<html><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div>We never really came to a consensus on this question, and I'd like to try to do that. To be clear, here is the proposal:</div><div><br></div><div>1) Remove the @author lines from the code, and instead rely upon SVN as the official master record of individual contributions</div><div>2) Change the Eclipse preference files to remove the @author lines from the code templates</div><div>3) Add a AUTHORS file to the distribution(s); this file will contain the names and email addresses for all contributors, and can even allow a contributor to describe their contribution if they so desire. </div><div>4) Change the headers to remove the "@author" wording and to replace it with "See the AUTHORS file in the</div><div>distribution for a full listing of individual contributors." </div><div>5) Change the POM files to include the AUTHORS file in each distribution.</div><div><br></div><div><div>The AUTHORS file would look like this:</div><div><br></div><blockquote class="webkit-indent-blockquote" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 40px; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; ">Randall Hauch (<a href="mailto:rhauch@redhat.com">rhauch@redhat.com</a>)</blockquote><blockquote class="webkit-indent-blockquote" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 40px; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; ">John Verhaeg (<a href="mailto:jverhaeg@redhat.com">jverhaeg@redhat.com</a>)<br>Dan Florian (<a href="mailto:dflorian@redhat.com">dflorian@redhat.com</a>)<br>Stefano Maestri (<a href="mailto:stefano.maestri@javalinux.it">stefano.maestri@javalinux.it</a>)<br>Serge Pagop (<a href="mailto:Serge.Pagop@innoq.com">Serge.Pagop@innoq.com</a>)<br>Michael Trezzi (<a href="mailto:michael@mathwizard.org">michael@mathwizard.org</a>)<br>Alexandre Porcelli (<a href="mailto:porcelli@devexp.com.br">porcelli@devexp.com.br</a>)<br>Sergiy Litsenko (<a href="mailto:litsenko_sergey@yahoo.com">litsenko_sergey@yahoo.com</a>)</blockquote><blockquote class="webkit-indent-blockquote" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 40px; border-top-style: none; border-right-style: none; border-bottom-style: none; border-left-style: none; border-width: initial; border-color: initial; padding-top: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; "><br></blockquote><div>Note that unlike the @author tags, this file will list all contributors, and the names of new contributors will be appended to the list by the project lead. (No names will be removed from this file.)</div></div><div><br></div><div>I would prefer to hear from every contributor, so please respond with +1 if you agree with this proposal, 0 if you don't care, or -1 if you want to keep the @author tags. If you vehemently want to keep the @author tags and names in the source file, please say so.</div><div><br></div><div>Best regards,</div><div><br></div><div>Randall</div><div><br></div><div><div>On Nov 18, 2008, at 3:33 PM, Randall Hauch wrote:</div><br><blockquote type="cite"><div><br>On Nov 18, 2008, at 2:52 PM, Stefano Maestri wrote:<br><br><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">Randall Hauch wrote on 17/11/08 22:17:<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">I've recently read a suggestions for open source communities that the<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">author names are removed from the content. In the case of DNA's<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">codebase, that would mean removing the @author tags.<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">May I ask where?<br></blockquote><br>I knew someone was going to ask. :-) I had to go back and look, but here are a few:<br><a href="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4216011961522818645&ei=8o0YSbiFOY6qrgLC2PnLDQ&q=poisonous+people">http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4216011961522818645&ei=8o0YSbiFOY6qrgLC2PnLDQ&q=poisonous+people</a><br><a href="http://docs.ofbiz.org/display/OFBADMIN/Coding+Conventions">http://docs.ofbiz.org/display/OFBADMIN/Coding+Conventions</a><br><a href="http://subversion.tigris.org/hacking.html#other-conventions">http://subversion.tigris.org/hacking.html#other-conventions</a><br><a href="http://blogs.sun.com/ahe/entry/author_tags">http://blogs.sun.com/ahe/entry/author_tags</a><br><br><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">tags:<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"> 1. When there are no @author tags, then there is a far smaller<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"> notion of ownership by the author(s). On one side of this, the<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"> author(s) may not appreciate changes to "their" code, and on the<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"> other side, non-authors may feel intimidated about working on<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"> code for which they are not an author. IMO, we want to<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"> _discourage_ ownership and _encourage_ everyone to work in any<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"> area of the code they want.<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">+1...but is really @author tag intimating someone, or giving ownership<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">to some other? Quiet frankly not for me.<br></blockquote><br>I hope it doesn't discourage people from contributing and diving in wherever they want. BTW, it's quite possible that no matter what our policy, some people may not like it. For example, if we were to adopt a policy of NOT including @author tags, some people may refuse to join the community because they see the @author tag as proof they worked on it. It takes all kinds of people. :-)<br><br><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">Anyway I agree on the _discurage_ownership and _encourage_everyone to<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">work in any area, so if it can help, remove @author tag.<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"> 1. @author tags can be inaccurate. SVN has the true history of who<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"> contributed exactly what code.<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">+1<br></blockquote><br>IMO, this is perhaps the biggest justifiable reason. Its rubbish if its not up-to-date, so it seems far better to not have @author tags.<br><br><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">The only benefit I can think of is that the @author tag does help to<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">give some notion of who is the "expert" of the class, in case they<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">need to be consulted. However, I don't believe this is really much of<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">a reason, since it's far better to consult the SVN history and see who<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">actually modified the different parts of the code. In fact, the<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">annotated views in Fisheye even show on many of the lines the name of<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">the last person to change it. For example,<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">see <a href="http://fisheye.jboss.org/browse/DNA/trunk/dna-common/src/main/java/org/jboss/dna/common/i18n/I18n.java?r=120">http://fisheye.jboss.org/browse/DNA/trunk/dna-common/src/main/java/org/jboss/dna/common/i18n/I18n.java?r=120</a><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">abosolutely better to use fisheye...if fine people of JBoss.org would<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">also mind to upgrade it to a more recent version it would be even<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">better. Also Jira integration may help a lot.<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">I would just add that if we decide to remove the tag we have to change<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">also the license information at the beginnig of any file which say:<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">/* 2<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><<a href="http://fisheye.jboss.org/browse/DNA/trunk/dna-graph/src/main/java/org/jboss/dna/graph/GraphI18n.java?r=598#l2">http://fisheye.jboss.org/browse/DNA/trunk/dna-graph/src/main/java/org/jboss/dna/graph/GraphI18n.java?r=598#l2</a>><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">* JBoss, Home of Professional Open Source. 3<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><<a href="http://fisheye.jboss.org/browse/DNA/trunk/dna-graph/src/main/java/org/jboss/dna/graph/GraphI18n.java?r=598#l3">http://fisheye.jboss.org/browse/DNA/trunk/dna-graph/src/main/java/org/jboss/dna/graph/GraphI18n.java?r=598#l3</a>><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">* Copyright 2008, Red Hat Middleware LLC, and individual contributors 4<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><<a href="http://fisheye.jboss.org/browse/DNA/trunk/dna-graph/src/main/java/org/jboss/dna/graph/GraphI18n.java?r=598#l4">http://fisheye.jboss.org/browse/DNA/trunk/dna-graph/src/main/java/org/jboss/dna/graph/GraphI18n.java?r=598#l4</a>><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">* as indicated by the @author tags. See the copyright.txt file in the 5<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><<a href="http://fisheye.jboss.org/browse/DNA/trunk/dna-graph/src/main/java/org/jboss/dna/graph/GraphI18n.java?r=598#l5">http://fisheye.jboss.org/browse/DNA/trunk/dna-graph/src/main/java/org/jboss/dna/graph/GraphI18n.java?r=598#l5</a>><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">* distribution for a full listing of individual contributors.<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><br>Yes, we'd have to update the headers.<br><br>Best regards,<br><br>Randall<br><br></div></blockquote></div><br></body></html>