[jsdl-wg] Tracker status values proposal

[Andreas Savva]

Donal,

[Sorry if this appears twice. I'm having connection problems.]

Donal K. Fellows wrote:

> Andreas Savva wrote:
>
>> Automatically closing the tracker is the default setting in the 
>> tracker creation form but it is configurable. And I always change 
>> these settings (they are evil) so that gridforge does not 
>> automatically close artifacts. It is not particularly useful in our 
>> situation.
>
>
> While I'd agree with that, I have to admit that I really don't like
> changing the meaning of any predefined terms even locally. It makes it
> very hard for people to transfer knowledge from one part of the system
> to another. (Auto-closing tracker items is useful when you have many
> poor-quality tracker items submitted, such as happens with many software
> bug report DBs; we don't have that problem.)


I don't think we are really changing completely the meaning of the
'Pending' state; refining it, yes. It is a pity that GGF didn't set up
the  default tracker creation with a more useful set of state values.
Perhaps something can be done in the future, but that shouldn't stop up
from improving its usability now.

The alternative is do nothing. Or define other values and ignore the
Pending value but  I would find it more confusing to have a value that
has no meaning in the status value list.

>
> I've no real problem with the states themselves (I'd love to see a state
> diagram of course, but that's just because I like state diagrams. :^)
>
> [Thanks for the explanation. It helped a lot.]


Good to hear. (Michel did seem to hint about a state diagram in his last
email.)