Using name instead of initials

stéphane ducasse ducasse at iam.unibe.ch
Tue Sep 13 09:31:15 UTC 2005


Ok for me I will start to always use my firstnamename instead of  
initials
and I will update my SM account once you have multiple ids.

Goran it was not clear to me that SM was more than a catalog.
May be you should market it a bit more :)


On 13 sept. 05, at 08:45, goran at krampe.se wrote:

> Hi!
>
> Samir Saidani <saidani at info.unicaen.fr> wrote:
>
>> goran at krampe.se writes:
>>
>>
>>> Hi!
>>>
>>> Samir Saidani <saidani at info.unicaen.fr> wrote:
>>>
>>>> I agree with you, but I think we don't need to ask for an  
>>>> agreement :
>>>> just replace your initials sd by 'StephaneDucasse'. Then you can  
>>>> use
>>>>
>>>
>>> Mmm, and if everyone start changing their initials we need to  
>>> deal with
>>> the fact that there is already lots of code out there with the old
>>> initials too.
>>>
>>
>> True, that's why I keep the old one and my old squeakmap account to
>> tackle this problem. Anyway there is probably initials which
>>
>
> Yes, I have seen several people doing the same. That is good at least.
>
>
>> correspond to nothing in squeakmap since the initials convention was
>> taken before squeakmap.
>>
>
> Note that I migrated all known initials that were written down in the
> Squeak Swiki page when I released SM2. Sure, all aren't there though.
>
>
>> Another way should be to change all my
>> initials in the next release by the new "initial" : I will see how to
>> do this kind of script. For the older image, I keep the old squeakmap
>> account for a while, then delete it after few years, since probably I
>> will unable (and don't want) to answer questions of what I did few
>> years ago : just read the code and consider that it is anonymous.
>>
>
> There is a problem with that, see below.
>
>
>>>> Some people wants initials and other wants something more  
>>>> explicit. I
>>>> think that the economic way is to choose by default something like
>>>> 'DavidSmith' which is more explicit than 'ds' : 'StephaneDucasse'
>>>> encodes more information than 'sd', and we don't need to make a
>>>> connection to SqueakMap to know the name : so it is economic.
>>>>
>>>
>>> There is no "connection to SqueakMap". You have the SqueakMap  
>>> instance
>>> inside your image - the lookup is just a Dictionary lookup, no  
>>> network
>>> involved.
>>>
>>
>> Anyway, replace "connection" by "calling instances", this is the same
>> : dissipation of energy, when it is not necessary. The initial can
>> encode easily this kind of information - the name.
>>
>
> Sure, I agree that having a more readable convention of what we use as
> dev initials is fine. But I still think it should be used as the  
> key to
> SM, because there we have more information about you, like your email
> for example.
>
>
>>> So let me recap what I think:
>>>
>>> 1. We need unique ids of some kind. The developer initials has  
>>> served
>>> this purpose until now, and sure, it is not perfectly readable -  
>>> but it
>>> is what we have and we need to think a bit IMHO.
>>>
>>
>> So let us think a bit now. For me, I see that this is economic to
>> encode the name into the "developer initials".
>>
>
> I only agree if we still make sure this is the key to your account  
> on SM
> and that we make sure we keep track of old dev initials, again see  
> below
> why this is important.
>
>
>>> 2. If we want to have a more readable field then we seriously  
>>> need to
>>> consider the fact that just renaming our ids to something else will
>>> cause "information loss". If I rename myself to "GoranKrampe",  
>>> then all
>>> code with "gk" will be hard to map to me.
>>>
>>
>> See above, we can also maybe give the possibility to have at least  
>> one
>> alias for developer initials in squeakmap : keep the old one if you
>> want and let us use a readable one.
>>
>
> After chatting yesterday with some people on #squeak several people
> wanted the ability to enter multiple "old" dev initials on SM. So  
> fine,
> I will add a field for that in which you can enter a space separated
> list of old ids. They will still have to be unique, so the old ids are
> "forever booked".
>
>
>>> 3. Adjust the tools so that we stuff not only the initials but  
>>> also the
>>> full name into changesets and MCs. Then we have both and all are  
>>> happy.
>>>
>>
>>
>>> And of course, I am not sure how serious problem we have - but it  
>>> seems
>>> less smart if people start renaming their dev initials so that we  
>>> lose
>>> the ability to track all old code...
>>>
>>
>> I see that I made an error by using an unreadable developer name,  
>> so I
>> decide to get a new readable name for developer name. For the  
>> tracking
>> old code issue, personally I never contact a developer for a question
>> in one particular method for few particular lines after few
>> years/months : it will be silly.
>>
>
> Now, the whole point with being able to track *indefinitely* is a  
> simple
> one: code ownership
>
> That code is copyrighted by you and it is vitally important for open
> source projects to keep track of where code comes from. Just see the
> whole SCO vs Linux shebang.
>
> So no, I don't think it is fine to simply "forget" old dev ids.  
> That is
> a bad thing. Hopefully it is now clear why I think we need to "think a
> bit" before we start changing dev ids all willy nilly. Ok?
>
>
>> Cheers,
>> Samir
>>
>
> regards, Göran
>
>




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