Today's English Expression 24/30 · Stage: Meetings & Chats. All example sentences were made up for this post. They are not copied from real repository comments, and the timeframes and channel names are examples.
Table of Contents
- At a Glance
- 1. Meaning and Nuance
- 2. Example Sentences
- 3. Similar Expressions and Differences
- 4. Common Mistakes Made by Koreans
- 5. One-Line Practice
- Sample Answer
- References
At a Glance
| Expression | Friendly ping. / Gentle ping on this. |
| Meaning | (Gently) bringing this back to your attention. |
| Where to Use | Unanswered PR and issue comments, Slack, mailing lists |
| Politeness | Soft. Reduces the feeling of rushing someone |
1. Meaning and Nuance
Ping is the name of a network command that checks whether the other party is alive. From there, it is widely used as a verb and a noun meaning to contact someone briefly or send a signal. I'll ping you later means "I will contact you later." Adding friendly or gentle to make Friendly ping means "I'm not trying to rush you, but I'm checking in just in case you missed it".
Most open-source maintainers are busy, and notifications pile up, so missing PRs is common. Therefore, following up at appropriate intervals is not rude; it is expected behavior. What matters is the intervaland the content.
- Interval. LLVM's code review documentation considers one week to be a polite ping interval for non-urgent patches. It says you can ping if the requested reviewer hasn't responded for a week, and for urgent patches, you can ping every few days after explaining why.
- Path. The Kubernetes contribution guide suggests first checking if there is an assignee for the PR and asking the assignee via PR comments when they might be able to review it. If there is still no response, you can use Slack, email, or team mentions, and finally post the PR link in Slack's review request channel.
- Content. If CI is failing, fix it first. Then, summarize the current status (all feedback addressed, CI passing) in a single line so the reviewer knows what needs to be done.
Rules vary by repository, so always check the CONTRIBUTING document first.
2. Example Sentences
Situation 1: A PR with no response for over a week
Friendly ping on this one. All comments are addressed and CI is green. Let me know if there's anything else you'd like me to change.
CI is green is a developer expression meaning "all CI checks have passed."
Situation 2: Asking the assignee for an estimated timeframe
Gentle ping. Do you think you'll have time to review this before the next release? No rush if not, just want to plan the follow-up work.
No rush if not relieves pressure by saying "no need to hurry if you can't."
Situation 3: Slack's review request channel
Hi all, friendly ping for a review on this docs PR for the backup plugin. It's a small change (about 20 lines): (PR link)
Stating the size of the changes helps reviewers judge whether it's something they can handle quickly.
3. Similar Expressions and Differences
- Ping. Using just a single word. The LLVM documentation also explains ping as "a comment containing the word Ping." It is short but lacks context, so for a reviewer seeing it for the first time, it is better to pair a friendly ping with a one-line status update.
- Just bumping this. Bump means "to push a post back up." It is widely used in forums or mailing lists.
- Any updates on this? This is a bit more direct as it asks the other person for an answer. It is fine if you have been waiting for a long time.
4. Common Mistakes Made by Koreans
- Why nobody reviews my PR? This has grammatical errors and sounds like a complaint.
- Corrected sentence: Friendly ping. Is there anything I can do to make this easier to review?
- Please review ASAP. It is urgent. Without explaining why it is urgent, this just feels like rushing.
- Corrected sentence: Gentle ping. This fixes a crash on upgrade, so it would be great to get it into the next patch release.
- Pinging multiple times a day. This creates notification fatigue and actually delays things further. Respect the intervals.
5. One-Line Practice
Translate the following Korean sentence into a PR comment.
Bringing this to your attention again. I've reflected all the points you mentioned and passed the tests. Please take a look when you have time.
Sample Answer
Friendly ping. I've addressed all the comments and the tests are passing. Could you take a look when you have time?
The last sentence has the same structure as Could you take another look? from Part 13. After the ping, clearly state what the reviewer needs to do.
Titi's Note. Wait a week, provide a one-line status update, and add words that relieve pressure. That is a friendly ping.
References
- LLVM Code-Review Policy and Practices (ping): https://llvm.org/docs/CodeReview.html
- Kubernetes Contributor Guide, Pull Request Process (When there is no review): https://github.com/kubernetes/community/blob/master/contributors/guide/pull-requests.md
- Merriam-Webster, "ping": https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ping