Poll Created Sat 4 Oct 2025 9:14AM
OpenSSL Open Pull Request Triage Effort Closed Sat 11 Oct 2025 4:00AM
What is this poll about?
I have a group of university students (BSc level) tasked with OpenSSL community service this semester (fall 2025). One of the outcomes of yesterday's BAC / TAC meeting in Brno was that perhaps these students could help triage the backlog of open PRs in the OpenSSL GitHub repository. The students would NOT perform technical reviews, but rather gather and organize metadata, and possibly initiate conversations via GitHub comments on these PRs to ping folks and help move the PRs towards resolution.
Why is this important?
The OpenSSL repository currently has hundreds of open PRs, many of which are outdated, inactive, or lack sufficient information for maintainers to take action. We're hoping students can help identify which PRs are still relevant, which need attention, etc., and grease the wheels to get things moving.
What are you asking people to do?
What information should the students collect, and what actions should they take? Here is a preliminary list I came up with, please indicate which ones you think are relevant, and propose others. Please note there is a distinction between collecting information and engaging, and both are in scope.
Results
| Results | Option | % of points | Voters | |||
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Is the PR author still interested in pursuing the change? | 6 | 5 |
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What is the current PR status according to the PR author? | 6 | 5 |
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Applies to currently supported OpenSSL version? | 6 | 5 |
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Has the author signed a CLA? | 6 | 5 |
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Last Activity Date (comment, commit, etc.) | 6 | 5 |
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Associated GitHub Issue (if any) | 6 | 5 |
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Author GitHub Handle | 6 | 5 |
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PR Title | 6 | 5 |
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PR Number | 6 | 5 |
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Number of code reviews initiated | 5 | 4 |
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Number of approvals received | 5 | 4 |
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Names of reviewers and approvers (if any) | 5 | 4 |
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PR labels / tags | 5 | 4 |
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Are the PR labels / tags (if any) accurate? | 5 | 4 |
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Is the author still active on the OpenSSL GitHub repo? | 5 | 4 |
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Is the author still active on GitHub in general? | 5 | 4 |
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Date Opened | 5 | 4 |
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Merge conflicts with target branch? | 5 | 4 |
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| Undecided | 0 | 1 |
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5 of 6 votes cast (83% participation)
Jeff Johnson Sat 4 Oct 2025 9:14AM
That is already a pretty comprehensive list and should be very helpful in the triage effort. The onlyother thing I can think of is "bug fix" or "feature" but I guess that's coverend in the title anyway probably. Thanks Billy for pulling this together. I like all of these. I'll vote for them all. I expect a nice AI generated chart that should help us figure out what ineeds to be tackled first. Or maybe a recommendation to close about 1/2 of them :). Anyway, thanks again.
-jj
Paul Dale Sat 4 Oct 2025 9:14AM
I'm unconcerned about the history of the PR, rather about how to move it forward.
Randall Becker Sat 4 Oct 2025 9:14AM
I think all of these data points are relevant
James Bourne Sat 4 Oct 2025 9:14AM
All data points are relevant.
Billy Brumley Sat 4 Oct 2025 9:14AM
Thanks for feedback, folks. I (or heck, maybe the students themselves) might split these into what can be automated for data collection, and what requires a manual touch.
Billy Brumley · Fri 10 Oct 2025 7:11AM
Jeff, good point on the prioritization -- will keep it in mind.
Paul, thanks for the opinion. In a way, you're putting more weight on the engagement ones. I personally think those are important, since one of the biggest parts of "move it forward" is getting buy-in from the OP. I found this blog post I'll have the students go through.
James and Randall, yall are aligned. After the students start mining the data, will be interesting to circle back and get their perspective on what the found particularly useful (or not) in the end.
Happy Friday, folks :) Was fun seeing a bunch of yall in Czech Republic these past couple weeks!