[Numpy-discussion] Homu

[Nathaniel Smith]

Hi all,

As an experiment, I just enabled @homu on the main numpy repository.
Basically what this means is that there's a bot named @homu, and if
someone with appropriate permissions posts a comment on a pull request
that says:

@homu r+

then homu will (a) doublecheck that the pull request still passes
tests when merged into current master, and (b) if it does, then go
ahead and hit the green merge button for you. ("r+" is mozilla-ese for
"I approve this patch"; @homu comes out of the rust/mozilla
community.)

So you can still hit the big green button if you want, no change
there, but this provides a second option with a few advantages:

- Normally, a green light from Travis just means that the PR passed
the tests when it was submitted. If master has changed since then,
things might have become broken, but you'll never know until after you
merge it and master turns red.

More minor advantages:

- You can approve a PR before Travis has even finished running, and it
will automatically be merged iff the tests pass.

- In theory, it should be possible to put someone on the @homu
permissions list without adding them to github proper, which would
mean that they have the ability to push to the repository via
PRs-that-pass-tests-and-trigger-notifications, but can't do a direct
commit directly into master that doesn't create any notifications. Not
sure if this is really useful, but hey.

- You don't have to merge-and-then-comment-saying thanks, you can just
post a single comment, saving two entire mouse clicks. Efficiency!

Anyway, seemed worth taking for a spin and seeing whether we liked it;
we can always turn it off again if not. I think that everyone who has
commit access to numpy/numpy is also listed on @homu's access list --
if I missed anyone just let me know.

Links:
  http://homu.io/
  https://www.reddit.com/r/rust/comments/39sogp/homu_a_gatekeeper_for_your_commits/
  http://graydon.livejournal.com/186550.html
  http://homu.io/q/numpy/numpy

-n

-- 
Nathaniel J. Smith -- http://vorpus.org