Quoting guenther+smartlist@gac.edu:
This is where I see what happened as telling about the procmail & SmartList communities: who was there to take on maintainence of either of these packages? How many people at that point had submitted more than one patch or chunk of code to either procmail or SmartList? The list at the bottom the README file would seem to indicate that you could
I wrote some addons (confirmation, remote administration) for SmartList but found it difficult to participate in the development. E.g. although I sent several emails to you with a small patch for x_command it isn't included in the latest SL release. I also wasn't sure if addons would be considered at all. Together with Peter Hartzler I wrote a new SL FAQ. I couldn't found any word about it in the latest SL package. It's mentioned on procmail.org but not in the package. I think it wouldn't be bad to include a FAQ into the package.
count those people on one hand, and that's still true today. To ensure stability, that number should probably be greater than 20, with at least
I don't think that the requirement for open software development is a certain number of active people. There are very successful projects with only a handful people.
a handfull (not one!) having write access to the source. It appears that the SmartList and procmail communities are too small, too content, too busy, or too inexperienced to _sustain_ Open Source development. Until those conditions disappear, procmail and SmartList will be in danger of becoming unmaintained. The status of the lists is just a reflection of this.
I don't think that the SmartList and procmail communities are too small. A lot of people are using this tools without problems. They are only users, satisfied with the features of Procmail and SL and have no demands to join the mailing lists or to improve the code.
That the SmartList community is too small, too disinterested, too busy, or too powerless to change it. Guess what: it's *true*!
I think it's a strength of the SL community (or family?) to stay on the SL list although it was flooded with spam ;) To ensure the future of Procmail/SmartList I could contribute the following: - Running and maintaining the SL mailing list (with Smartlist) - searchable Webarchive for the SL list - (web)CVS for Procmail and SL packages Implementation within 2 weeks Since my internet connectivity isn't the best and because of time restraints I wouldn't act as a primary ftp site for packages and wouldn't run the procmail list. That's just a proposal. If someone else has better facilities I will be happy. Werner