Foolishly I started reading this thread just before going to bed. Subsequently
my wife has (at 2am)
kicked me from the bedroom as I keep tossing and turning going over the various
issues at play here.
Please put up with my additions to the discussion so I can unload and go and
get some sleep!/
//
Jim Grisanzio wrote:/
I think Team Indy should get its project and go build something.
//Ian Murdock wrote://
So, we should go do the initial work inside Sun before proceeding?
////Ian Murdock wrote:////
On 5/31/07, Alan Burlison <Alan.Burlison at sun.com
<http://mail.opensolaris.org/mailman/listinfo/opensolaris-discuss>> wrote:
>/ > The level of beaurocracy in OpenSolaris exceeds what I've seen
/>/ > in any other open source group by an order of magnitude and
/>/ > is a facet of life at Sun that we seem to have carried over from
/>/ > Solaris to OpenSolaris, for better or worse.//
/
Holy crap yes.
There is a lot of talk of what a Project Indiana distro should look like
and how it should be created but I feel that there is a fundamental
barrier which first has to be addressed.
The developers are now operating in the open and changes from non-Sun
people are being shepherded through. The governance is now occurring in
the public with an elected board under a ratified constitution.
However, AFAIK the release management and C-teams only operate within
Sun as part of the Solaris Express program. Irrespective of what any
Indy distro maybe, the gate is currently locked up tight by Sun and is
not open or community driven. As such, to produce a real community
distro is simply impossible at this stage. Given the bureaucracy that
Ian/Alan etc have already experienced I think that you haven't even come
close to what you'll hit in the entrenched and mystic processes of the
release/build/C-teams (I'm sure people can back me up here).
If we want a great community distro then there are some fundamental
things that need to be done and it all comes down to doing it in the
open and with speed, in the process helping Sun to help itself. If I was
Ian, here is what I would do.
1) Create a separate organization from Sun (a wholly owned Sun
organization with Ian, a couple of OGB members and whoever else is
relevant on the board (though I think Jeff Waugh would be brilliant
based on his canonical experience))
2) Go out and hire the best damn release manager on the planet (to
support the best damn distro on the planet). Hiring would be approved by
the OGB, I don't care if they are from Sun or not (I just want the best)
3) Get all the build IP from Sun given to the new org (so they can
choose to use it or not)
4) Hire (again with OGB approval) a whole new set of C-team leads (can
be from the existing pool of Sun C-Team leads but this would be a great
opportunity to open this up to the world including the AIX, HP-UX and
other teams). Anyone who was from Sun would (at least in the short term)
no longer work for Sun (no Sun badge, no Sun email), the purpose of this
is that it would force the rest of Sun internally to work out in the
community as nothing will get passed without the newly liberated C-Team
leads and release manager being included. Once again we want the best
people we can get.
5) Wrestle control of the primary source code repository from Sun (Sun
can keep a copy, but the primary copy should be independent for a period
of time)
6) Create an independent build infrastructure (or have the existing one
transferred from Sun)
7) Temporarily second from Sun the build team who can continue to do
SXCE builds until they are replaced or added to.
This has nothing to do with Sun controlling the resources as Sun would
still be paying the bills, and it's not about creating a permanent
separate entity (my opinion is that it would be temporary). This is all
about creating a small unencumbered team (<20 people), of the highest
quality (no offense intended for any incumbents) that can work at speed
for establishing the community distro (whatever it will look like) and
liberating the community processes. At the same time it will provide a
level of separation that allows Sun to beneficially fix it's internal
processes by forcing it to operate as a community member rather than a
controlling power (which it currently does through process even if it
doesn't desire that situation).
This means someone has to give Ian the budget, but most of it will be
simply taken straight out of existing Sun budgets, we are not talking
new headcount, it's a like for like swap and if there are new hires from
outside of Sun then Rich Green will have to deal with the leftovers
(harsh, but this is too important not to do it right).
I have no doubt that this would be painful, but I also have no doubt
that it (at least in some similar form) is essential.
Once this is done what ever is decided in terms of distros can be
implemented, without it I can only see this being a talk fest.
Regards
Rob Giltrap
(NB: I'm a Sun Contractor but I'm not working with the Engineering
groups in any way)
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