How to (not) Troll GitHub Comments

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5 points·craigkerstiens··4 comments

This happens so frequently to me. I'll Spend an hour running benchmarks and then post a PR. Someone chimes in and says "method x is faster" with nothing to back it up. I have to benchmark again, and then my way is still faster.

Do you have to benchmark again? Why not just say something like "post evidence, please. You're free to use my benchmark source code"? (I guess it's a variant of the somewhat annoying [citation needed], but sometimes it is apt to post something like that.)

I've learned to do this, but for me it wasn't obvious at first. At the end of the day if it's my PR, it's my job to provide the supporting evidence as to why that code should be merged and not some other code. If you respond "no you benchmark it" and they never respond, the ticket can sometimes get stuck in limbo.

I'd suggest giving them a "deadline" if they haven't at least responded constructively within a few days. Something like "If you're actually serious you have until $TODAY+7 days to post something substantive, otherwise I'm going to assume you have nothing actionable.". (Of course adjust 7 as needed based on the situation at hand.)

In any case you can just say: "OK, until someone comes up with evidence to the contrary, I think we should go with my version. If someone shows up with a better version later, I have no objection to merging that."

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