Timothy Bennett wrote:
In reality, this is really about deep issues certain members of the Foundation have with one person in the community, isn't it?
No.
If he suddenly disappeared off the face of the earth, there would hardly be a thought or hesitation about not spinning Merlin out of Avalon as it's own TLP. And that's the plain truth, and there's no convincing me otherwise.
There would be a thought and hesitation.
The first hesitation would be, do we really need both Avalon and Merlin when we already just spun off Excalibur?
The next question is, does the Merlin project have a large enough, healthy enough, diverse enough community which respects the principles of ASF meritocracy?
These are questions asked before any project becomes a TLP. It isn't just automatically granted because of technological aptitude.
If he weren't involved in the project, then Merlin would've been a TLP last March. But he is and thus the quarantine and *reform* him via incubation.
One of the chief reasons Merlin has not become a TLP is because the question of a need for yet another Avalon-based TLP. If we agree to close Avalon upon creation of Merlin that makes the Merlin proposal more acceptable. Yet that provision has never been proposed along with each Merlin proposal. When I did suggest it immediately after the Board commentary last week I got a rather favorable response. However, due to the behavior and comments of many Merlin developers over the last week, I sense the Board has now become much more hesitant.
And I'm against incubation of a technically mature (with an otherwise reasonably strong/healthy community) project on the basis of the issues that the Foundation has with a single individual.
The Merlin/Metro community doesn't have intra-community issues.We like
each other! We work well together. It's user community is supported, embraced even. We have the same vision of where the technology is going. It's roadmap. It's destiny, even. It is a healthy, vibrant, and passionate community.
ASF projects are not islands. It's not just a matter of it you all get along. There are hundreds of technically mature projects whose developers get along well together over at SourceForge. That doesn't mean they would simply be granted Apache TLP status. Just as you earned the trust of the Avalon developers in order to become a committer here, you need to earn the trust of other ASF members before you will be granted TLP status. The Merlin community has not gained that trust nor proven why that trust should be extended. Much of that has to do with Niclas's comments on community over the last week. If you really believe Merlin belongs here in the ASF, then you need to make that case before the ASF members, particularly before the ASF Board.
The issues here are between certain members of the Foundation and one member of our community. Has been for a long time, and certainly needs to be resolved! But the project and the community around it as a whole does not need to suffer the setbacks of an unmerited incubation in order for conflict resolution to occur between Stephen and the folks that have issues with him. There are other avenues available to resolve these conflicts than the one found in the incubator.
There are other avenues. One of which was to not have Stephen on the Metro PMC. You didn't like that avenue.
jaaron
--------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
