[Osmf-talk] [OSM-talk] "The Future of Free and Open-Source Maps" Slashdot.org , Saturday February 17, 2018

[Ilya Zverev]

I don't think your first suggestion is right. As I see it, when developers do something in OSM, they solve some of their own issues. Like, when it is hard to work with multipolygons or no way to quickly edit an object, or to browse all imagery layers at once in my case. "Glory" in open source, especially in OSM, is a myth. So what developers really think is, "if I spend my free time on something, I want it to be merged / not outright deleted, at least". And we often don't get even that. Unless we work on our pet projects, not contributing to an existing project.

As for coordination, we in EWG would warmly welcome anybody with developer management experience and ideas on how to organize and facilitate development in OSM.

Ilya

> 20 февр. 2018 г., в 13:44, Simon Poole <simon at poole.ch> написал(а):
> 
> Actually I think this is more  indicative of why software development is so inefficient in OSM than anything else. 
> There are plenty of developers in OSM space, but when they do something 
> - It is mainly ego driven, quite understandably so "if I spend my free time on something, I want the glory", with the result that it is nearly impossible to get people to work together on an existing project,
> 
> - it is completely uncoordinated, the EWG just went through a process of gathering and prioritising important tasks, Bryan creates a parallel effort to bolster his election platform so we end up with duplication of effort even at a meta level, not to mention that most devs can't even be a****d to mention on the dev list that they intend to work on something and by that don't get important requirement information (for example information on GDPR related requirements).
> 
> SImon
> 
> Am 20.02.2018 um 08:57 schrieb joost schouppe:
>> This discussion shows once again how great we are at generating smart ideas. That definitely is not our problem. But all ideas are equal and will only get executed if the one who posited them executes them. As the project becomes more complex, that means you can either play in a corner by yourself, or try to effect change as an individual. It also means power to the devs and the time-rich, not to the community at large. None of which is optimal. 
>> We need a way to turn a thread into competing ideas, and to turn winning ideas into actions. I'm not sure how we can do that, but I'm enthousiastic about Bryan Housel's just-do-it project of using a github issue tracker for that (see his position statement for the OSM-US elections [1]). I agree with emacsen that having such things run by a single developer is probably the worst possible solution, but I think this is a good enough idea to be worth a shot for being organised at OSMF level.
>> 
>> 
>> 1: https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/User:Bhousel
>> 
>> 
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