3D model release plan, and the parts Git repo in general
Howdy folks.
I wanted to draw attention to an issue I filed in the 3d parts github repo; I don't think many people see those issues, and I wanted to see what people here thought of it:
https://github.com/prusa3d/Original-Prusa-i3/issues/94
The issue above focuses on an ask for a formal release process around part revisions, so that we can track releases back to specific Git commits, and in general follow the changes to designs. There's a lot of derivative concerns here, like "are the parts downloadable off the website even the same parts as the ones in the Git repo?" and "are the parts in the most recent commit to the Git repository 'released', or are they experimental?". There needs to be a more formal process around part design releases and the Git repo. Please comment on that ticket if you have any constructive suggestions for how that process could be improved.
I think a larger conversation is worth having, though, about how the community engages with the parts designs. It seems to me, and please correct me if I'm wrong, that the part models are developed in-house at Prusa Research, stored in internal tooling of some sort, and only moved into the public Git repository as part of the release process? That the Git repository is not part of the day-to-day development cycle of the hardware designs, the way it is for the Slic3r PE and firmware projects? It's worth noting that while Prusa Research developers are active in the software repositories and often accept pull requests, the parts repository is handled by customer service.
If my understanding is correct, this is similar to the read-only Git mirrors you sometimes see in Github. Because they're not the system-of-record for the parts files, its difficult to integrate community-developed changes that community members try to submit as pull requests. There's quite a few pull requests both open and closed in the parts repo, and I don't think I've seen one clear case of an accepted one.
https://github.com/prusa3d/Original-Prusa-i3/pulls?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=is%3Apr
I think it's great that Prusa Research is committed to publishing their designs under an open-hardware license. But to really see the benefits of an open design, we need a mechanism for back-and-forth engagement with the community, so that improvements can be developed and submitted for inclusion.
What do you think?
Re: 3D model release plan, and the parts Git repo in general
+1...I think. Seems to be some confusion as there's already at least one revision to R3 apparently.
Re: 3D model release plan, and the parts Git repo in general
I'd like Prusa to also be a successful business as they create new and innovative Prusa printers. One of the challenges to this in an open source world is cheap clones. Whether or not open source can support an up to the latest nanosecond sharing and a successful business in a clone hostile environment is an open question. It might require a bit of delay in releasing all the details and possibly some obfuscation. I'm not a fan of this sort of thing in general, though I'd rather put up with it than have another orphaned printer company - especially one providing many significant innovations and real customer support. It's a fine line and personally I'm willing to tolerate a bit of uncertainty. That said, I agree we could at least use more clarity in whatever process definition Prusa is using.
DJ
Re: 3D model release plan, and the parts Git repo in general
@djspathis Sure, I can easily accept that business concerns affect open source policies. But I don't think anyone is served by there being ambiguity over which parts were released to production when. And in the extreme case, if there are part fixes that aren't being published for strategic reasons, then that steps over the line where I don't believe you can reasonably call a project "open source" any more.
More importantly, the spirit of open source is not "give away free stuff, because open source". The goal is a mutual benefit for all involved, by facilitating 2-way give-and-take between a project's users and its developers. The project should benefit from the enthusiasm of the users who are identifying problems and developing proposed solutions, and in return the users should benefit by having ready access to the sum result of those improvements. Open source is not a marketing ploy, and it's not charity - the intent is to leverage the efforts of users to produce a more successful product.
So for this specific situation, I believe Prusa Research would benefit by streamlining the process for accepting, evaluating, and publishing community improvements in a way that's visible to everyone, and not just a "we'll forward this on to the engineers, thank you for your comments". And I believe that being up front about which versions of the hardware have been reviewed and approved for production is a reasonable ask to effectively organize that community involvement.
After all, it's how they're already operating their firmware and Slic3r projects.
Re: 3D model release plan, and the parts Git repo in general
@Jonathan, Thank you for clarifying; I agree with you. I was only trying to point out that any ambiguity seems temporary and hopefully unintentional. I too advocate for a collaborative open source process benefitting participants and users alike. I agree that chaos is not a useful process though achieving a repeatable and continuously improving process takes time and effort. The fist step IMHO is acknowledging the need.
@Prusa, can we have a comment, please?
DJ