Why Optimistic Merging Works Better
The article discusses the concept of Optimistic Merging (OM) as a strategy for building open source communities. It contrasts OM with the traditional Pessimistic Merging (PM) approach, highlighting the drawbacks of PM, such as discouraging new contributors and fostering a negative environment. OM promotes quicker integration of patches, encouraging collaboration and innovation while minimizing the potential for conflict within the community.
- ▪Optimistic Merging (OM) allows for quicker integration of code patches without waiting for extensive reviews or testing.
- ▪Pessimistic Merging (PM) often leads to delays and discourages new contributors, creating a negative atmosphere.
- ▪OM fosters collaboration and innovation by encouraging contributors to work together and learn from each other.
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pieterh wrote on 16 Nov 2015 15:14 I spoke at DomCode in November 2015 (excellent conference, small and beautiful city!) explaining my top rules for building open source communities. One person asked me later to explain why I recommend to merge quickly, without waiting for Continuous Integration testing to finish, and without review of the code. I'm going to call this strategy Optimistic Merging or OM. Here's the reasoning behind OM. Standard practice (Pessimistic Merging, or PM) is to wait until CI is done, then do a code review, then test the patch on a branch, and then provide feedback to the author. The author can then fix the patch and the test/review cycle starts again.
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Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at Hintjens.
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