Hi Sven, Frans, Thomas and Joey, having read this thread on debian-powerpc, I would like to comment as a largely uninvolved bystander that is thankful for the hard workers for Debian GNU/Linux. Note that I have only read the emails on this list which is the basis for my humble opinion.
a) I think it was good that Sven brought up the issue
which includes a technical and social side.
Sven, thanks for doing so.
b) The social and personal side is important. Sven's emails are clearly
showing this, but some of the responses by Thomas and
others did not reflect this.
Leadership in all part of Debian should accept that
there is a personal side. If Sven would have "my" volunteer
I would have sought a personal contact with Sven and other participants
trying to find out what is actually going on.
(Whether this has happend or not of course, I cannot say.)
Such problems always have more then one "contributor" and
most of the time it is not good to try to blame someone,
but to find out how the situation came to be and what part
everybody has in it and how to improve from there.
My part is: Writing this comment to help the situation.
I am also speaking up to support Sven. I believe
that he was bit badly treated in the thread.
No matter what he did to contribute to the situation,
this list has people which are new to the problem.
What could have been done better?
If Sven's commit rights have been revoked and he got "kicked out",
it would be very good to give a reasonable explanation
that people can be point people to.
The usage of the phrase "kicked" by Sven,
seems to indicate that there was
no common position why he left the d-i team.
c) I have the feeling of an incomplete picture.
Sven, you could have pointed to the reasons
why your commit rights have been revoked or that those reasons are missing
right on the start. That would have helped me.
But also others could help to to get more clear about this.
What is the d-i position on not wanting Sven?
Are there already explanations somebody could point me to?
d)
Thomas disregarded Sven's estimation about the diffculties of the
d-i efforts and the port. I think this is a mistake on the technical side,
Sven has experience and his estimations deserve a sound evaluation
and a serious rebuttal. Of course he is not the only competent person,
but this does not discredit his estimations.
On Mon, May 01, 2006 at 08:21:01AM +0200, Sven Luther wrote:
> On Mon, May 01, 2006 at 02:20:09AM +0200, Frans Pop wrote:
> > On Thursday 27 April 2006 13:39, Sven Luther wrote:
> > I revoked your commit rights immediately after your resignation from the
> > team because I felt (and I still do) that things had deteriorated so much
> > that the d-i team was better of without any involvement from you.
Frans, this can be okay (without knowing what the probkems are),
but ..
> > Also, I did not want any interference in the work of (the) new powerpc
> > porter(s).
I fail to see how Sven giving a hand would be that bad
(even without commit rights),
at the worst case he would need to be ignored
which seems worth the risk to me.
> > The fact that you attempted to fix the cd building breakage
> > without first consulting is proof that that was not unjustified.
This might have been a documentable case where clear requirements
of d-i commit rights (as I imagine them) were not met:
* Consult the main person before commiting.
> What porters ? You mean Colin Watson ? Or is there someone else ?
I assume it is clear that everybody need to follow rules in a team.
Sven, you so far did not write that you would be willing to accept
rules like this. Your response (quoted above) to Frans remark seems
off the point to me in this respect and switching the topic to
another problem.
I am pointing this out as an example how I see that people
in this thread fail to communicate with each other and create
more missunderstandings. I explicitly do not blame Sven (or anyone else).
Sven obviously reacted to part of the message that is more important
to him: Who will do the work? This is a legitimate question...
Again: I am just trying to point the mechanism.
> What do you want instead ? That i bugger Colin to fix the issue, while we all
> know he is busy ? That i send a patch to the BTS, then come begging to
> debian-boot that it be fixed ? This would cause much more mailing list
> traffic, and much more risk of annoying you, so sorry, but your removal of the
> commit rights was ill-thought.
Sven, while I understand your demand of clear rules,
I cannot follow your conclusion out of this.
(Means: I can imagine other ways of doing things in general.)
> So, this is a first step, but i need more. I need :
>
> - the commit access being restored.
I have not read plausible reasons why this would be necessary.
If the goal is to have a good installer and ppc port,
other ways of collaborating could be found.
It would be part of the responsibility of the d-i team
to keep their part of the promises then.
The post from Colins I have seen shows me that the d-i team
is willing and reacted to Sven's hint.
> - an apology for the lack of decency this action shows.
> - apologies for continual bashing would be nice, but more important you
> refraining from doing so in the future. When i post, avoid saying things
> like 'its the kernels fault' or otherwise indirectly pointing the finger
> back to me.
My suggestion for both sides is:
* Do not demand appologies. Instead each try to be more clear yourself.
* Set up clear rules and requirements of a potential
collaboration that others can understand.
I have seen potential for this from all participants!
Best Regards,
Bernhard
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