[Bioc-devel] What to do with Francesco Ferrari?

Marc Carlson mcarlson at fhcrc.org
Thu Jan 17 21:14:45 CET 2008


So I have some correspondence from a guy named Francesco Ferrari. 

He has made 6 packages that he would like to have available here at
Bioconductor.  Two each of the CDF packages, the probe packages and the
corresponding annotation packages.  These were made for two remapped
platforms from their custom "gene cards" database.

Because they are based on the gene cards databases, the annotation
packages are extremely different from an annotation package that you
would make using AnnBuilder.  They didn't use Annbuilder to make these
packages either.  These packages are fully custom jobs.

He claims that he will fully support these packages and update them
every 6 months with fresh content (using his own methods).  He also
claims to have done everything he can to make them seem the same as the
other annotation packages, although because of the contents this is
quite impossible.  He has very few of the same environments in common
with the packages that we make here, although it is clear that he has
made a strong effort to keep the interface similar.  He has also
expressed a willingness to make the packages so that they can work with
the new DB-based design.

So the question I have is what are we going to tell this guy?  Should we
offer to host his bizarre annotation packages?  Or is this situation
another dangerous time-sucking vortex?  And if we do host them, how will
we keep them sorted from the other ones? 

Last summer there were some other annotation packages that were more
subtly different, and we hosted those with the addition of some
alternate biocviews.  Those packages were more classic annotation
packages that were just labeling a different item in the genome (CpG
islands instead of genes).  Where is the line?  How different from our
normal annotation packages is something normally allowed to be?


Advice welcome,


    Marc



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