PR Review Process

[efriis]

In order to enhance the LangChain contributor experience and clarify some of the processes around PR review, we have added this Review Process page to the documentation.

https://python.langchain.com/docs/contributing/review_process/

We're catching up on "triaging" the backlog of pull requests this week.

Let us know if you have feedback on or questions about the process below!

[MacanPN]

Could you please clarify how does the needs support status work? You mention that PRs with this status are "Automatically promoted to the backlog if it receives 5 upvotes." I'm not aware that PRs themselves have "upvote" functionality? Do thumbs up on PR description count? Further down it is mentioned that "... if they do not get enough support (measured by upvotes or comments)". How do comments enter the equation? Are upvotes on these comments also counted as a support? Or is it mostly eyeballed? Thanks!

[eyurtsev]

You can add an emoji 👍 to a PR

e.g., https://github.com/langchain-ai/langchain/pulls?q=is%3Apr+is%3Aopen+sort%3Areactions-%2B1-desc

[Davi-Schumacher]

I had this question too. Can we get this into the review_process doc?

[michaelfeil]

I am unhappy about this extreme measure taken by langchain. I have written the early integrations with https://github.com/michaelfeil/infinity and reviewed the integrations of others. #27043

I am used to that a ISSUE might be de-prioritized. I have not heard of a software project that forbids PR's that need to have a certain amount of likes.

[efriis]

Hey there! We're adding some docs in the coming weeks for how you can self-maintain an external package that may be relevant to your project. Will add a link here when they're in!

This process isn't meant to forbid PRs but instead surface which new integrations that were contributed without an associated issue are worth prioritizing among the maintainers, and make explicit which ones are unlikely to get eyes in a reasonable amount of time. We recognize it's not perfect, and hopefully it's better than previous lack of clarity.

[michaelfeil]

Thank you! Yes it could be helpful. I am pushing the integration into langchain, as users demand "how can I use your repo with langchain".

It would be great to host extensive doc material so that users can be redirected to use the external package.

[efriis]

Here's the guide! https://python.langchain.com/docs/contributing/how_to/integrations/

If you have any questions, let me know, and I can edit the guide to cover them!

[mkemeter]

Could you please elaborate how this affects existing integrations (see question below)?

[mkemeter]

Folks from our team at SAP have contributed the vector store integration for SAP HANA Cloud in the past. We found the review process so far (surprisingly) uncomplicated and PRs have been reviewed super-fast. I can understand that this lean process does not necessarily scale well for a vivid project like LangChain.

Last month, we wanted to enhance and maintain our contribution, but have not been successful in getting it reviewed. In absence of knowledge of the new review process, we have closed an re-opened the PR. When digging deeper into the topic, I stumbled upon this discussion, which clarifies what we have observed.

We as a team would like to take responsibility for the maintenance of our contribution as we think this is what good community citizens should do. However, we are currently experiencing, that this seems to be getting harder with the new review process. Note, that our current PR exclusively touches files that are part of the SAP HANA integration.

While I understand the ratio behind voting on new features and enhancements, I do not think, that this approach is easily transferrable to the maintenance or enhancement of existing integrations.

Do you have any thoughts or ideas how to solve this while keeping the workload of reviewers manageable?

[mkemeter]

@efriis, I am a bit lost as there obviously is a gap in the contribution process, which we are currently stuck in. Or maybe it's just a misunderstanding on our side, which requires clarification. Anyhow, our recent contact approaches via this discussion, slack, and our PR have not been successful.

We would appreciate any guidance on how to practically maintain our contribution in the light of the new review process.

[efriis]

sorry about that! here's the guide on publishing a separate integration package: https://python.langchain.com/docs/contributing/how_to/integrations/

managing like this, deprecating the community integration (in favor of the external package), and making PRs that only touch the docs/ repo is the best path forward!

[mkemeter]

Thanks for clarification! We will investigate how to migrate the existing integration.