README.cvs-commits, HACKING, AUTHORS, etc files

[Telsa Gwynne <hobbit aloss ukuu org uk>]

The subject came up on gnome-bugsquad of CVS modules with empty
AUTHORS (and so on) files. 
http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-bugsquad/2002-December/msg00022.html

Chatting with Luis, I can't find written down anywhere what should 
be in that and related files: specifically, MAINTAINERS. So I poked 
around. I think the info is all there, but split across different places. 

The programming-guidelines.sgml in gnome-docu mentions using
the GNU Coding Standards. A quick scamper through "info standards"
finds README, INSTALL and COPYING mentioned in the "release" section
and NEWS in the "documentation" section. There's a "Maintaining GNU
software" document at http://www.gnu.org/prep/maintain.text but that
doesn't add anything. (Well, actually, I note with interest that
it says maintainers should thank users for every single bug report, 
but that's not the issue here :)) 

So, looking at old gnome-hackers posts, particularly this thread:
http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gnome-hackers/2001-March/thread.html#00191
here's my guess on the remaining files. 

AUTHORS                 Original author(s)
MAINTAINERS             Current maintainer(s)
README.cvs-commits      Rules for committing
HACKING                 What you need to build it (libs, special instructions)

esound's a good example of the need for separate AUTHORS and MAINTAINERS
files, I reckon :) The AUTHORS file is huge!

I realise (now) that when we (the release team) said that notes for
the build sheriff should go in HACKING, we messed up according to
the g-h thread I mentioned above; but presumably our collective 
memory of g-h was not that long. 

Is the above list a good rule of thumb? Are there others I have
forgotten? In case this spirals into a long discussion, I'll 
mention that the original comment on bugsquad was specifically
about the AUTHORS file; although I imagine that for many modules
knowing the current maintainer is more useful.

Telsa
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