[Mageia-dev] Contributors using real name/working email? or not? or maybe?

Thu Mar 3 15:00:01 CET 2011

Hi there,
+
+in the past few days/hours, on sysadmin list has a discussion arisen
+about publishing packager email into commit/change log; you can check
+the whole thread, here are three starting points of it:
+
+ * https://mageia.org/pipermail/mageia-sysadm/2011-March/002946.html
+ * https://mageia.org/pipermail/mageia-sysadm/2011-March/002952.html
+ * https://mageia.org/pipermail/mageia-sysadm/2011-March/002955.html
+
+And you would perhaps like to read the whole thread; not everyone
+agrees there. The discussion slipped to whether:
+ * packagers/contributors [sh|w]ould use & publish their real name (as
+registered in identity),
+ * packagers/contributors [sh|w]ould publish their contact email (same),
+ * in their contributions to the project (here, in the changelog),
+ * if it should be strictly enforced or not, and why.
+
+for practical or personal reasons. It's a general, pretty key matter,
+it's been rightly suggested to raise the point here, so here it is.
+
+We can't enforce anything unless we decide on this first and this
+thread is here to gather views. What we (Council) will decide later on
+about this depends on the outcomes of the discussion (and if we ever
+decide or not btw). It will be part of the project's privacy policy.
+
+And please try to keep this discussion to the point, focused and
+civilized; state your views, don't infer on others' ones, stay cool.
+Or your point will become shallow and the discussion will be wasted.
+
+The points to decide here are:
+ a) should a contributor provide a public email address, to be used in
+changelogs, commits and everywhere her contribution to the project
+needs an id or contact id? (for instance changelog, commit, document
+authoring)
+ b) should a contributor provide a real name for the same goals? or is
+a fake name/alias ok, as long as there are people that do know/meet
+the person?
+
+I won't comment on pros and cons below (not exclusive of others), but
+those were raised in the discussion before:
+
+The pros (as in "yes one should"):
+ - that is the common way used in MDV and other major distributions
+ - (email or name) it identifies the author of a change to the project/code
+ - (email) it helps identifying & contacting directly someone in the
+project (peer review or any ad hoc matter)
+ - (email & name) it helps building confidence among contributors and
+from the outside
+ - (name) it encourages people to adopt a consistent behaviour
+ - (email & name) it builds one's contributions list for
+future/outside reference
+
+The cons (as in "no, one should be free not to")
+ - public email addresses get spammed
+ - personal preferences to not reveal one's name
+ - there are situations where anonymity is a requirement or "nice to
+have" (from a personal or corporate point of view)
+ - it will encourage people to contact directly contributors instead
+of using other expected channels
+
+Note that one may use a fake name/identity anyway to stay anonymous
+(but unless one already has a network of trust within a group, she
+would not have a past public record to help building her new
+reputation).
+
+What is at stake is the accountability for each contributor, hence for
+the whole project. What will matter is what one does and how.
+
+And again, let's have this point discussed in a cool, informative,
+constructive and efficient way, please.
+
+Cheers,
+
+Romain
+