Hi!

I recently posted a thread (Questions about patches...) which gave me some very useful information on how to create diff patches etc. and I now know how the whole process works thanks to two helpful members of the forum.

As stated in the thread I linked to above, I'm just setting out to do really trivial stuff like typo and grammar errors to start off with. As I'm planning on doing this for quite some time, I'm considering getting an SVN account. One main reason for this is because a lot of the edits that I'll be doing to the code are probably going to be very trivial and simple and I don't think that developers would like me posting/emailing patches for these kinds of things when I can just commit them without having to hassle people with requests. I know some people might see what I'm setting out to do as nitpicking, but I feel that it's a worthwhile contribution that I can make to the KDE project. It's something that I'm very confident about doing.

Are there any people on these forums who have SVN accounts? If so, do you think I'll have any trouble getting one? I've noticed on the application form that there's a space for me to type the name of someone who supports my request, but I don't actually have anyone who has encouraged me to apply for an SVN account. Do you think that this will lower my chances of getting one?

Thanks in advance for any replies!

You can send a mail to the KDE sysadmins to: sysadmin [at] kde [dot] org -- explaining why you need the account. They will review your application and process it accordingly.

Also read here: http://techbase.kde.org/Contribute/Get_a_SVN_Account

When I applied for one, I did not have a supporter. As long as you have a valid reason, then you will usually be granted an account.

A new contributor should still send patches whenever working on a new module.

Most maintainers do post-commit reviews, i.e. checking other people's commits to their code after the fact, but some like to check before committing.

Once you are an established developer this is less critical, though I personally always send a patch to the appropriate mailinglist when changing code in a module I have not worked on before.

Cheers,
_

Yes, I think the best way is, first to send you patches to the specific maillinglist.

When you have done that with a few patches, you will learn a lot about how things in KDE and the specific module you want to work on, are handled. When you then apply for a SVN account, you will easly find a supporter.

Oh, and for example plasma: They require a post commit preview even for quite well known "longtime" contributors. So, it changes from module to module how such things work. But when you are complete new you should always get a peer review of your patches.

Oh, and welcome to KDE. A lot of informations can be found on techbase.kde.org. And maybe you want to come by in the developer chat (#kde-devel on the freenode network).

You wrote about "typo and grammar" errors. If you were talking about errors in your local translation of KDE, you should should get in contact with the translation teams at http://i18n.kde.org/

anda_skoa wrote:A new contributor should still send patches whenever working on a new module.

DanielW wrote:Yes, I think the best way is, first to send you patches to the specific maillinglist.

Thank you both for that information. I've already submitted my first proper patch to the KDE Bug Tracking System so I'll see what the outcome of that is. I'll make sure to keep using patches until I'm confident enough on specific modules... then I'll try to contact one of the lead developers of that module to ask if they are comfortable with me using SVN to commit.

DanielW wrote:Oh, and welcome to KDE. A lot of informations can be found on techbase.kde.org. And maybe you want to come by in the developer chat (#kde-devel on the freenode network).

Thanks for the welcome and channel information!

DanielW wrote:You wrote about "typo and grammar" errors. If you were talking about errors in your local translation of KDE, you should should get in contact with the translation teams at http://i18n.kde.org/

They are actual errors with the default US English and not ones that are specific to my region (British English) and I'm aware that if there's a regional difference (i.e. color and colour) then I'm to contact the British English translation team about it.

Thank you for all your replies! I've already applied for the SVN account but I won't be too shocked if I don't get it. I'm sure I can re-apply in the future if needed once I've got to know some of the projects a bit better, yes?

xeriouxi wrote:Thank you for all your replies! I've already applied for the SVN account but I won't be too shocked if I don't get it. I'm sure I can re-apply in the future if needed once I've got to know some of the projects a bit better, yes?

Sure, that is no problem.

And in general: KDE svn accounts are quite easy to get. This whole process ist just to make sure that one wants to stay there for a little longer than just one or two weeks (for that you do not need a svn account) and that you know what you are doing and understand the basic rules (codying style, release shedule (features freezes and the like)) . And well just to know if you can trusted.

For that it is best to have seen a few of your patches and if possible see you an the maillinglist.

So i recommend to get on the maillinglist of your module/project of interessest (or if general kde-devel and kde-core-devel). And send patches there. And if there are questions about it discuss them there.

That way you will get known and you will learn them and the workings of the community.

See mail.kde.org for a list of the maillinglists. (And if you are interessted in Nepomuk development, there is a seperate ml not listet there, ask me)

Thanks, DanielW, for the extra information!

My SVN account request got accepted so it's good to know that I can move over to using it straight away once a few patches are checked over etc. for each module first. The email did actually say to make sure a couple of patches are reviewed by developers before I commit directly, hehe! I'm curious... is this a standard thing they put on every acceptance email or just for the unknown/unsupported people?

Thanks again to everyone who helped me out on this! :star: