Looks like there was no follow-up to this. Ross are you still on track to put this forward?
Sanjiva. On Mon, Jun 24, 2013 at 7:59 PM, Ross Gardler <[email protected]>wrote: > During the proposal phase for the Stratos podling I floated the idea of > the IPMC using the podling to experiment with a more streamlined incubation > process. > > It is not my intention to drive this experiment. Ant Elder expressed a > desire to explore the idea during recent discussions among the IPMC. Whilst > we were drawing up the Stratos proposal I asked Ant if he would be willing > to lead the experiment. He agreed. > > In this mail I will summarize the relevant parts of the discussion thread > on the [email protected] list. The intention is to give Ant a > starting point for the discussions here. It's up to the Stratos community > to ensure the experiement does not limit the project in any way and up to > Ant to drive the experiment for the IPMC. Naturally, the IPMC mentors will > be a very important part of defining the model and feeding back on the > experiment to the IPMC. I'll be lad to help evaluate as an IPMC member too. > > Chris' original skeleton proposal is at [1]. This outlines who is > responsible for what in the new model. I'll remind the team that the board > has not discussed the proposals here and a number of board members have > expressed concern about it, while a couple are actively pushing for it. > > The following specific questions were raised during discussions. These > will need to be addressed in any proposal. > > # Who's responsible for monitoring the probation, the IPMC or the board? > > This is perhaps the biggest potential area for pushback is moving > oversight for the project to the board. Going to board certainly bypasses > the problem of the IPMC often getting in the way of efficient process but > it also removes the valuable input that some members of the IPMC often > provide. Furthermore, should there be a problem it means it is the board > that must fix the problem. Podling mentoring is not, traditionally, a role > the board has ever taken on (fixing broken communities is not the same as > mentoring fledgling communities). > > Note that one Director explicitly stated that he will vote -1 on any > proposal that has a "podling" reporting directly to the board. This doesn't > mean it won't be approved by the board, but it does mean it will be > rigorously discussed. > > # What bits must absolutely be done before probation begins? > > We dodged this question in the discussion thread by saying we'd go to > podling status first. I guess defining this is part of defining the scope > of the experiment. > > # What minimum criteria does a probationary TLP have to meet to stay in > good graces? > > Here I suggested the criteria would be the same as a TLP. The problem is > understanding whether we have that documented anywhere. The IPMC has > addiitonal requirements (e.g. keep the meta-data up-to-date) whilst the > board has, for the last 12 months or so, been pushing to have TLPs provide > some of the same meta-data (e.g. last release date, last committer > addition, last PMC addition). > > I suggest trying to come up with using the same criteria for TLPs, > podlings and pTLPs. Where podlings will have a lower set f expectations > (i.e. no need to have voted in any committers yet, pTLPs have voted in a > committer in the last six months but may not have done an approved release > and TLPs should have a fairly regular flow of committers and releases). > Note these "metrics" ought not be fixed, they should be seen as guidelines. > A project with no recent releases that continues to report and answer user > queries may just be mature, for example. > > One measure can be the pTLP PMC membership. Initially it would be only the > project mentors and champion. Over time active committers from the initial > committer list are voted into the PMC (recognising merit). So we then have > a possible measure, if there are 3 members of the pTLP from the initial > committer list then there are now sufficient binding votes for the project > to operate as a TLP. > > While writing this I realised that we might want to propose an interim > step in the incubation process. e.g. start as a podling, move to pTLP when > certain criteria are met (e.g. >3 active binding votes) and then TLP. I've > not thought this through, just an idea you might consider. > > Another commentator observed that "It would probably be good to be clear > on what are the exact characteristics that make this podling pTLP worthy > for the future. For example, the number of ASF veterans in its ranks." - a > good observation. The danger here is creating an "us" and "them" > environment. Perhaps the podling -> pTLP -> TLP idea resolves this - not > sure. > > # What happens if the probationary TLP is not in good graces? > > I don't see this as being any different from a TLP. For a TLP the board > says "fix it", if it isn't fixed they clear the decks and invite the > remaining PMC to fix it. If it still isn't fixed it gets axed. What needs > to be defined is who provides these "fix it" ultimatums and when. > > Please be *very* careful here. When we set up the IPMC we said the IPMC > would do this - that's the main failure point now. It is mob rule. If a > pTLP reports to board then it's easy, but if reporting to the IPMC it is > harder. > > Note, a Director said " the Board will need a *definition* of > probation. This is more than just a wiki page. I believe it needs to > be a page laid down in www.a.o/dev/ that defines the constraints laid > down upon a "pTLP"" I believe answering the above question will provide > this. > > # What bits must absolutely be done before probation completes? > > Here I don't see any reason for it to be different to podling graduation > (proven ability to be open to new community members, properly vetted > release). > > # How do we maintain the "podling" brand? > > People are familiar with the concept of a podling. The press understands > the difference between a TLP and a podling. We must not lose this > distinction. The Apache brand is valuable because of our high quality bar. > If we dilute that quality by allowing projects to claim they are official > before they understand what is required of an ASF project we run the risk > of damaging the brand for all projects. > > So there you go. I hope I've done a reasonable job of summarizing a 55+ > mail thread. > > Good luck! > > Ross > > [1] http://wiki.apache.org/incubator/IncubatorDeconstructionProposal > -- Sanjiva Weerawarana, Ph.D. Founder, Chairman & CEO; WSO2, Inc.; http://wso2.com/ email: [email protected]; phone: +94 11 763 9614; cell: +94 77 787 6880 | +1 650 265 8311 blog: http://sanjiva.weerawarana.org/ Lean . Enterprise . Middleware
