Hi, On Wed, Feb 15, 2012 at 11:46 AM, Benjamin Root <ben.r...@ou.edu> wrote: > > > On Wed, Feb 15, 2012 at 1:32 PM, Alan G Isaac <alan.is...@gmail.com> wrote: >> Can you provide an example where a more formal >> governance structure for NumPy would have meant >> more or better code development? (Please do not >> suggest the NA discussion!) >> > > Why not the NA discussion? Would we really want to have that happen again? > Note that it still isn't fully resolved and progress still needs to be made > (I think the last thread did an excellent job of fleshing out the ideas, but > it became too much to digest. We may need to have someone go through the > information, reduce it down and make one last push to bring it to a > conclusion). The NA discussion is the perfect example where a governance > structure would help resolve disputes.
Yes, that was the most obvious example. I don't know about you, but I can't see any sign of that one being resolved. The other obvious example was the dispute about ABI breakage for numpy 1.5.0 where I believe Travis did invoke some sort of committee to vote, but (Travis can correct me if I'm wrong), the committee was named ad-hoc and contacted off-list. > >> >> Can you provide an example of what you might >> envision as a "more formal governance structure"? >> (I assume that any such structure will not put people >> who are not core contributors to NumPy in a position >> to tell core contributors what to spend their time on.) >> >> Early last December, Chuck Harris estimated that three >> people were active NumPy developers. I liked the idea of >> creating a "board" of these 3 and a rule that says any >> active developer can request to join the board, that >> additions are determined by majority vote of the existing >> board, and that having the board both small and odd >> numbered is a priority. I also suggested inviting to this >> board a developer or two from important projects that are >> very NumPy dependent (e.g., Matplotlib). >> >> I still like this idea. Would it fully satisfy you? >> > > I actually like that idea. Matthew, is this along the lines of what you > were thinking? Honestly it would make me very happy if the discussion moved to what form the governance should take. I would have thought that 3 was too small a number. We should look at what other projects do. I think that this committee needs to be people who know numpy code; projects using numpy could advise, but people developing numpy should vote I think. There should be rules of engagement, a constitution, especially how to deal with disputes with Continuum or other contracting organizations. I would personally very much like to see a committment to consensus, where possible on these lines (as noted previously by Nathaniel): http://producingoss.com/en/consensus-democracy.html Best, Matthew _______________________________________________ NumPy-Discussion mailing list NumPy-Discussion@scipy.org http://mail.scipy.org/mailman/listinfo/numpy-discussion
