Add a chapter on maintainers

Closes: https://bugs.gentoo.org/705472
Closes: https://github.com/gentoo/policy-guide/pull/1
Signed-off-by: Michał Górny <mgorny@gentoo.org>

1 files changed, 73 insertions, 0 deletions

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+Package Maintainers
+===================
+
+.. index:: maintainer; adding
+
+Adding new maintainers
+----------------------
+:Source: QA
+:Reported: no
+
+Developers must not add other developers as package maintainers, unless
+the developers in question consent to that.  Developers must not add
+projects that they are not members of as package maintainers, unless
+one of the project members explicitly agrees to that or the project
+policy explicitly permits it.
+
+*Rationale*: this policy aims to prevent package maintainers being added
+as backup maintainers without their consent or knowledge.  What's worse,
+once the original maintainer resigns the packages frequently drop
+to backup maintainers who are neither interested in maintaining them,
+nor often aware why they are listed as maintainers.
+
+For example, developers used to frequently add Python team as a backup
+maintainer to various packages not fitting the project's profile.  This
+includes various end-user programs written in Python.  Many of those
+packages ended up being maintained solely by Python, and distinguishing
+them from packages actually within project's profile was hard.
+
+
+.. index:: maintainer; new packages without
+
+New packages without a maintainer
+---------------------------------
+:Source: QA
+:Reported: no
+
+It is explicitly forbidden to add new packages without a dedicated
+maintainer.  This does not apply if the package in question is not
+technically a new one but merely split out of unmaintained package.
+
+*Rationale*: Gentoo is currently suffering from a very large number
+of packages without a maintainer.  There is a small group of developers
+trying to fix them as necessary.  It is unfair and inappropriate
+to increase their maintenance burden by adding new packages and refusing
+to take care of them.
+
+
+.. index:: maintainer; removing
+.. index:: up for grabs
+
+Removing package maintainers
+----------------------------
+:Source: QA
+:Reported: no
+
+When removing maintainers from a package, the developer must reassign
+all bugs filed for it.  Furthermore, when removing the last maintainer
+for a package, the developer must add the following comment
+to ``metadata.xml``::
+
+    <!-- maintainer-needed -->
+
+Furthermore, the developer must send an 'up for grabs' mail
+to gentoo-dev mailing list, containing the list of packages with
+no maintainer.  If possible, please include any information that could
+be helpful to future maintainers.
+
+*Rationale*: reassigning bugs is necessary to make sure that old bugs
+are not lost assigned to developers who are no longer interested
+in them.  The maintainer-needed comment is meant to make it possible
+to easily grep for unmaintained packages.  The 'up for grabs' mails aim
+to increase the chances of packages finding a new maintainers (compared
+to them silently becoming maintainer-needed).