Module maintenance: problems and oportunities

["Lucas Rocha" <lucasr gnome org>]

Hi all,

I've been checking our latest development releases (2.19.x) and
noticed that some modules haven't had any releases so far in this
development cycle. Here's a list of some of those modules:

- bug-buddy
- gedit
- gnome-applets
- fast-user-switch-applet
- gconf-editor
- gnome-icon-theme
- gnome-keyring-manager
- gnome-media
- gnome-nettool
- gnome-system-tools
- gnome-terminal
- gnome-utils
- vino
- yelp

And others...

Of course, the reasons for not releasing can vary a lot: no need, no
time, no one, etc. Let's try to turn our problems into positive
things. If you're maintainer of one of those modules and the problem
is lack of time and/or manpower, I suggest you to:

- Send a list of things you would love to see in your module but you
don't have time
 to do to gnome-love list

- Blog about this list so that it reaches Planet GNOME and the whole world!

- Try to dedicate some time to help new contributors to get used to
the module's
 code base

My point is: let's try to turn our lack-of-time-problem into
oportunities for new contributors. This way we decentralize the
workload and hopefully have better results. I know that giving support
for new contributors can be time consuming in the beginning but I'm
sure it pays off in the future.

Cheers!

--lucasr