Hey openedx-platform maintainers (@feanil, @UsamaSadiq , @robrap , @jristau1984), I want to talk about openedx-platform maintenance. A recurring problem I’m noticing that there are a handful of tasks which are monotonous, interrupt-ey, toilsome, and/or easy-to-forget, but in the end very important to keep openedx-platform development running smoothly. I’m thinking of things like:
- Fixing, reviewing, and merging weekly requirements upgrade PRs
- When a status check starts failing on master, figure out the cause and get it back to green.
- Keep an eye on the #dev channel for new problems which globally block development or break the repo build. Fix them if you can, or if not, then ticket them up and try to find someone else to resolve them. An example of this is the setuptools release from last month which broke both the master and ulmo builds for everyone.
Arbi-BOM used to take care of most of these, and since they disbanded, Feanil, Usama and I have kinda backstopped it as best we can, but we often fall behind or are caught by surprise at the interruptions.
I’d like to propose a lightweight “on-call” rotation between the named openedx-platform maintainers. Each engineer in the wg-maintenance-openedx-platform group would take two weeks where they are the primary person handling those tasks. The “on-call” hours would not extend out of standard working hours ( nothing on that list warrants working nights or weekends 
).
I’m also open to expanding the membership of the maintenance group to distribute the load across more people.
Let me know what you think!