[darcs-users] [issue1141] using the BTS as a patch tracker

[Trent W. Buck]

On Sat, Oct 11, 2008 at 11:12:51AM -0400, David Roundy wrote:
> On Sat, Oct 11, 2008 at 8:53 AM, Trent W. Buck <trentbuck at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On Sat, Oct 11, 2008 at 12:15:13PM -0000, David Roundy wrote:
> >> [...] And in the future, I'd prefer if you didn't copy
> >> bugs at darcs.net on patches.
> >
> > Hmm, my intent was to (ab)use the issue tracker as a patch tracker, so
> > people who are interested in a few patches -- but not general
> > discussion -- can track the status of those patches.
> 
> The trouble is that replies to your email don't go to the same issue
> in the bug tracker, so it doesn't work well as a patch tracker.
> There's been talk of setting it up to handle this, but there isn't any
> consensus.  If you think there's something that's worth putting into
> the issue tracker, then you can first create the issue, and then make
> your patch resolve the issue.

Ah, I should have seen that.  I have similar issues trying to link
Debian bugs to roundup bugs.

> > In particular, I expect it to be useful for patches that are
> > *rejected*, because they stay visible in the issue list instead of
> > vanishing into the list archive.  It means that the rationale stays
> > visible next time someone reinvents the same patch, avoiding the need
> > to rewrite the same rationale again when rejecting the new patch.
> 
> I think the list archives ought to be a useful resource, but they
> somehow don't seem to be.  I'm not convinced that old and neglected
> bugs are really more useful than old and neglected email threads.

I think it's more obvious in the BTS which old issues are neglected
and which are merely done -- that's what the "status" property is for.
To me, that alone makes it easier to do periodic sweeps for old
patches that could do with re-examination.