authors can't test all ports, porters  
> don't have all games available. Bummer.
>   

Yeah that is true, still I guess we still have potential, me included, 
in improving that situation.

> On the other hand, developers are humans and forget to do things, and  
> sometimes need... coercing. I send tons of mails behind the scenes  
> talking to people, pleading them to make changes or fixes, sometimes  
> even sending patches I made myself blindly. Very often there is little  
> to no reaction, but at least sometimes good comes from it. From my  
> perception, a lot of the degrading quality indeed comes from the fact  
> the Eugene and me put far less energy and effort into the whole thing  
> than we used to. Maybe I am wrong and/or deluded, but I believe that  
> we *did* make quite a difference when we constantly nagged people  
> about fixing that bug, or just digged in ourselves to fix up stuff.

Partly true. I actually guess that isn't something which had to be done 
by the leads. For engine subteams the maintainer should do it for 
example. And after all in theory everyone should be able to do that :-).

>  I hope it doesn't sound arrogant, but looking at <https://sourceforge.net/tracker2/reporting/index.php?atid=418820&what=techall&span=&period=lifespan&group_id=37116 
>  >, Kirben, Eugene and me really made an impact there ;-). Even though  
> I'd actually prefer if bug handling was spread over more people,  
> reality is that many devs don't like tracking and fixing bugs as much  
> as writing new code...
>   

Actually seeing that Kirben is no official lead shows that the problem 
does not lie in us not having enough team leads, imho.

>> Actually I guess if an engine is not maintained the probability that
>> regressions are introduced is low. Of course there could be possible
>> regressions when code in common/ etc. is changed and the engine would
>> need to be adapted. But apart I guess regressions are mostly  
>> introduced
>> because someone working on an engine changes / adds functionality. If
>> that is the case we have of course someone with knowledge about the
>> engine. I guess the problem here is really that not every person  
>> working
>> on an engine is interested in all games supported by that engine :-/.
>>     
>
> You are right to a degree, but nevertheless we *do* get regressions in  
> these engines on occasion. Or discover old bugs. Or get problems  
> specific o a port. And we do lots of changes to common, graphics,  
> sound and backends all the time, and indeed, all of these can (and  
> sometimes do) cause regressions, even without anybody touching the  
> engine.
>   

Of course we do get regressions. And actually the idea is to only reduce 
the probability of that.

> [...]
> So, if someone reads this and is interested in working on this, he is  
> welcome to send / commit his patches :-)
>   

I might actually take a look into it, but currently I am personally also 
a bit busy with real life.

// Johannes