Using Stale bot to clean up issues

Using Stale bot to clean up issues

[GUNNAR MILLS]

 From some discussion on IRC.
We have a lot of old issues (primary in openbmc/openbmc).
I came across Stale bot, https://github.com/apps/stale
An example of the bot in action: 
https://github.com/boostorg/beast/issues/1235

Is anyone opposed to using this bot to help clean up our issues?

I was thinking we could start pretty lax,  6 months of inactivity to 
mark stale and 1 month of inactivity before a stale issue is closed.
Would like to see this enabled on all our repos, but could start with 
openbmc/openbmc.

If no one is opposed, Brad could you install this bot?

Thanks!
Gunnar

Re: Using Stale bot to clean up issues

[Ed Tanous]

On 2/7/19 11:26 AM, GUNNAR MILLS wrote:
> 
> Is anyone opposed to using this bot to help clean up our issues?
> 

Have we looked at what a majority of our issues are getting stale from?
If a majority is lack of feedback from the submitter, I might be in
favor, but we need to be careful we don't accidentally sweep things
under the rug just because we don't have the manpower to get them fixed
right away.

-Ed

Re: Using Stale bot to clean up issues

[GUNNAR MILLS]

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On 2/7/2019 5:13 PM, Ed Tanous wrote:
> Have we looked at what a majority of our issues are getting stale from?


Just in  openbmc/openbmc there is 467 issues. 281 are older than a year 
and 78 are older than 2 years.
Some of them are a lack of feedback from the submitter. A pretty large 
percentage I don’t know if they are still an issue.

I feel this many issues is unmanageable. From the stale bot README:
"In the experience of the maintainers of this app—and the hundreds of 
other projects and organizations that use it—focusing on issues that are 
actively affecting humans is an effective method for prioritizing work.

To some, a robot trying to close stale issues may seem inhospitable or 
offensive to contributors. But the alternative is to disrespect them by 
setting false expectations and implicitly ignoring their work. This app 
makes it explicit: if work is not progressing, then it's stale. A 
comment is all it takes to keep the conversation alive."

I feel strongly we should do something like this to manage our issues.

- Gunnar



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Re: Using Stale bot to clean up issues

[Brad Bishop]

On Thu, Feb 07, 2019 at 03:13:53PM -0800, Ed Tanous wrote:
>
>
>On 2/7/19 11:26 AM, GUNNAR MILLS wrote:
>>
>> Is anyone opposed to using this bot to help clean up our issues?
>>
>
>Have we looked at what a majority of our issues are getting stale from?
>If a majority is lack of feedback from the submitter, I might be in
>favor, but we need to be careful we don't accidentally sweep things
>under the rug just because we don't have the manpower to get them fixed
>right away.

Can you elaborate on the need for care?  It isn't obvious to me.
Thinking out loud... If an issue is closed by the bot that we didn't
want closed, can't we just reopen it?  And if noone notices...it wasn't
that important in the first place?

Re: Using Stale bot to clean up issues

[krtaylor]

On 2/8/19 6:23 PM, GUNNAR MILLS wrote:
> 
> On 2/7/2019 5:13 PM, Ed Tanous wrote:
>> Have we looked at what a majority of our issues are getting stale from?
> 
> 
> Just in  openbmc/openbmc there is 467 issues. 281 are older than a year 
> and 78 are older than 2 years.
> Some of them are a lack of feedback from the submitter. A pretty large 
> percentage I don’t know if they are still an issue.

Maybe what we need is a fix it week! Oh yeah, we have tried that. :) But 
seriously, maybe just old issue review is good enough for now? 
Priorities can change (increase) over time and some old forgotten issues 
my be important enough to fix now, or may add an important twist for a 
new design.

I understand the desire to keep it open due to lack of resources for 
fixing it, but a year? 2 years? Yeah, let's close 'em.

> I feel this many issues is unmanageable. From the stale bot README:
> "In the experience of the maintainers of this app—and the hundreds of 
> other projects and organizations that use it—focusing on issues that are 
> actively affecting humans is an effective method for prioritizing work.
>
> To some, a robot trying to close stale issues may seem inhospitable or 
> offensive to contributors. But the alternative is to disrespect them by 
> setting false expectations and implicitly ignoring their work. This app 
> makes it explicit: if work is not progressing, then it's stale. A 
> comment is all it takes to keep the conversation alive."

As long as the issue is closed and not deleted. I just want someone to 
be able to find an issue and reopen it, and retain all the previous 
discussion history. Of course, that assumes that someone will search 
closed issues before opening a new one, but still.

> 
> I feel strongly we should do something like this to manage our issues.

SGTM.

Where are you planning on hosting it?

Kurt Taylor (krtaylor)

Re: Using Stale bot to clean up issues

[GUNNAR MILLS]

On 2/11/2019 5:41 PM, krtaylor wrote:
>
> As long as the issue is closed and not deleted. I just want someone to 
> be able to find an issue and reopen it, and retain all the previous 
> discussion history. Of course, that assumes that someone will search 
> closed issues before opening a new one, but still.
>
Yeah, they will just be closed, not deleted and my thought was to start 
pretty lax.

Don't touch them until 6 months of inactively and then another month of 
inactively in this "stale" state before closing. We can revisit this later.


>
> Where are you planning on hosting it?
>
No need to host it anywhere. It is a GitHub App.
https://developer.github.com/apps/about-apps/#about-github-apps

I installed it on a personal repository, just a couple clicks!

Need to be "an organization owner or have admin permissions in a 
repository to install a GitHub App".  Will then need a .github/stale.yml

- Gunnar

Re: Using Stale bot to clean up issues

[Gunnar Mills]

On 2/11/2019 9:50 PM, GUNNAR MILLS wrote:
>
> Don't touch them until 6 months of inactively and then another month 
> of inactively in this "stale" state before closing. We can revisit 
> this later.
>

> Need to be "an organization owner or have admin permissions in a 
> repository to install a GitHub App".  Will then need a .github/stale.yml
>
Are there still concerns or can we install this Stale bot?
https://github.com/apps/stale

- Gunnar

Re: Using Stale bot to clean up issues

[krtaylor]

On 2/26/19 4:03 PM, Gunnar Mills wrote:
> 
> On 2/11/2019 9:50 PM, GUNNAR MILLS wrote:
>>
>> Don't touch them until 6 months of inactively and then another month 
>> of inactively in this "stale" state before closing. We can revisit 
>> this later.
>>
> 
>> Need to be "an organization owner or have admin permissions in a 
>> repository to install a GitHub App".  Will then need a .github/stale.yml
>>
> Are there still concerns or can we install this Stale bot?
> https://github.com/apps/stale

Please?  :)

I like the 7 month window because I could see a issue being created at 
the beginning of a cycle and not being touched until the next. We can 
then make an effort to check the "stale" ones as they are tagged.

Kurt Taylor (krtaylor)

Re: Using Stale bot to clean up issues

[Gunnar Mills]

On 2/26/2019 4:03 PM, Gunnar Mills wrote:

>
> Are there still concerns or can we install this Stale bot?
> https://github.com/apps/stale
>
>
Stale bot was installed on openbmc/openbmc. If any issues get tagged 
'stale' that you would like *not* to see closed, just add a comment. :)

Thanks,
Gunnar