[IDEA/PRE-RFC] PHP Core Mentorship Program

14 years ago by David Coallier — view source

unread

Hey all,

Let me start by saying that this is merely an idea I'm trying to put
together and before doing so, I need to see who would be interested.

A short while ago, the Python community created something called "The
Python Core Mentorship Program" [1][2] which is essentially an attempt
to lower the barrier of entry to the Python core for new developers,
students, etc. and connect everyone together in a more cohesive manner
where people actually talk and interact. I strongly believe in such
initiative and believe this is something we should also think about.

Simply put, I'd love to put something together for the PHP
core/internals where the goals of the program would be, not unlike the
Python project, to get a few internals (Zend Contribs (Stas are you
reading this? :P), Core contribs, PECL extensions developers,
documentation maintainers) to be willing to help newcomers and provide
a more comprehensive understanding of the contribution processes,
internal trickeries, optimisations, etc.

The general idea is to create a channel between the rest of the world
and the internals of PHP where more experienced developers can
transfer their knowledge and get a fresh perspectives from new
developers that haven't approached the core before.

Before continuing further into exploring this idea, we need to get
volunteer mentors. The mentee process is likely to get a self-managed
one and the mentors' role will hopefully be rather low in terms of
time consumptions and the roles of the mentor will most likely be:

Introducing new developers to the processes
Answering questions
Helping with code review of patches

Again, like the Python program and similarly to the GSOC projects, we
should have a mailing list (restricted) dedicated only to the mentor
(php-mentorship?) where anyone can ask the simpler questions. From
this mailing list we should also be able to construct a solid baseline
for new developers contributing to PHP. From the mailing list, we'll
see what questions are coming over and over again we'll be able to
build a wiki-faq-like sections for new contributors.

I digress and here's what I'm hoping to achieve with this email: I
want to get a few contributors from various aspects of the core
including docs and pecl extensions willing to help new people. If you
are interested, please raise your voice and if enough interest is
displayed I'll get a proper wiki section started.

Furthermore, one thing I am hoping this program will help bring is not
only a stronger interest in the core and a fresh injection of talent
but more importantly I hope we'll be able to contributors from our
various communities that are scattered across the internet that barely
ever interact with the internals.

Hoping this email reaches as many of you and that my message is
properly conveyed :-)

P.S. This is really an attempt to find volunteers. If you are interested please
feel free to contact me directly if you prefer so we can start organising
whatever would have to be done: davidc@php.net

References:
[1]: http://pythonmentors.com/
[2]: http://jessenoller.com/2011/03/25/just-proposed-python-core-mentorship-program/

--
David Coallier
Orchestra.io

14 years ago by dukeofgaming — view source

unread

Hi David,

That would be awesome. I do want to contribute but haven't got time to get
to know all PHP's quirks. I have some knowledge of compiler theory and low
level C/C++ (memory management, system programming).

Some stuff I had in mind to try implementing:

The "object(...)" language construct.
Constructor dereferentiation (i.e. "new Foo()->bar()").

But it would be nice to have some previous reference/insight/guidance of
where and how to do it.

I like the idea of a separate mailing list and I think the general idea
would be a very healthy boost for the PHP internals community. I also think
that it would be a god idea to build a knowledge base in the wiki and
perhaps feed the PHP Internals part.

Best regards,

David Vega

Hey all,

Let me start by saying that this is merely an idea I'm trying to put
together and before doing so, I need to see who would be interested.

A short while ago, the Python community created something called "The
Python Core Mentorship Program" [1][2] which is essentially an attempt
to lower the barrier of entry to the Python core for new developers,
students, etc. and connect everyone together in a more cohesive manner
where people actually talk and interact. I strongly believe in such
initiative and believe this is something we should also think about.

Simply put, I'd love to put something together for the PHP
core/internals where the goals of the program would be, not unlike the
Python project, to get a few internals (Zend Contribs (Stas are you
reading this? :P), Core contribs, PECL extensions developers,
documentation maintainers) to be willing to help newcomers and provide
a more comprehensive understanding of the contribution processes,
internal trickeries, optimisations, etc.

The general idea is to create a channel between the rest of the world
and the internals of PHP where more experienced developers can
transfer their knowledge and get a fresh perspectives from new
developers that haven't approached the core before.

Before continuing further into exploring this idea, we need to get
volunteer mentors. The mentee process is likely to get a self-managed
one and the mentors' role will hopefully be rather low in terms of
time consumptions and the roles of the mentor will most likely be:

Introducing new developers to the processes

Answering questions

Helping with code review of patches

Again, like the Python program and similarly to the GSOC projects, we
should have a mailing list (restricted) dedicated only to the mentor
(php-mentorship?) where anyone can ask the simpler questions. From
this mailing list we should also be able to construct a solid baseline
for new developers contributing to PHP. From the mailing list, we'll
see what questions are coming over and over again we'll be able to
build a wiki-faq-like sections for new contributors.

I digress and here's what I'm hoping to achieve with this email: I
want to get a few contributors from various aspects of the core
including docs and pecl extensions willing to help new people. If you
are interested, please raise your voice and if enough interest is
displayed I'll get a proper wiki section started.

Furthermore, one thing I am hoping this program will help bring is not
only a stronger interest in the core and a fresh injection of talent
but more importantly I hope we'll be able to contributors from our
various communities that are scattered across the internet that barely
ever interact with the internals.

Hoping this email reaches as many of you and that my message is
properly conveyed :-)

P.S. This is really an attempt to find volunteers. If you are interested
please
feel free to contact me directly if you prefer so we can start organising
whatever would have to be done: davidc@php.net

References:
[1]: http://pythonmentors.com/
[2]:
http://jessenoller.com/2011/03/25/just-proposed-python-core-mentorship-program/

--
David Coallier
Orchestra.io

14 years ago by Alexey Shein — view source

unread

Really great idea. I'd like to be a part of it (as a newcomer of course :))

2011/6/10 David Coallier davidc@php.net:

Hey all,

Let me start by saying that this is merely an idea I'm trying to put
together and before doing so, I need to see who would be interested.

A short while ago, the Python community created something called "The
Python Core Mentorship Program" [1][2] which is essentially an attempt
to lower the barrier of entry to the Python core for new developers,
students, etc. and connect everyone together in a more cohesive manner
where people actually talk and interact. I strongly believe in such
initiative and believe this is something we should also think about.

Simply put, I'd love to put something together for the PHP
core/internals where the goals of the program would be, not unlike the
Python project, to get a few internals (Zend Contribs (Stas are you
reading this? :P), Core contribs, PECL extensions developers,
documentation maintainers) to be willing to help newcomers and provide
a more comprehensive understanding of the contribution processes,
internal trickeries, optimisations, etc.

The general idea is to create a channel between the rest of the world
and the internals of PHP where more experienced developers can
transfer their knowledge and get a fresh perspectives from new
developers that haven't approached the core before.

Before continuing further into exploring this idea, we need to get
volunteer mentors. The mentee process is likely to get a self-managed
one and the mentors' role will hopefully be rather low in terms of
time consumptions and the roles of the mentor will most likely be:

- Introducing new developers to the processes
- Answering questions
- Helping with code review of patches

Again, like the Python program and similarly to the GSOC projects, we
should have a mailing list (restricted) dedicated only to the mentor
(php-mentorship?) where anyone can ask the simpler questions. From
this mailing list we should also be able to construct a solid baseline
for new developers contributing to PHP. From the mailing list, we'll
see what questions are coming over and over again we'll be able to
build a wiki-faq-like sections for new contributors.

I digress and here's what I'm hoping to achieve with this email: I
want to get a few contributors from various aspects of the core
including docs and pecl extensions willing to help new people. If you
are interested, please raise your voice and if enough interest is
displayed I'll get a proper wiki section started.

Furthermore, one thing I am hoping this program will help bring is not
only a stronger interest in the core and a fresh injection of talent
but more importantly I hope we'll be able to contributors from our
various communities that are scattered across the internet that barely
ever interact with the internals.

Hoping this email reaches as many of you and that my message is
properly conveyed :-)

P.S. This is really an attempt to find volunteers. If you are interested please
feel free to contact me directly if you prefer so we can start organising
whatever would have to be done: davidc@php.net

References:
[1]: http://pythonmentors.com/
[2]: http://jessenoller.com/2011/03/25/just-proposed-python-core-mentorship-program/

--
David Coallier
Orchestra.io

--

--
Regards,
Shein Alexey

14 years ago by Ifthikhan Nazeem — view source

unread

Sounds like a great idea. I have always wanted to contribute but did not
find a structured way to incrementally build my knowledge of the internals.
This might be a great way to attract new devs.

--
Thanks and Best Regards,
Iftikhan Nazeem
LinkedIn : http://ae.linkedin.com/in/ifthikhan http://ae.linkedin.com/in/iftikhan
Mob : 00971 050 7382623
Skype : iftecan2000

Really great idea. I'd like to be a part of it (as a newcomer of course :))

2011/6/10 David Coallier davidc@php.net:

Hey all,

Let me start by saying that this is merely an idea I'm trying to put
together and before doing so, I need to see who would be interested.

A short while ago, the Python community created something called "The
Python Core Mentorship Program" [1][2] which is essentially an attempt
to lower the barrier of entry to the Python core for new developers,
students, etc. and connect everyone together in a more cohesive manner
where people actually talk and interact. I strongly believe in such
initiative and believe this is something we should also think about.

Simply put, I'd love to put something together for the PHP
core/internals where the goals of the program would be, not unlike the
Python project, to get a few internals (Zend Contribs (Stas are you
reading this? :P), Core contribs, PECL extensions developers,
documentation maintainers) to be willing to help newcomers and provide
a more comprehensive understanding of the contribution processes,
internal trickeries, optimisations, etc.

The general idea is to create a channel between the rest of the world
and the internals of PHP where more experienced developers can
transfer their knowledge and get a fresh perspectives from new
developers that haven't approached the core before.

Before continuing further into exploring this idea, we need to get
volunteer mentors. The mentee process is likely to get a self-managed
one and the mentors' role will hopefully be rather low in terms of
time consumptions and the roles of the mentor will most likely be:

Introducing new developers to the processes

Answering questions

Helping with code review of patches

Again, like the Python program and similarly to the GSOC projects, we
should have a mailing list (restricted) dedicated only to the mentor
(php-mentorship?) where anyone can ask the simpler questions. From
this mailing list we should also be able to construct a solid baseline
for new developers contributing to PHP. From the mailing list, we'll
see what questions are coming over and over again we'll be able to
build a wiki-faq-like sections for new contributors.

I digress and here's what I'm hoping to achieve with this email: I
want to get a few contributors from various aspects of the core
including docs and pecl extensions willing to help new people. If you
are interested, please raise your voice and if enough interest is
displayed I'll get a proper wiki section started.

Furthermore, one thing I am hoping this program will help bring is not
only a stronger interest in the core and a fresh injection of talent
but more importantly I hope we'll be able to contributors from our
various communities that are scattered across the internet that barely
ever interact with the internals.

Hoping this email reaches as many of you and that my message is
properly conveyed :-)

P.S. This is really an attempt to find volunteers. If you are interested
please
feel free to contact me directly if you prefer so we can start organising
whatever would have to be done: davidc@php.net

References:
[1]: http://pythonmentors.com/
[2]:
http://jessenoller.com/2011/03/25/just-proposed-python-core-mentorship-program/

--
David Coallier
Orchestra.io

--

--
Regards,
Shein Alexey

14 years ago by David Coallier — view source

unread

Sounds like a great idea. I have always wanted to contribute but did not
find a structured way to incrementally build my knowledge of the internals.
This might be a great way to attract new devs.

Hey everyone, thanks for the interest in participating as mentees.
Just to give you an update, right now I'm trying to compile a list of
volunteer-mentors. Once this has been done, we'll start compiling
user-groups mentees and mentees in general.

Thanks for your interest :)

--
David Coallier

14 years ago by Rafael Dohms — view source

unread

David,

I'm no good at core code, but i can help out in the test department if
newcomers need to learn to write tests for their patches

--
Rafael Dohms
PHP Evangelist and Community Leader
http://www.rafaeldohms.com.br
http://www.phpsp.org.br

14 years ago by Pierre Joye — view source

unread

hi,

As I have nothing against a mentor program, nor something in favor of
one, I think it should be done right from the 1st day. And to be in
right it has to be open, by all means. Restricted lists, private
discussions, etc. have no place in OSS projects. If you don't have
access to the wiki to document your progress, pls request an account.
If anything is happening or happens, it should happen in the
respective list (doc, web, internals, pecl) and publicly.

My doubts are more (like this thread shows) about the lack of will to
contribute (to wish something is not necessary a will). Mentors does
not or cannot create extra time in contributors days either :). To
guide the contributors through the php project is only a very small
part of the actual work, and could be explain better in our
docs/wiki/sites.

One immediate step could be to create a 'contribute' page,
www.php.net/contribute. This page should explain the various areas one
could contribute (docs, tests, core, pecl, etc.) and how to get in
touch with the responsible developers. Maybe with a link to an issue
in the bug tracker for a given todo, or in a wiki doc (for a verbose
description).

Cheers,

Sounds like a great idea. I have always wanted to contribute but did not
find a structured way to incrementally build my knowledge of the internals.
This might be a great way to attract new devs.

Hey everyone, thanks for the interest in participating as mentees.
Just to give you an update, right now I'm trying to compile a list of
volunteer-mentors. Once this has been done, we'll start compiling
user-groups mentees and mentees in general.

Thanks for your interest :)

--
David Coallier

--

--
Pierre

@pierrejoye | http://blog.thepimp.net | http://www.libgd.org

14 years ago by Florian Anderiasch — view source

unread

Hey all,
while I share some of Pierre's concerns I also think this is a great
idea. Fresh contributors always put some extra weight on the people
already on the project, that's nothing new and not exclusive to open
source projects. I do think that a concerted effort like this proposed
program could really help in that way.

And as long as some people are available as mentors there's no harm in
trying.
To get back to the "improve docs" part I'd gladly collect the artifacts,
mails, wiki entries, etc of this effort and try help create this
"contribute page" Pierre spoke of.

Greetings,
Florian

14 years ago by Philip Olson — view source

unread

To get back to the "improve docs" part I'd gladly collect the artifacts,
mails, wiki entries, etc of this effort and try help create this
"contribute page" Pierre spoke of.

Here are a couple of resources to help with this:

Both sources are considered rough drafts, and are in need of organization/combining and examples.

Regards,
Philip

14 years ago by David Coallier — view source

unread

See response inline.

As I have nothing against a mentor program, nor something in favor of
one, I think it should be done right from the 1st day. And to be in
right it has to be open, by all means. Restricted lists, private
discussions, etc. have no place in OSS projects. If you don't have
access to the wiki to document your progress, pls request an account.
If anything is happening or happens, it should happen in the
respective list (doc, web, internals, pecl) and publicly.

Thanks for that and we aren't talking about a "restricted" list but a
different mailing list where newcomers could browse freely and ask all
sorts of questions that might or might not have their place on the
internals list.

Moreover, before spending time creating all the pages, I'm validating
the idea by talking to people and trying to get things going. If an
interest is shown, I'll be glad to create any wiki page you want me to
create however, until the idea is validated, I'm not going to create a
ghost-wiki page that might end up dieing.

My doubts are more (like this thread shows) about the lack of will to
contribute (to wish something is not necessary a will). Mentors does
not or cannot create extra time in contributors days either :). To
guide the contributors through the php project is only a very small
part of the actual work, and could be explain better in our
docs/wiki/sites.

Agreed.

One immediate step could be to create a 'contribute' page,
www.php.net/contribute. This page should explain the various areas one
could contribute (docs, tests, core, pecl, etc.) and how to get in
touch with the responsible developers. Maybe with a link to an issue
in the bug tracker for a given todo, or in a wiki doc (for a verbose
description).

See Pierre, that's where I believe we are doing things wrong. We
already have all our infrastructure to report bugs, create wiki pages,
send emails. The goal of the program is to create something more
personal, something more interactive than just sending everyone to
read the manual.

I do however agree that we need to have some initial steps created
(ala contribute page you suggested). Sure some contributors might not
have extra time in their day and that's exactly why I precisely
mentioned [IDEA] in the subject. Before going on a mad documentation
trip, I want to see who's interested in contributing. I've received a
bunch of emails from people that want to help with the core but
without volunteer-mentors, there's only so much that can be done
(links to the wiki, docs, books to read etc.).

The idea behind this whole thing Pierre is not to attack anyone or to
denigrate the work of the core team but rather to help our various
communities talk together. By various communities, I mean from "core
devs" to "wordpress developers". There are a lot of developers out
there that have never even been remotely interested in contributing to
PHP because of the tedious process of learning how to write "Zend-C".

Either way, I think you are right and this needs to be open. Before
time is invested into making this properly opened, I'd like to
validate the idea. If anyone is interested in starting a few
"contributing" pages on the wiki and whatnot then nothing stops them
or you from doing it. It is open source, let ideas flourish.

Back to the main subject of discussion: Are you interested in being a
volunteer-mentor?

--
David Coallier

14 years ago by Pierre Joye — view source

unread

Moreover, before spending time creating all the pages, I'm validating
the idea by talking to people and trying to get things going. If an
interest is shown, I'll be glad to create any wiki page you want me to
create however, until the idea is validated, I'm not going to create a
ghost-wiki page that might end up dieing.

That's exactly the goal of the wiki. Just like committing somewhere
anything you are working on even it ends nowhere. Release early,
release often (even if I don't do that enough :).

See Pierre, that's where I believe we are doing things wrong. We
already have all our infrastructure to report bugs, create wiki pages,
send emails. The goal of the program is to create something more
personal, something more interactive than just sending everyone to
read the manual.

We see new contributors every day or week. They waste time to find the
right persons or the right way to send patches, report issues, ask new
features or send patches. A contribute page solves 99% of these issues
and need zero extra organisation.

I do however agree that we need to have some initial steps created
(ala contribute page you suggested). Sure some contributors might not
have extra time in their day and that's exactly why I precisely
mentioned [IDEA] in the subject. Before going on a mad documentation
trip,

We should do this page, no matter if the mentor idea works out or not. IMO.

The idea behind this whole thing Pierre is not to attack anyone or to
denigrate the work of the core team but rather to help our various
communities talk together. By various communities, I mean from "core
devs" to "wordpress developers". There are a lot of developers out
there that have never even been remotely interested in contributing to
PHP because of the tedious process of learning how to write "Zend-C".

Not sure where this reply comes from, or which part of my reply causes
this answer :)

Back to the main subject of discussion: Are you interested in being a
volunteer-mentor?

I'm already one.

--
Pierre

@pierrejoye | http://blog.thepimp.net | http://www.libgd.org

14 years ago by Hannes Magnusson — view source

unread

See response inline.

As I have nothing against a mentor program, nor something in favor of
one, I think it should be done right from the 1st day. And to be in
right it has to be open, by all means. Restricted lists, private
discussions, etc. have no place in OSS projects. If you don't have
access to the wiki to document your progress, pls request an account.
If anything is happening or happens, it should happen in the
respective list (doc, web, internals, pecl) and publicly.

Thanks for that and we aren't talking about a "restricted" list but a
different mailing list where newcomers could browse freely and ask all
sorts of questions that might or might not have their place on the
internals list.

Doesn't this fit nicely within the idea behind gsoc.. so reusing the
gsoc@ list for it?

One immediate step could be to create a 'contribute' page,
www.php.net/contribute. This page should explain the various areas one
could contribute (docs, tests, core, pecl, etc.) and how to get in

http://no.php.net/get-involved.php

Granted that page needs more work, I do believe its a good starting point.

-Hannes

14 years ago by Rafael Dohms — view source

unread

See response inline.
...
See Pierre, that's where I believe we are doing things wrong. We
already have all our infrastructure to report bugs, create wiki pages,
send emails. The goal of the program is to create something more
personal, something more interactive than just sending everyone to
read the manual.
...

David Coallier

I agree here with David, i think the mentorship would bring a "human"
interface for newcomers.
Yes we already get newcomers, but we could get much more if we had a
human interface instead of hitting everyone with a TL;DR documentation
page. Let their first interaction be with a human who can then direct
to the page at given points.

Mentorship has grown some awesome developers in the community, i think
it can do the same in internals.

And yes, we still need all of those pages described, this is an extra
layer on top of everything being done. If we can get mentors who like
to help the i say we go for it.

--
Rafael Dohms
PHP Evangelist and Community Leader
http://www.rafaeldohms.com.br
http://www.phpsp.org.br

14 years ago by Justin Carmony — view source

unread

I like the idea for the mentorship program. I also agree with Pierre with the things we'll want to avoid while doing it.

Pierre brought up a good point about how ideally a mentorship program wouldn't be necessary, but the website, wiki, etc would have all the resources and information for people to jump in and contribute. The problem is, the current system of doing that isn't perfect, so I think the mentorship system can accomplish two things:

First, add the human element to helping bring in new comers into a complex system. I know people can already hop in, but it is a daunting task. Having a mentor who you could have more than email conversation (irc, im, phone, etc) can help get people up to speed quicker. I would feel less dumb asking my dozens of dumb questions (questions that do have answers somewhere online, but either I couldn't find them or didn't understand them) to a mentor, rather than spam the internals list with them. The mentorship helps new volunteers get in an imperfect system quicker.

Second, and just as important, that the mentors and mentees Document and try to Fix the hurdles they discover during the mentorship. This will help improve the overall barrier of entry for other new volunteers. I think this could be the greatest ROI of the program, making it easier for the next new volunteers.

I'm willing to be a mentee and help start this program. I have some ideas for the program, but don't want to spam everyone with a wall of text about them.

Justin Carmony

See response inline.
...
See Pierre, that's where I believe we are doing things wrong. We
already have all our infrastructure to report bugs, create wiki pages,
send emails. The goal of the program is to create something more
personal, something more interactive than just sending everyone to
read the manual.
...

David Coallier

I agree here with David, i think the mentorship would bring a "human"
interface for newcomers.
Yes we already get newcomers, but we could get much more if we had a
human interface instead of hitting everyone with a TL;DR documentation
page. Let their first interaction be with a human who can then direct
to the page at given points.

Mentorship has grown some awesome developers in the community, i think
it can do the same in internals.

And yes, we still need all of those pages described, this is an extra
layer on top of everything being done. If we can get mentors who like
to help the i say we go for it.

--
Rafael Dohms
PHP Evangelist and Community Leader
http://www.rafaeldohms.com.br
http://www.phpsp.org.br

14 years ago by Peter Cowburn — view source

unread

hi,

As I have nothing against a mentor program, nor something in favor of
one, I think it should be done right from the 1st day. And to be in
right it has to be open, by all means. Restricted lists, private
discussions, etc. have no place in OSS projects. If you don't have
access to the wiki to document your progress, pls request an account.
If anything is happening or happens, it should happen in the
respective list (doc, web, internals, pecl) and publicly.

My doubts are more (like this thread shows) about the lack of will to
contribute (to wish something is not necessary a will). Mentors does
not or cannot create extra time in contributors days either :). To
guide the contributors through the php project is only a very small
part of the actual work, and could be explain better in our
docs/wiki/sites.

One immediate step could be to create a 'contribute' page,
www.php.net/contribute. This page should explain the various areas one
could contribute (docs, tests, core, pecl, etc.) and how to get in
touch with the responsible developers. Maybe with a link to an issue
in the bug tracker for a given todo, or in a wiki doc (for a verbose
description).

Starting points, http://php.net/get-involved.php and
https://wiki.php.net/ideas/getinvolved

Cheers,

Sounds like a great idea. I have always wanted to contribute but did not
find a structured way to incrementally build my knowledge of the internals.
This might be a great way to attract new devs.

Hey everyone, thanks for the interest in participating as mentees.
Just to give you an update, right now I'm trying to compile a list of
volunteer-mentors. Once this has been done, we'll start compiling
user-groups mentees and mentees in general.

Thanks for your interest :)

--
David Coallier

--

--
Pierre

@pierrejoye | http://blog.thepimp.net | http://www.libgd.org

14 years ago by Christopher Jones — view source

unread

One immediate step could be to create a 'contribute' page,
www.php.net/contribute. This page should explain the various areas one
could contribute (docs, tests, core, pecl, etc.) and how to get in
touch with the responsible developers. Maybe with a link to an issue
in the bug tracker for a given todo, or in a wiki doc (for a verbose
description).

Starting points, http://php.net/get-involved.php and
https://wiki.php.net/ideas/getinvolved

Also see http://svn.php.net/viewvc/php/php-src/trunk/README.SUBMITTING_PATCH?view=markup

Chris

--
Email: christopher.jones@oracle.com
Tel: +1 650 506 8630
Blog: http://blogs.oracle.com/opal/

14 years ago by Chris Stockton — view source

unread

Hello,

Hey all,

Let me start by saying that this is merely an idea I'm trying to put
together and before doing so, I need to see who would be interested.

First let me start by saying I like the initiative to get more active
internals development. If you ask me, PHP could be much better if it
was easier to participate and the system for doing so was better.

One key I think to your proposal is the mentors portion, if I had
direct access to a developer with karma I would much more inclined to
help and submit patches. One thing that should be remembered about
open source projects is the only real incentive a mentee has for
working on it (for most) is that little bit of satisfaction gained
from contributing a small piece to a project that you regularly use or
believe in.

I personally have tried several times over the years to get more
involved but patches usually sit for months, or years inside the bug
tracker till they are out of date or fixed by a core developer. Even
submitting them to this list ends up rotting at times (I.E. [1]). This
ends up being discouraging and likely has blocked me from making some
serious contributions, I know I am not alone here. There are plenty of
developers who may know the internals of PHP very well from working
for private companies or recreational hacking, but feel such a
resistance or large gap between core developers and themselves they
give up or move on.

Couple things I would love to see from this program, and in general..

It would just be great to work out some heavier internal
documentation. C Code is good documentation I get that, but would be
nice for some high level documentation on the more cryptic areas of
PHP (zendmm, execution life cycle, etc)
Process for new developers to get their patches and work in, the
bug tracker could be this maybe it just needs more eyes?

I want to make it clear that I have been very pleased to see all the
RFCS that developed over the years and the gap between core developers
and everyone else has seemed to close a lot. I hope this continues and
some of the kinks of this idea are worked out of this Mentor/Mentee
program and it develops into something great so we can see faster
adoption of new technologies into PHP and maybe some kind of target
zero goal for all bugs.

-Chris

[1] http://marc.info/?l=php-internals&m=125589606407945