random library: Request for Carter Tazio Schonwald (@cartazio) to step down as maintainer with immediate effect

[Alexey Khudyakov]

On 03.06.2020 17:02, Profpatsch wrote:
> I think a lot of other people feel the same way, so I encourage you to
> add your voice publicly.

Vector needs maintainers too. For the last few years it was maintained 
in very dysfunctional manner. Last release 0.12.1 (2020.02.01) contained 
several bug fixes and improvements that lived in master for years(!). 
Here is incomplete list:

  - Empty storable vectors in GHCi error with divide by zero. #167
     Reported: 2017.05.01
     Fixed:    2017.05.03
  - Add Unbox instances for everything in base #185, #194
     Merged: 2018.02.12
  - Add NFData1 instance for boxed vectors #233
     Merged: 2019.01.14
  - Implement partitionWith #176
     Merged: 2017.06.05

For reference 0.12.0.3 was uploaded on 2019.04.30. Discrepancy between 
state of master and what is released on hackage created a lot of 
questions. On 2019.09.30 Alexey Kuleshevich reported issue #258:

 > This seems like a related ticket #167 that was fixed on master over
 > two years ago in this commit 3e2bd9f, but somehow was never released
 >
 > Guys, what's going on with vector release process? Some unknown 
branch > is being used for releases, but all changes go to master? Not 
only bug > fixes are not getting released on hackage, but new tickets are
 > constantly being opened because of this problem, here are just couple 
 > that I've seen recently: #256 #255

To which Carter promptly responded:

 > V0.12 branch series is the most recent release.
 >
 > Unit is semanticly uniformstive for strict array representations.
 >
 > I’m going to edit the ticket title and your message to focus on the
 > constructive parts. This complaining element doesn’t help anyone :)

Notably Carter removed question about release process from issue text. 
Then discussion about release process unfolded and resulted in exactly 
nothing being done.


Questions about release didn't stop and on 2019.12.18 two we asked.
One by Callan McGill (#264)
 > Currently you cannot use an Unboxed vector with Any, All, Sum,
 > Product. I think there should be instances of the form:

Carter didn't answer it but another one by Fumiaki Kinoshita started 
discussion (#265):
 > #185 is merged two years ago, and there are various improvements/fixes
 > but I don't see anything on Hackage. What's the blocker? Is there
 > anything I can help?

Carter then responded:
 > I’m doing the vector backlog this week and next week over the
 > holidays. Thanks for your patience.

Quite predictably nothing happened again. Question about release and 
adding more maintainers we asked without any real answer. In the end 
issue was closed  with rather bizarre message:

 > Locking again because a policy conversation on an issue tracker is not
 > the right forum and I’m cutting a release shortly. “Pick a person”
 > isn’t a very precise strategy. Iin all for having another maintainer
 > but who.
 >
 > Let’s discuss this in email or video call but not drive by ticket
 > comments.

At some later point issue was removed altogether. Discussion then moved 
to #266 and finally some useful work by several people started being 
done. Vector 0.12.1 was released on 2020.02.01. Notable changes from 
release branch (it isn't master) are still not merged back to master (#302).


So what we have at this point:

  - Vector is basically unmaintained. Release process is broken. PRs get
    merged and then then just hang around without being release

  - Even worse he is very allergic to questions about release policy,
    maintaiership, etc. He locks and even deletes(!) issues. This is what
    caused parent post.

All in all vector badly needs maintainers.