Subject: Bug#37078: Debian bug 37078 and 38116: "go team"

From: Alfie Costa <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 01 Jun 2004 03:33:29 -0400

Back in 2002, Andrew Ferrier wrote, on bug #37078 "Control system should 
notify original submitter":

"I would go further and say that all messages that are entered
into the BTS, via whatever mechanism, for a particular bug,
should be sent to the submitter of that bug."

This would be helpful, and should be the default BTS behavior, maybe 
with a toggle to turn it off.  I've posted a buglist message or two that 
should have been shorter, had I only known others had earlier posted 
something  to the same effect.

At present to find out if there's new stuff a user can poll the bug list 
web page, leading to an arithmetic progression of bandwidth waste, to 
say nothing of man-hours.  You'd have to download 'n' messages, where 
'n' is how many messages there are today, each and every time before you 
post.  The minimum total messages a user who polls would download over 
the course of a bug is a triangular number, some variant of n(n+1)/2, 
depending on the posting frequency.

Example, I post a bug and resolve to be thorough in checking for replies.

Day 1:  post bug.  Receive confusing reply from Erehwonian maintainer.

Day 2:  check web list to see if anyone replied to maintainer.  No. 
I've just DL'd the text of 2 messages I already have.  Then I write a 
reply to maintainer.  Before finishing, the phone rings, business calls 
me away.

Day 3:  finish writing reply to maintainer.  Now I can post it, but 
first I check the web list to see if anyone else has posted.  No.  So 
I've now DL'd the text of 2 messages I already have, twice; total 
redundant message DL's 4.  I post my message.

Day 4:  maintainer, still confused, replies.  Check list, nothing new, 
but I had to DL 4 messages to find out.  Total redundant message DL's 8.
Write reply slowly as to eliminate confusing parts.

Day 5:  double check reply, it's ready.  Check list, nothing new, DL 4 
messages,  Tot. Red. Mess.'s 12.  Send reply.

And so on.  If a reply takes much time to write, you have to check the 
list twice, once before you write it, and then before you post it.

When bugs turn into debates, bug lists can exceed 100K, at which point 
most posters are unlikely to poll the web list, so they miss messages 
relevent to them, and the debate collapses from collective fatigue and 
amnesia.

Though fine for short and simple bugs, the present web-based system 
doesn't scale well.

See also:

	#38116 bugs.debian.org: one should be able to subscribe to a
	particular bug
	http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=38116

...and a netiquette maxim:

	Read all follow-ups and don't repeat what has already been said
	http://www.use-net.ch/netiquette_engl.html#followup3

Note:  I'm cc'ing this post to some recent posters on the topic. 
Apologies if this is unwelcome.