On Mon, Aug 17, 2020 at 10:54 PM Anurag Thakur <[email protected]> wrote: > > (I searched the mailing list archives, but could not find anything related to > this topic, so here goes: ) > > Freetype is an essential library, generating what billions of eyes see > worldwide everyday, this means that any improvement made here would have a > huge impact all around the world. It also means that it is an attractive > attack vector for hackers, so the code must be bug free. I believe that the > current development setup is suboptimal for a library this important and > would like to suggest some improvements. > > #1: Migrate development over to github: > Host the git repo on GitHub, use the GitHub issues and PR tracker instead of > GNU Savannah and e-mail > > Benefits: > 1. Makes contribution easier: > GitHub is the most popular code hosting platform used by millions of > projects, and as a result, most open-source developers already know how to > use it, reducing the need to learn new tooling as compared to GNU Savannah > and email which are much less common. > > 2. Visibility: > It is much easier for a curious developer to navigate a GitHub repository > than to clone the repo and scour mailing lists looking for patches and code > reviews. > > 3. Easier for newbies : > GitHub has *excellent* documentation about almost everything related to git > and GitHub, so new developers can get acquainted with version control easily > and quickly. It should also help GSOC students focus on their task instead of > navigating around obsolete UI. > > 4. Attracts younger developers: > Stuff like hacktoberfest, the GitHub student developer pack ensures student > Dev's from around the world are on GitHub, effectively increasing potential > contributors. Even if not code, it makes it easier for developers to just > stop by and give suggestions in comments to PRs or issues. > > 5. Productivity features: > GitHub has many features that make contributing to as well as reviewing code > easier. A beautiful interface, code review tools to suggest changes per > line!, a powerful issue tracker with labels, duplicates, milestones etc., > ability to create a wiki, managing releases, a mobile app so you can post > suggestions on open issues while laying on your bed!! etc. > > It even has a cli!! > > > Overall, it is much easier to open issues on GitHub, send patches via PRs and > the tight integration means you can easily manage PRs that close specific > issues, milestones etc. > > #2: Join GitHub sponsors program: > Text rendering has a profound impact on the user experience and there would > be many people willing to sponsor improvements to text rendering, > particularly linux folks, so it would be great if there was a way to channel > their support. > > Benefits: > Increase incentive for developers to contribute to freetype, the money could > be used to hire part time devs, support website infrastructure, etc. > > #3: Use GitHub actions: > GitHub actions can be used to setup a ci for freetype and make issue/PR > tracking easier with bots. > > Benefits: > You can have all kinds of testing and fuzzing for all supported architectures > *for free* , this would be very helpful in improving code quality and > preventing regressions, and would ultimately lead to increase in robustness > of the library. It would also be helpful in automating workflows, for example > generating docs on a new release using GitHub actions with freetype-docwriter. > > Overall, the proposed changes would decrease friction for new developers, > increase the amount of contributions, incentivise development, and provide a > pleasent user interface for code contribution, review and management. > > > There are many successful FOSS projects being developed on GitHub: opencv, > harfbuzz, curl, rust, vscode and thousands more, so it would be great to join > them. > > These are my points (I am a newbie too), I hope this post starts a discussion > and we are able to reach a conclusion.
you mentioned ci (there are several ones) but in addition : coverity (static analysis) and coveralls (API coverage) regards Vincent Torri
