On Fri, 16 Apr 2021 at 19:01, Jason Merrill <ja...@redhat.com> wrote: > > On Fri, Apr 16, 2021 at 10:49 AM Christopher Dimech via Gcc > <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote: > > > Sent: Saturday, April 17, 2021 at 1:03 AM > > > From: "Ville Voutilainen" <ville.voutilai...@gmail.com> > > > To: "Christopher Dimech" <dim...@gmx.com> > > > Cc: "GCC Development" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> > > > Subject: Re: A suggestion for going forward from the RMS/FSF debate > > > > > > On Fri, 16 Apr 2021 at 15:46, Christopher Dimech <dim...@gmx.com> wrote: > > > > > The "small minority of developers" you speak of sure > > > > > seems to consist of developers who are not in the minority > > > > > considering how much they _actually contribute_ to the project. > > > > > > > > Due to their being paid for the work. Have no doubt that if others > > > > were being paid, the contributions could likely drown the current > > > > contributors. Thus, the claim of a power grab is valid. > > > > > > How convenient to make that claim and just bypass what's said in the next > > > bit: > > > > > > > > > > > > Some of them don't need to perform a "power grab"; they > > > > > already have all the power fathomable, by virtue of being maintainers > > > > > and active developers. > > > > > > I very much doubt your lofty hypothesis that if "others" were being paid, > > > the > > > contributions would "likely drown" the current contributors. Especially > > > when we're talking about people who have submitted pretty close to ZERO > > > patches to GCC. You can give a claim that a person $foo would contribute > > > if being paid to do it. I'll buy that claim if you're talking about > > > people like > > > Nathan Sidwell and Iain Sandoe from the time before they became active > > > contributors again, now that they've been hired to do that. I will not > > > buy that claim about people who haven't been GCC contributors before. > > > > There are many users of gcc who are more qualified to know what is needed > > in gcc, than developers. That does not mean than I want to diminish their > > authority for gcc. But that authority was still conferred to them by the > > the Gnu Project - which demands responsibility to carry out the assigned > > tasks to the best of their ability, not to excoriate their obligation > > towards > > the project itself. > > > > The ultimate authority is the final responsibility of the Gnu Project, > > not only that of gcc. > > Free Software means there is no ultimate authority. In Free Software, > leadership of the development process is by the "consent of the > governed". If there is sufficient objection to the existing > leadership, developers can change it, either by negotiation for > changes with the current leadership or by forking. > > The EGCS fork happened because a critical mass of developers gave up > on the GNU GCC2 leadership model. The reconciliation happened because > GNU agreed to accept the EGCS development model as GNU GCC. > > I hope to resolve the current crisis by leadership adjustments > something along the lines of Ville's proposal, rather than forking. > > Jason
That's pretty much all I ask. Jason, Jeff, Thomas, others, please discuss this matter among the maintainers, and if need be, among the SC, and make a decision, or at least provide an indication of how you see these matters. I think that indication gives us megabytes more data than philosophical discussions will, entertaining as they might be.
