[drupal-support] CVS Procedures and Protocols

[Eric Scouten]

Gunther Herzog wrote:

>   1) What is the shortest learning curve to
>   submitting a patch? I do have CVS-NT and
>   Tortoise (though the latter is not installed
>   yet). System is Win2K Pro.

I don't know CVS-NT, but I can say that Tortoise has a very nice, short 
learning curve. Once you've installed it, you can simply right-click on 
the patched file and choose "Make Patch". It creates a patch file in the 
appropriate format, saves it where you choose (default: desktop), and 
opens it for you so you can give it a quick once-over before submitting.


>   2) Since I want to work with something
>   resembling production-quality, I'm on 4.6.2, not
>   CVS, though some of the modules I've patched are
>   CVS because they aren't available for 4.6.2 --
>   how are all these related? Are there functions
>   and features in Core CVS that the CVS modules
>   rely on?

Depends on a case-by-case basis. Some APIs have changed between 4.6.x 
and current CVS. They may not be backwards-compatible.


>   3) What is the most accepted protocol for
>   updating another author's module(s)? Email the
>   author directly first? Report a bug but don't
>   mention the patch unless there is a long wait
>   for issue resolution?

Submit a bug report against the module on drupal.org. If you have a 
patch, submit that with the bug report and set the issue status to 
"patch (code needs review)".

If there's a long delay, send an e-mail ping to the module author. (Use 
the Drupal contact form on their user account page if you don't know the 
address.)

-Eric


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