On Wed, Feb 15, 2012 at 12:09 PM, Matthew Brett <matthew.br...@gmail.com>wrote:
> Hi, > > On Wed, Feb 15, 2012 at 11:46 AM, Benjamin Root <ben.r...@ou.edu> wrote: > > > > > > On Wed, Feb 15, 2012 at 1:32 PM, Alan G Isaac <alan.is...@gmail.com> > wrote: > >> Can you provide an example where a more formal > >> governance structure for NumPy would have meant > >> more or better code development? (Please do not > >> suggest the NA discussion!) > >> > > > > Why not the NA discussion? Would we really want to have that happen > again? > > Note that it still isn't fully resolved and progress still needs to be > made > > (I think the last thread did an excellent job of fleshing out the ideas, > but > > it became too much to digest. We may need to have someone go through the > > information, reduce it down and make one last push to bring it to a > > conclusion). The NA discussion is the perfect example where a governance > > structure would help resolve disputes. > > Yes, that was the most obvious example. I don't know about you, but I > can't see any sign of that one being resolved. > > The other obvious example was the dispute about ABI breakage for numpy > 1.5.0 where I believe Travis did invoke some sort of committee to > vote, but (Travis can correct me if I'm wrong), the committee was > named ad-hoc and contacted off-list. > > > > >> > >> Can you provide an example of what you might > >> envision as a "more formal governance structure"? > >> (I assume that any such structure will not put people > >> who are not core contributors to NumPy in a position > >> to tell core contributors what to spend their time on.) > >> > >> Early last December, Chuck Harris estimated that three > >> people were active NumPy developers. I liked the idea of > >> creating a "board" of these 3 and a rule that says any > >> active developer can request to join the board, that > >> additions are determined by majority vote of the existing > >> board, and that having the board both small and odd > >> numbered is a priority. I also suggested inviting to this > >> board a developer or two from important projects that are > >> very NumPy dependent (e.g., Matplotlib). > >> > >> I still like this idea. Would it fully satisfy you? > >> > > > > I actually like that idea. Matthew, is this along the lines of what you > > were thinking? > > Honestly it would make me very happy if the discussion moved to what > form the governance should take. I would have thought that 3 was too > small a number. One thing to note about this point is that during the NA discussion, the only people doing active C-level development were Charles and me. I suspect a discussion about how to recruit more people into that group might be more important than governance at this point in time. If we need a formal structure, maybe a good approach is giving Travis the final say for now, until a trigger point occurs. That could be 6 months after the number of active developers hits 5, or something like that. At that point, we would reopen the discussion with a larger group of people who would directly play in that role, and any decision made then will probably be better than a decision we make now while the development team is so small. -Mark > We should look at what other projects do. I think > that this committee needs to be people who know numpy code; projects > using numpy could advise, but people developing numpy should vote I > think. > > There should be rules of engagement, a constitution, especially how to > deal with disputes with Continuum or other contracting organizations. > > I would personally very much like to see a committment to consensus, > where possible on these lines (as noted previously by Nathaniel): > > http://producingoss.com/en/consensus-democracy.html > > Best, > > Matthew > _______________________________________________ > NumPy-Discussion mailing list > NumPy-Discussion@scipy.org > http://mail.scipy.org/mailman/listinfo/numpy-discussion >
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