At this point I’d also like to re-affirm that the OSGi RFC documents are public, and that there is a public feedback mechanism for RFC bugs. As the holder of the pen for Transaction Control, the JAX-RS whiteboard, and the JPA service updates I can truthfully say that community discussion and feedback has influenced the direction of those RFCs/specifications, not just the converter.
As David says below, you can gain increased control over the direction of things anywhere by becoming a member/committer/employee. Committers in Apache Aries have ample opportunity to review and discuss the many implementations built there, just as they do in Felix. This right applies both before and after the release of the specification. What Apache Committers can’t do is make changes to an OSGi RFC/spec, for that they need to lobby an OSGi member. This is exactly the same for a committer in Eclipse, on Github, or in a private company, so it leaves Apache committers just as equal as everyone else. The main difference here is that there are a lot of OSGi members who believe in Apache, and therefore contribute as committers. Are we really saying that those committers should be disallowed because they are OSGi members and therefore have “more power”? Finally, there are a lot of projects and/or components in Open Source (including Apache) that are written by a single committer, typically the person with the itch to scratch. Only If that committer tries to prevent discussion about, or changes to, that code is there a problem for the community. To my knowledge this does not apply to any of the components in Apache Aries or Apache Felix. Best Regards, Tim Ward > On 19 Jan 2017, at 17:32, David Leangen <o...@leangen.net> wrote: > >>> Ray has listed a number of things that have been implemented during the >>> past few months. All of them have been written by a single committer who >>> also happen to be the one modifying the spec document. >>> >>> >> This is factually incorrect at least for the Converter implementation at >> Felix. Just look at the commit history for commits done on behalf of >> community members and also check the mailing list for discussions that >> definitely provided great feedback on the work done. > > I have been doing a very tiny bit of work on the Converter as a double > outsider (non committer in Felix, and non OSGi member). > > I completely rely on others to accept my contributions and suggestions, > making me a kind of second class citizen. It does work, but I need to either > (i) become a first class citizen either by merit or paying fees, depending on > the organisation, or (ii) accept my dependence on the goodwill of others. > Currently I have a de facto sponsor who has been very attentive to my > questions and contributions, so (ii) is working out well enough. If it didn’t > work out, could always fall back on option (i). > > So I can understand the frustrations and agree that there is a bit of a grey > area, but at the same time I understand that in the end I have the same > opportunities as everybody else. In this case, I am not willing/able to “pay > the price” for full citizenship, so I don’t feel I have the right to complain. > > > Just my 2¥. > > Cheers, > =David > >
