JOSM enhancements vs. separate plugin

[Dirk Stöcker]

On Wed, 9 May 2018, Jo wrote:

> I guess it all depends on availability of time of the core team. What
> surprises me is that plugins that everybody probably have installed like
> buidings-tools and utilsplugin2 are not 'adopted' into core.

No single plugin has more than 50% user base. Even not the ones 
automatically installed with windows installer.

> That probably tells you something about how likely it is that others 
would be.

No. It tells you nothing.

As utilsplugin2 is specifically our "not ready or wanted for core" 
test plugin your comment is even less useful.

> 2018-05-09 7:25 GMT+02:00 Jiri Hubacek <jiri.hubacek at gmail.com>:
>>
>> I would like to ask question about the JOSM enhancements. Where is the
>> line between functionality acceptable upstream and the feature that
>> should be in separate plugin?
>>
>> The concrete example - I wrote some script for automatic creation of
>> residential area around the selected buildings. I rewrote it to Java to
>> be able to push it upstream but it looked too specific to be included in
>> "Tools" menu. So I created the plugin (mapathoner). Are there any
>> guidelines for these decisions?

There are guidelines, but they are not easy to explain. It is a personal 
decision based on a few major questions:

- is the function interesting for a large part of the user base
- does it fit into the overall concept of the editor
- is it mature enough to be in the core
- do we want to be responsible for it in the future
- does the LICENSE match the core requirements
- is there already a similar functionality

So chances for generic important mature functions with no similar feature 
existing are good. For others not.

Ciao
-- 
http://www.dstoecker.eu/ (PGP key available)