[savannah-help-public] [sr #106581] doing something about stale jobs?

[Assaf Gordon]

Follow-up Comment #4, sr #106581 (project administration):

Hello Karl, Brandon,

If you agree, I'm going to pickup this cleanup issue.

But my stance is different:
I think clean-up / purging should be very aggressive.

Here's my rationale:
1. Broadly speaking, every free-software project could use more
developers/contributors.
I could automatically post a "help wanted" for every project on GNU Savannah,
detecting the project's main programming language and asking for a developer
with relevant experience - and it will be valid forever.

2. Because of #1, I think that generic posts (especially old ones) are not
adding any value or providing any information beyond the obvious, and as such
can and should be closed.

3. If a post has been seen stale for a year - I would take it as either:
there's no interest from volunteers; or that the post's wording is
ineffective; or something similar.
In all cases, the post is not working, and should be closed.
It's reasonable to notify the developer who posted it, and he/she should
consider posting a new message.

4. While I don't have any statistics to support this claim (I'll be glad to
try gather them), it's my unsubstantiated impression that the job posting on
Savannah is not the most popular/effective way to recruit developers - these
days there any many more popular methods 'out there' (which, obviously, did
not exist when Savannah just started).
Perhaps this could be improved, or perhaps it should be evaluated if this
feature is still useful.

To conclude,
If my approach is acceptable, I'll do the following:
1. For messages older than 3 years and inactive projects (no commits in last 3
years), I'll mark the post as deleted.
2. For messages older than 3 years and active projects, I'll contact the
developer and give notice before marking as "deleted".
3. Messages of 3 years or less, contact developers.

To put things in perspective, out of 129 posting:
1 is from 2014, 5 are from 2013, 2 are from 2012, 5 are from 2011.

Let me know what you think.
 - Assaf.


    _______________________________________________________

Reply to this item at:

  <http://savannah.gnu.org/support/?106581>

_______________________________________________
  Message sent via/by Savannah
  http://savannah.gnu.org/