[mythtv] Ticket locking and a PulseAudio fix

[Jeremy D. Jones]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: mythtv-dev-bounces at mythtv.org [mailto:mythtv-dev-
> bounces at mythtv.org] On Behalf Of Michael T. Dean
> Sent: Monday, May 09, 2011 8:30 AM
> To: Development of MythTV
> Subject: Re: [mythtv] Ticket locking and a PulseAudio fix
> 
> On 05/09/2011 08:36 AM, James Le Cuirot wrote:
> > I wish to express my concern at how tickets are sometimes being
> handled
> > by the developers, in particular with regard to how PulseAudio users
> > are being treated as second-class citizens. Now I know that some of
> you
> > have strong opinions about PulseAudio and you are obviously entitled
> to
> > those opinions. You are even entitled to refuse your time to work on
> > PulseAudio issues yourselves but please do not lock such tickets
> > without good reason. This prevents users from talking about these
> > issues or even providing possible fixes without posting to this list
> as
> > I am doing today.
> 
> The ticket was locked /because/ the ticket is not the place for
> discussion.  All discussion belongs on the mailing list, and bug
> reports
> and information relevant to fixing the bug should be the only
> information in the bug database.
> 
> When people start discussions on the ticket, it causes an explosion of
> comments in Trac.  Since there's no way to sort the comments by
> "value",
> the only way for developers to find the important information is to
> read
> every single comment when they begin working on the ticket or when they
> have some code that may fix the issue.  Not trying to speak for other
> developers, but if fixing a bug requires me to do a couple hours of
> reading through 100+ comments in a ticket, I can guarantee I won't be
> fixing bugs--I'll be spending what free time I have available for
> MythTV
> work reading tickets (and the inability to actually make progress will
> lead to my setting aside less time to work on MythTV, so ...)
> 
> If the comments on the ticket are left to get out of hand, the
> developer
> will never find the pertinent information buried among the "me too"
> comments or the comments from users who didn't understand the problem
> and reported additional, unrelated information (perhaps regarding
> issues
> with similar symptoms or where the last logging was similar or
> whatever).  Therefore, at a certain point, the developer is almost
> guaranteed to ignore all the comments--including those that provided
> critical/relevant information.  Then, the ticket will be closed with a
> fix that seems reasonable to the dev, but if it fails to take into
> account certain information that was buried in the comments, the person
> who brought up that important information will need to create a new
> ticket once the original is closed to get the "rest" handled properly.
> So, locking the ticket isn't a punishment for those who have something
> important/useful to say--it's instead a way of making sure they're
> heard.
> 
> Therefore, /all/ discussion should occur on the list (here), then, if
> some information is deemed important enough, or if a patch or something
> else the developer will need when fixing the issue comes about from
> that
> discussion, it should be put on the ticket (or a link to the important
> post on the list should be put on the ticket).
> 
> > The issue at hand is http://code.mythtv.org/trac/ticket/9579. Pausing
> > playback currently causes one CPU core to use up 100%. jyavenard
> simply
> > locked the ticket stating that using ALSA:pulse works for him.
> 
> Pretty sure that was an "in the meantime, while I figure out what I'm
> going to do" suggestion.
> 
> That said, here /is/ the right place for a discussion.  So, if you
> really want to discuss the issue in #9579, please create a new thread
> here on the list with the ticket number in the subject (i.e. "Ticket
> #9579
> 100% CPU on one core when paused"--generally replying to the ticket
> e-mail from the -commits list works perfectly) to make it easy to
> find/relate back to the ticket.
> 
> Thanks,
> Mike


Mike,

That was well said, and personally having made the same mistake, I think
something like that would be a good addition to "How to Create a Ticket."
(http://code.mythtv.org/trac/wiki/TicketHowTo)  

It may save repeating the same thing every other month, since that link is
in red letters on every ticked at the top of the page.  

I suppose I could add that.  I really don't know.  I guess I'll do some more
reading on how to contribute to the wiki.

Jeremy