The open-source generation gap

Posted May 24, 2016 4:51 UTC (Tue) by BlueLightning (subscriber, #38978)
In reply to: The open-source generation gap by marcH
Parent article: The open-source generation gap

I'm not sure where you got "mailing-list-backed database" - that implies that the mailing list is the storage medium. Yes, the mailing list is still the input - but it isn't the database itself. Messages posted to the list that are patches are picked up by patchwork and loaded into a database, which allows patchwork's web interface perform well enough to be practical. That isn't part of what Damien has implemented, either - that's how patchwork has worked for years.

The open-source generation gap

Posted May 24, 2016 5:44 UTC (Tue) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]

I did take a shortcut or two: everything is explained fantastically well in Damien's blog which is the only reason why I pointed at it - not because he implemented everything from scratch.

The general clumsiness and brittleness of automating populating a patch and review database from a mailing-list is relatively clear when reading Damien, especially for anyone having used any vaguely modern code review tool like Github. Comparing it to for instance Gerrit (not a very high bar...), the only area where patchwork might be barely ahead of Gerrit is around the concept of a series: a very recent addition I believe.