| > Some projects attract more inexperienced developers than others. Fair. > In many ways community submitted pull requests are a "million monkeys at a million typewriters." I strongly disagree with this assertion. To argue that community cannot be lead or directed toward a common goal is very pessimistic. Sure, Joe in Idaho has a specific itch, but there's a good chance there is an opportunity to capture Joe's enthusiasm and willingness to do work on the project by working with him instead of treating him like a code-monkey at a keyboard. Community relations is hard because dealing with people is hard. > 1. Tools that help maintainers cultivate the submitters talent pool on their project. Yes, I agree that this is someplace where some tools would help tremendously. > Github can help me discover what is happening to that function elsewhere. Great idea. I'd love to see a "related diffs" tool for a given piece of code. > So many of us are code-first, conversation-later types and that constantly conflicts with the social nature of our job. I totally agree. Ultimately, tools will only get us so far; people skills must fill in the rest. Making "Joe" feel welcome and a part of the creative process requires measures of patience, kindness, gentleness and mentorship. |