Re: [board-discuss] Privacy Mission Statement
On Mon, Jun 18, 2018 at 5:22 PM, Thorsten Behrens wrote: > Florian Effenberger wrote: >> the Board of Directors has discussed and approved a Privacy Mission >> Statement [..] >> > Thx Florian & team for tirelessly working on this rather substantial > document! > > In this day and age, I'm glad we're taking a stand for privacy and > freedom not only with the software we publish, but also on how we run > our websites & services. 2.3 Private hardware and software may only be used within the scope of the operating procedures for telecommuting/home office for the processing of personal data. 'may only be used' means that anything that does not match the specified conditions is verboten. "within the scope of the operating procedures for telecommuting/home office for the processing of personal data." is not something comprehensible to me. Norbert -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? https://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: https://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ Privacy Policy: https://www.documentfoundation.org/privacy
Re: [board-discuss] [DISCUSS] change of travel policy wrt. kilometers driven
On Wed, Mar 23, 2016 at 1:34 PM, Thorsten Behrens wrote: > Perhaps even a bit more explicit: "When cheaper public transportation > is available, it should be preferred. Transporting event materials or > excessive transfer times might be reasons for exemption. If in any > doubt, please get confirmation before travel." Getting confirmation _before_ travel should be the rule not the exception, to get travel assistance funds. Norbert -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] Re: [tdf-members] Preliminary results 2015 Elections TDF Board of Directors
On Sun, Dec 13, 2015 at 10:38 AM, Thorsten Behrens wrote: > Cor Nouws wrote: >> The proper results should read: >> Directors are the candidates, in this order: Marina Latini, Michael >> Meeks, Thorsten Behrens, Jan Holesovsky, Osvaldo Gervasi, Simon Phipps, >> Eike Rathke. >> And as deputies: Norbert Thiebaud, Bjoern Michaelsen, Andreas Mantke. >> >> My apologies for the initial announcement and thanks to all people that >> responded. >> > As someone affected by this change: I accept the new ranking, and > trust the MC is doing the right thing here. As someone affected too, I concur with Thorsten. Norbert -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] Questions for the candidates to the board of directors of the Document Foundation
On Mon, Nov 2, 2015 at 4:38 PM, Charles-H. Schulz wrote: > Dear candidates to the board of directors of the Document Foundation, > > 1. Do you commit yourself to have enough time and the necessary > technological tools in order to participate to the regularly scheduled board > calls? I have made the time in the past five years for the ESC, for the Membership Committee, for which I wrote the 'technological tools', and for the BoD. > > 2. Do you commit yourself to follow up and work on (at least) the main items > and actions you have volunteered to oversee or that have been attributed to > you by the board? Yes, by 'volunteering' to do a task, by definition I commit myself to doing it... No I do not commit myself to be designated volunteer and be 'attributed' task without my consent. In practice I have a very good attendance record, and I tend to deliver what I promise and try not to over-promise. > > > 3. What are your views on the foundation's budget? How should the money be > spent, besides our fixed costs? There is no reason to exclude our 'fixed' cost of the analysis. In fact, rampant increase of fixed/recurring cost is a concern to me, as such can make it painful to adjust our expense level to a fluctuating income stream. as for how the money should be spent: as I said in my earlier statement: + Favor spending directed directly to support the community of volunteer to have the tools needed to work, to be able to communicate and interact with each other. + Favor project driven by volunteer committed to bring them to fruition. In other work, helping those that are helping themselves In other words: if you need resource to support your volunteer efforts, you'll find a sympathetic hear. If you just want money to be thrown at a problem, but are not willing to actually do anything about it yourself... then I'm much, much more reluctant. > > 4. Should we work towards broadening our pool of contributors, both > technical and non-technical? Why the artificial divide ? and why the focus on this particular axe. Of course the more _contributors_ the better. There are plenty of activities that can benefit from even more contributors, all of them are 'technical' in their own right, from Documentation to Coding, from QA to l10n, from Infra to RelEng, each of these activities and plenty others, need skills and hard work, each require the mastery of some techniques. In any case it is misunderstanding the role and power of the board, to reduce the growing of the community to the Board's will. > > > 5. Should the Foundation -as an entity distinct from the LibreOffice project > or the Document Liberation project- engage into growing its influence and > promoting and defending Free Software and Digital Freedom? It is, after all, > an integral part of its mission per its very Statutes. It is a bit troubling when you answer your own questions. Of course what the statues actually say is: "spreading the philosophical and cultural ideals of FLOSS" I certainly agree with that. > > > 6. How do you view your (potential) role as a member of the board of > directors, given that this position does not give you any specific > functional role inside the LibreOffice or Document Liberation projects? I view my role in the BoD as a steward. My goal is to make sure that the 10's of thousand of 10 euros donations entrusted to us by individuals all over the world are spent wisely and fairly -- within the legal constraints imposed on the foundation -- on things that support the community that make these projects exists and thrive. The board is not a group of exalted visionaries. The board is an administrative body whose function is to insure and orderly functioning of the Foundation itself -- work which mostly consist in administrative trivia. The foundation's purpose is to provide a home to the community of volunteers.. the volunteers are the one that bring visions and direction by they collective work. The BoD is not a 'leader' it is a 'Shepard' > > > 7. What is the biggest problem of the foundation in your opinion? What is > its biggest opportunity? Both boils down to the same topic. On one hand the foundation benefit from a wide support by the public, providing it with substantial financial support, on the other hand, as a foundation we have some difficulties to 'execute'. We are a volunteer and meritocratic organization. that means, to me, that we, as a board, should support the volunteer that show up to work, and discourage the make-a-whish attitude. Norbert -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [tdf-core] [board-discuss] Marketing Budget Approval for FUEL GILT 2015
On Sun, Oct 25, 2015 at 2:02 PM, Charles-H. Schulz wrote: > Le 25 octobre 2015 16:40:31 GMT+01:00, Italo Vignoli > a écrit : >>FUEL GILT is one of the largest conferences focused on localization >>issues, and is organized by a number of TDF community members in India >>(those who have attended the conference in Aarhus). They have invited >>Sophie and myself to attend the conference, and the idea is the I >>attend >>2015 and Sophie attends 2016, to foster the connection with the Indian >>NLP and promote LibreOffice and ODF in the Indian market. >> >>The conference happens in Chennai (Madras) on November 20-22, and I >>will >>present a paper on LibreOffice localization (edited with Sophie's >>precious help) and one on the ODF document standard (and associated >>issues, such as free fonts for interoperability). >> >>Travel expenses will be lower than 1,000 Euro (flight is around 600 >>Euro, hotel is less than 75 Euro per night, and other expenses are low >>in comparison with Europe). >> >>For more information on FUEL: http://fuelproject.org/gilt2015/index. >> >>I ask Charles to approve the expense from the marketing budget. > > Excellent idea. Approved. Guys, do you actually keep track of 'the marketing budget' ? or is it just assumed to be bottomless ? Norbert -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
[board-discuss] Candidacy
Dear members, I'll be seeking another term in the upcoming BoD election. I've been a volunteer in the project since its creation five years ago. These days, aside from my duties on the Board, I mostly work on Infra, particularly the tools and systems used by the developers ( gerrit, continuous integration, automated testing, ). I also do the Releases for the MacOSX platform and some coding, mostly low key clean-up and other fairly easy hacking. I am unaffiliated, that is, I do not work for a company doing business on or around libreoffice, nor do I have any other professional or financial interest in any of TDF endeavors. I intend to continue to further the policies consistent with my vision of the role of the Board: + Foster an environment designed to help people willing to volunteer, to do good and productive work. + Be financially conservative, with the long term financial sustainability of TDF in mind. + Favor spending directed directly to support the community of volunteer to have the tools needed to work, to be able to communicate and interact with each other. + Favor project driven by volunteer committed to bring them to fruition. In other work, helping those that are helping themselves. Norbert Thiébaud aka shm_get -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] Design team leads
On Thu, Jun 19, 2014 at 10:56 AM, Mirek M. wrote: > Hi, > Astron told me that the idea to have positions within the design team was > not well-received and that I should discuss it with you. What do you find > problematic about having positions within the team? > > To be clear, leads would be there to make sure that things get done, that > the process by which they get done produces the best results, and to resolve > controversial issues if they arise. Just to pile up on what has already said: 'lead' has a loaded history in the project so is the bestowing of 'title'. That being said, as a team, the notion of coordinator is not offensive per se, and as long as it is a de facto acknowledgement of a actual function and not a de jure title it is perfectly fine imo. But one is such coordinator because he/she is actually 'coordinating' with the approval and agreement of the people being coordinated (no, no need for an election or such.. if you need a formal election it is already a 'fail') This is a natural extension of the meritocratic principle at the core of TDF. Norbert -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] vote on travel policy changes
On Thu, Apr 10, 2014 at 5:00 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hello, > > as a follow-up to the previous discussion, I'd like to ask the board to vote > on changes to our travel policy. I actually have two requests, and ask to > vote on them together. +1 Norbert -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
[board-discuss] Re: [VOTE] Rules of Procedure changes
On Fri, Feb 21, 2014 at 9:18 AM, Thorsten Behrens wrote: > The draft text was not fully ready during our board call on Wednesday, > I'd therefore ask the new board plus deputies to vote via email on > this list: +1 Norbert -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
[board-discuss] Re: Accepting my position in the Board
I, Norbert Thiébaud, elected [Deputy] Director of the Board of The Document Foundation, hereby accept this position within the Stiftung bürgerlichen Rechts "The Document Foundation". My term will start on the 18th of February 2014. Signed: Norbert Thiébaud =- Ich, Norbert Thiébaud, gewähltes [Ersatz-]Vorstandsmitglied der The Document Foundation, nehme mein Amt innerhalb der Stiftung bürgerlichen Rechts "The Document Foundation" an. Meine Amtszeit beginnt am 18. Februar 2014. Signed: Norbert Thiébaud -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
[board-discuss] Re: Nominating Norbert Thiebaud for the Board of Directors
On Mon, Nov 4, 2013 at 5:28 PM, Thorsten Behrens wrote: > Hi, > > I'd very much like to nominate Norbert for the upcoming board of > directors election. Thanks, I gladly accept the nomination, and would be honored to be elected to serve on the Board. Norbert -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
[board-discuss] Nominate Lionel Mamane
I'd like to nominate Lionel Mamane for the upcoming Board of Directors election. Lionel as been an active volunteer contributor to the project for 3 years, becoming our de-facto Base maintainer. He is very smart, patient, considerate and has demonstrated a capacity to work well with others. I believe that these qualities will make him a very good Borad member. Norbert -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] asking permission to use name / logo
On Thu, Sep 5, 2013 at 4:36 AM, Cor Nouws wrote: > 5. Enclosed you find a document with three possibilities for a 'logo' at the > header of the website of the trainingcenter. > A is the one that a designer drafted after my initial info. > B is extended mentioning OO > C is a different approach. > For Info: In the attached document, C looks bad on mac with lo4.0... the Text LibreOffice - has blank zone around it that 'erase the underlying 'Door Nou&Off' in B the color of 'en OpenOffice' is not quite the same than the one of 'Trainincenter and the fact that the later is a bitmap and the former a text also shows in the sharpness of the edges of the letter... A looks ok, modulo the grainy font edge due, I suspect to the logo being a png and not a svg Norbert -- To unsubscribe e-mail to: board-discuss+unsubscr...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] new BoD call time due to daylight saving time
On Sun, Mar 31, 2013 at 8:07 AM, Olivier Hallot wrote: > UTC is very handy, believe me. Sure I find the whole DST mess stupid to start with... but... _practically_ the meeting time is adjusted so that it always occurs at the same CET time. so the announce could be made using UTC for convenience, but in fact that UTC time has changed and will change according to the DST setting of CET... so instead of figuring out how many hours behind 3,4,5 you are from CET, you have to pay attention to the specific UTC time of the meeting, which will vary up to 2 hours depending on the specific date of the meeting. Note: 1/ I re-iterate that the reference time can be a certain CET time, and yet the announce can contain UTC time for convenience 2/ And the end of the day that was just a suggestion... that I made because we were running into the same problem with ESC meeting... I have no strong feeling about it... especially for a meeting that I rarely attend to start with :-) Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] new BoD call time due to daylight saving time
On Sat, Mar 30, 2013 at 3:32 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi, > > Norbert Thiebaud wrote on 2013-03-29 18:09: > >> may I suggest, to avoid that twice-yearly dance, to set the time based >> on CET once and for all.. rather than UTC with 2 adjustment a yer when >> CET switch in and out of DST. > > > I specifically went for UTC, as I have received many complaints in the past > from people who did not clearly know what CET is (particularly from Northern > America). www.google.com CET > I think UTC as reference time fits best, since it's an > international standard. Well, the issue here is that UTC, of course, does not have that funky 'daylight-saving' thing... so if you pick UTC then you will have to ask for a vote like this 2twice a year for the foreseable future... Note: you can announce the time in UTC but still have an agreement that the time is _based_ on a CET time... so that you won;t have to do a vote for a 'change' twice a year. Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] new BoD call time due to daylight saving time
may I suggest, to avoid that twice-yearly dance, to set the time based on CET once and for all.. rather than UTC with 2 adjustment a yer when CET switch in and out of DST. Norbert On Fri, Mar 29, 2013 at 7:55 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > +1 from my side, of course > > Florian Effenberger wrote on 2013-03-29 13:53: > >> Hello, >> >> in many countries, this Sunday daylight saving time will start again. In >> order to keep the effective time of the board calls constant, I'd hereby >> like to have a quick vote. My request is to change the call time from >> 1600 UTC to 1500 UTC. >> >> The complete request: >> >> The TDF BoD calls will take place every 2nd Wednesday at 1500 UTC, >> starting on April 3rd, 2013, and are scheduled to run for one hour. >> >> Florian >> >
Re: [board-discuss] FTP space for LibreOffice Server Install GUI
On Sat, Mar 16, 2013 at 2:54 AM, Florian Reisinger wrote: > > I am really sorry, but I don't have the slightest idea how to do that. It would be usefull to investigate... surely there is a way to do unattended build, even on windows. > It > might be helpful for you to know what I do to release a new version: Open > Visual Studio 2012 for Windows Desktop | Build --> Publish | > (A wizard opens. I enter the FTP Url I want it to be published -> I enter > the download URL -> I agree, that the software should be available online + > offline -> Finish > Build starts --> Prompt opens, asking me for FTP username + password --> > Waiting a second (till everything is uploaded --> A webpage opens when > everything is finished. Everyone using the program get a Update prompt and > are able to download it... There is 2 separate task: building the porduct... and uploading it. scipting the upload is not too much of a problem... scripting the build... well it is windows, so who knows... > > IMHO a daily would be non-sense as everyone would be forced to use a > daily... (See above) a daily build does not really mean _daily_ first a buildbot only build if there is something 'new' and will only upload if it build... and we can make the buildbot monitor the master branch to do just plain build (for verification purpose) and a 'release' branch that will only see new commit when you are ready to release a new version... which will then be built + uploaded. The only way to scale, is to automate. so anything that require someone to sit in front of a screen and click-wait-click-wait-click is not good. It may sound not to bad when you have just one small project, with one platform supported and little change rate... but now imagine dozen of these, and lo itself that see 50+ commit a day with 4-5 platforms and typically 2 release branches + master... Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] FTP space for LibreOffice Server Install GUI
On Fri, Mar 15, 2013 at 4:32 PM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi, > > Florian Reisinger wrote on 2013-03-15 20:57: > >> I continue to work at gerrit. I just wanted to ask, when I am able to >> re-publish my program? (In other words: When I am able to publish @TDF >> FTP?) > > > if I understood Norbert right, the plan is to host it inside our git > repository? Sure, but the build artifact need to be uploaded... most likely in gimli somewhere... Florain (Reisinger) what does it take to build your project ? can out make a cygwin-based shell scrip to run a build ? (ideally stored in the porject itself) in that case I could have one of the tinderbox to build the project on occasion and upload the binary artefact somewhere... the 'same' way we do daily build of lo. It may be possible to set-up something so that you could trigger that from gerrit itself... or even maybe using jenkins and a windows (VM) slave... david may have an idea about that, since he is developing gerrit buildbot-plugin that way... (well, except for the windows part) Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] FTP space for LibreOffice Server Install GUI
On Fri, Mar 8, 2013 at 8:04 AM, Florian Reisinger wrote: > Am 05.03.2013 09:45, schrieb Florian Reisinger: >> >> Hi, >> [...] > > >> "SI-GUI" maybe?? > > > Do I have the rights to do "git push" IMHO not... 4 days ago I asked you: " 1/ I need you to register to gerrit.libreoffice.org and send me the email you used to register (so I can give you proper ACL on the new repo) " I have no received such information, so I can not possibly assign 'rights' until I know which user to assign it too. Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] FTP space for LibreOffice Server Install GUI
On Mon, Mar 4, 2013 at 6:06 PM, Thorsten Behrens wrote: > Florian Reisinger wrote: >> So I am asking for TDF webspace as a place for releasing the >> program. As the current size is extreamly low, I wouldn't need more >> than 50 -70 M to keep ~30-50 version of the program itself + some >> auto-generated files by VisualStudio. >> > Hi Florian, > > appears folks are generally happy with that - though we would like to > ask you to move the git repo over to our gerrit (with some more added > benefits ;)). > > Also, please add proper license headers to all source files (if you > are the sole author, you are free to do so). The preferred > LibreOffice license is this: > > /* -*- Mode: C++; tab-width: 4; indent-tabs-mode: nil; c-basic-offset: 4 -*- > */ > /* > * This file is part of the LibreOffice project. > * > * This Source Code Form is subject to the terms of the Mozilla Public > * License, v. 2.0. If a copy of the MPL was not distributed with this > * file, You can obtain one at http://mozilla.org/MPL/2.0/. > */ > > > > /* vim:set shiftwidth=4 softtabstop=4 expandtab: */ > > (adjust comment style to file type in question, of course). Adding headers etc. is fine... but the project is already licensed under LGPLv3 which is fine for the purpose. ( https://github.com/reisi007/LibreOffice_Server_Installation_GUI/blob/master/doc/LICENCE ) So I don't think there should be a requirement of re-licensing here. Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] FTP space for LibreOffice Server Install GUI
On Mon, Mar 4, 2013 at 6:06 PM, Thorsten Behrens wrote: > Florian Reisinger wrote: >> So I am asking for TDF webspace as a place for releasing the >> program. As the current size is extreamly low, I wouldn't need more >> than 50 -70 M to keep ~30-50 version of the program itself + some >> auto-generated files by VisualStudio. >> > Hi Florian, > > appears folks are generally happy with that - though we would like to > ask you to move the git repo over to our gerrit (with some more added > benefits ;)). Florian 1/ I need you to register to gerrit.libreoffice.org and send me the email you used to register (so I can give you proper ACL on the new repo) 2/ Can you pick a repo name that is not insanely long.. LibreOffice_Server_Installation_GUI is really too long for confort. losig.git maybe ? to give you an idea here are the kind of repo names we have so far binfilter buildbot core cppunit dev-tools dictionaries gerrit-etc help libcdr libexttextcat libmspub libvisio mcm-database original-artwork sdk-examples templates test-files translations voting Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] FTP space for LibreOffice Server Install GUI
On Mon, Mar 4, 2013 at 8:08 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi, > > > However, someone has to check Florian's product and see if it fits into TDF. > So, I have not looked into deep details (and I won't since it is in C#). but on principle it seems to address a useful problem: helping people do QA more easily on windows by helping them having multiple version concurrently... iow allowing them to test a new version without messing with the stable version they rely upon. I would not mind hosting the source repo on gerrit... and then we could poly host the binary on gimli... neither of them are big. This is not unprecedented, we are doing that for few 'satellite' pieces already like cppunit and others... The difference being mostly hosting 'binaries'... which incurs an extra layer of 'trust'... So, my personal opinion is, we should encourage and support such satellite project, whose main aim is to make thing easier for QA people on windows... and QA is a very important thing, anything we can do to get more people involved and productive there is a 'good thing' Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] FTP space for LibreOffice Server Install GUI
On Sat, Mar 2, 2013 at 3:49 AM, Florian Reisinger wrote: > > Thanks for helping out. If you have any question, don't hesitate and ask as > I am subscribed to this ML.. The first question would be: what is the license ? I looked in the repo on github but did not see any information regarding any licensing regime. Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] Development Budget Request
On Tue, Feb 12, 2013 at 6:30 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hello, > > > Thorsten Behrens wrote on 2013-01-29 18:25: >> >> In total, the request would be, for 2013, a budget of >> >> >> ** 8.000,00 € ** >> >> for this setup (plan is to start with one EX4 and then ramp it up, >> thus we don't incur the full cost in the first months). > > > because installing your own Windows with Hetzner is a tedious if not > impossible task, or you have to rent expensive licenses, we are evaluating > various options right now. Norbert is currently working on a donated machine > to see if we can virtualize everything and if that particular machine can be > used. There's also another sponsor offer available that might work out. > > Therefore, I propose we hold off from this for the moment, and request a new > budget when required. Given we have approx. 30.000 € unallocated for the > 2013 planning, this should work out. Well, in the request above there was also 1/ a couple of these EX2 to be use for linux gerrit buildboxing 2/ budget to get a Mac to do release on a TDF owned and controlled box, which will also help for builbot when not doing release build. (on top of the 2 I already provide) These two should still move along... Beside, I would ask that the above budget be 'reserved' until the situation clarify. if we find way to do it cheaper great... but I would not want to be stuck until next year because everything has been spent already, nor would I like for us to have to dig in the reserve for that predictable and anticipated need. Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] Development Budget Request
On Sat, Feb 9, 2013 at 4:33 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi, > > I'll check with my admin colleagues if there's a solution, otherwise we need > to find another hoster for those boxes. (Although I am really scared of > having a Windows 7 box directly connected to the Internet, but that's a > different story...) Actually that later point is indeed scary... so maybe so solution to both is to run W7 in a vm on a minimalist host OS, with ~all ressource allocated to that one vm. I could not find clear and convincing pages about the impact of vm vs native... but I think we can at least give it a shoot on one box to see what kind of build perf we get. Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] Development Budget Request
On Fri, Feb 8, 2013 at 11:38 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi, > > Thorsten Behrens wrote on 2013-01-29 18:25: > > >> We looked into some offers, and it seems e.g. Hetzner's EX4 is >> economical in terms of spec/price ratio >> >> http://www.hetzner.de/en/hosting/produkte_rootserver/ex4 >> >> , and goes for 49.00 € / month including VAT. > > > [..] > > >> In total, the request would be, for 2013, a budget of >> >> ** 8.000,00 € ** >> >> for this setup (plan is to start with one EX4 and then ramp it up, >> thus we don't incur the full cost in the first months). > > > Is a Gigabit connection required for the machines? I doubt, but wanted to > clarify, since that would add 39 € per month per machine. No > > Plus, dues the above sum take into account the fee of a Windows Server > license for those machines? Since we cannot bootstrap this on our own (i.e. > cannot install a separatedly bought Windows license), and virtualization is > not desired, we need to take Hetzner's offer here, which costs 15 € per > month for web edition and 25 € per month for standard edition. Then we need to find another provider. Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] 2013 budget as of today
Note : the budget above does not include yet a line for builbot infratructure Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] Splashscreen & Startscreen proposals for the 4.0
On Mon, Jan 28, 2013 at 8:34 AM, Italo Vignoli wrote: > So, votes should happen only on mailing lists. We can decide to get the > random opinion of users on Google+, but it should be clear that this is > not going to have the same value as the same concept expressed on the > mailing lists. If I may suggest: wile I favor 'poll' to get input about what the mebership at large thinks of different proposal... as _one kind_ of input to the decision process. I would rather not such poll to be 'binding' votes Unfortunately 'logo' and other design element are prone to bikesheeding... everybody has an opinion, everybody is an expert... so using 'us' the membership as guinea pig to get some feed-back is one thing.. but delegating that decision to a 'general' vote seems not that great to me. Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] Format of the BoD votes announcement
On Wed, Jan 2, 2013 at 11:00 AM, Joel Madero wrote: >> > I'm wondering if this would cause a "group think" mentality within the BoD. > I know that if a name is public, being the only dissenter might dissuade a > current or future BoD from dissenting. Dissenting are usually not expressed at the vote level, but usually during the discussion prior to the vote. more often than not the vote reflect the consensus... > Ultimately I'm wondering how much > adding names helps the project move forward. As I said earlier. in a representative system the 'representee' need to have a way to make an educated decision to choose the ones representing them. The voting record of an incumbent candidate is an important piece of information with that regard. > I know that we adhere to a very > open policy but with voting, sometimes anonymous really encourages the best > deliberation. Not withstanding the fact that our statute call for public BoD meeting, except for limited cases, in any case voting _is_ public. The information is already mostly there... just not in a form that is easy for the membership to process. Some vote occurs online, some other occurs on public conference call... on rare occasion there can be vote during in-person meeting of the BoD in any case the result of such vote are posted on the ML. The only proposed difference is that these 'result' be a bit more complete as to allow the membership to get a better picture of what their representatives are doing... and since they do vote for individual and not a 'group', the voting record of each BoD member is important. Beside adding the name would also provide a easier, less error prone, for each BoD member and interested observer, to make sure that the 'minutes' are correct, at least wrt the voting record. (it is easier to detect that your name is in the wrong column, rather than deduce that based on the Yeah/Nay count) And yes... the vast majority of votes are unanimous... that is expected since most of the votes are not controversial in nature, and a well functioning BoD would search for a consensus before getting to a vote... iow function primarily as a consensus based entity not a 'majority rule' entity. But if that good pattern where to be disrupted in the future, the Board of Trustee (the members) will have to try to remedy things at the following election, and again, the voting record in this scenario would be a useful tool to make an educated decision. It is better/easier to establish 'good practice' and 'precedent' while we have well functioning institutions. Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] Format of the BoD votes announcement
On Wed, Jan 2, 2013 at 4:23 AM, Tom Davies wrote: > Hi :) > but there are times > when a vote needs to be taken anonymously. Can you give a concrete example of such time ? I mean for a BoD vote. note: there is a distinction between private deliberation, temporarily non-public and 'anonymous' BoD vote. I can think of cases where the 2 former are justified or necessary, for privacy concern or legal reasons... but I can't think of a case where the later would be justified. Norbert.
[board-discuss] Format of the BoD votes announcement
I'd like to suggest that the summary of the BoD vote as exemplified below be slightly changed to included nominative informations relative the the vote. In a representative democratic system, like it is the case here, where the BoD represent the Board of Trustee, It is important that the represented body can evaluate how it is being represented by each candidate it designated to do so, in order to be able to make and educated decision during the following election. Certainly today such information is mostly available in the ML by parsing the individual +1, or by listeneing to the recording of the Bod meeting and again extracting the vote from there... but that is quite a time consuming an error prone process, and surely we want the acces to information to the Board of Trustee to be as low as possible, so that the Board of Trustee can make the most informed decision as possible. So I would recommend that future summary recorded Vote by the BoD include the name associated with the vote. I edited the example below with fictional names as an example. This is just an example, and I'll be satisfied with any variations one may prefer that fulfill the goal : nominative voting record :-) On Fri, Dec 21, 2012 at 7:03 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hello, > > The Board of Directors at the time of voting consists of 7 seat holders > without deputies. In order to be quorate, the vote needs to have 1/2 of the > Board of Directors members, which gives 4. > The Following Board of directors member have participated in the vote: John, Phillip, Robert (representing Jean) and Caroline. For a total of 4 member: The vote is Quorate > > A quorum could be reached with a simple majority of 3 votes. > > Result of vote: 3 approvals: John, Robert, Caroline 0 neutral 1 disapprovals. Phillip > Decision: The request has been accepted. > Note: if the decision is unanimous one can have Result of the vote: unanimous approval/disapprovals To avoid re-naming everyone participating in the vote. Norbert PS: 'private decisions', if any, should be the object of the same summary vote and posted in the BoD private list as the decision is made, and forwarded to the BoD-disucss list as soon as the rational for the 'private' status become moot.
Re: [board-discuss] Incoming call: LibO at nonprofit
On Thu, Oct 25, 2012 at 10:38 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Florian Effenberger wrote on 2012-10-25 10:36: > >> Volunteers? > > > From the board, MC and their deputies, that is; otherwise I cannot share the > call details, since it was directly to TDF and therefore should not be > shared with third parties Hummm, every member of the Board of Trustee would qualify no ? Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] Fwd: Conference Moderator
On Sun, Oct 14, 2012 at 7:58 AM, Simon Phipps wrote: > Dear Board, > > This proposal has been discussed on the Conference list and is unopposed. > Please will you consider selecting a person to act as LibreOffice Conference > Moderator as described below? If they agree, I would suggest the Thorstens (both of them) for the job... Norbert
[board-discuss] Re: [tdf-core] change in membership confirmed by authorities
Now that TDF is fully established, It is time to perform the final step of the bootstrap process and to have a membership-elected MC. I that spirit, I hereby resign from the Membership Committee. I will continue to carry on my MC duty until such time as a duly elected Membership Committee is in place. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] Travel Expenses Reimbursement Policy
On Tue, Jun 19, 2012 at 4:31 PM, Jean Weber wrote: > The Travel Expenses Reimbursement Policy > (http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/TDF/Policies/Travel) appears to > say that if one chooses not to fly the cheapest way, or chooses to > stay at an expensive hotel, then no reimbursement at all will be > allowed. > > I would think that the policy should say something like "only the cost > of low-cost economy airfare will be reimbursed; That open the doors to 'what _is_ the cheapest fare' ? what degree of reasonableness should be applied ( the 'cheapest' fare could entail 3 stop and an overnight lay-over... and cheapest _when_ ?... on a typical flight there are more fare than there are seat on the plane...) I think the trick is to get approval _before_ the fact with a 'budgeted cost'... and reimbursement would be 'up-to' and approved sum. Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] membership application/language and supporters
On Thu, May 31, 2012 at 7:55 AM, David Emmerich Jourdain wrote: > > > If the MC need help to translation, I think I can help, 'cause I have > knowledge in some languages. I already had offered my help in another > situation and I offer again, if the MC wishes. As I said earlier, that should not emanate from the MC What you are welcomed to do is to work within the community to let them know that you can help them interact in English with the MC if they need it. Doing so will help the MC and also that means that you would probably have a better understanding of who the candidate are and what they did, so the MC can ping you for clarification if need be. The other thing, which is not MC-related, is to make sure that the statues are translated and available... on the Wiki I supposed would be a nice place for them... Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] membership application/language and supporters
On Wed, May 30, 2012 at 9:41 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hello, > > However, most of us is not all of us, and indeed it is one of our strenghts > that we have a wide, open and diverse community, active in many countries > and on many languages. I really feel uncomfortable excluding people who > contribute to the success of LibreOffice and the foundation, "just" because > they don't speak English. Just to be clear: It is not my position that we should be "excluding people who contribute to the success of LibreOffice and the foundation, "just" because they don't speak English." But, as far as communication with the MC, for membership purpose, I do not want to put the burden on the MC to find translator to be able to handle request in any languages. Presumably someone, who does not speak English, must be active and interacting with other local people, and surely at least one of them must speak enough English to help them fill the form properly, and decode the answer they receive from the MC. > > While of course the main language of the MC should be English, finding ways > of having "proxies", people helping to translate, would be very much > welcome. I would suggest that the burden to find such proxy is on the applicant... and that is actually an exhibit of proper interaction with the community. > > I think practically, we can do it similar to the statutes. The "official" > form and rules are in English, but for convenience, we can provide localized > versions, given we find volunteers to translate them. The "binding" > variants, however, should solely be the English ones then (except for legal > texts, but that's another topic I don't want to touch here...). Agreed, but without exception :-) Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] membership application/language and supporters
On Wed, May 23, 2012 at 5:59 AM, drew jensen wrote: > On Tue, 2012-05-22 at 08:25 -0500, Norbert Thiebaud wrote: >> On Tue, May 22, 2012 at 5:36 AM, sophie wrote: >> > This is what language communities are supposed to do : give those who don't >> > speak English a chance to be part of the project. We can't rely only on >> > English speaking people to grow the community and represent it every where >> > in the world. This is why settling each of our actions on an i18n point of >> > view first is very important. >> >> That conjure to me the following quote (from a brazillian TDF member >> on the aooo-dev ML) >> >> "4 - Suddenly, TDF was requesting that every person who wanted to be called >> a "contributor" should fill a agreement request in order to be >> "recognized". So we became to be concerned about that huge amount of people >> who contributed and didn't want to fill a formal agreement to a foreign >> organization that don't speak their language and has a lot of "channels", >> many of them obscured. >> 5 - In addition, people who we were fighting bacame key persons in TDF. One >> of them became a "brazilian" member of the BoD, with 70 votes, when >> brazilian accepted members in Brazil were less than 15 and most of them >> didn't vote for him." >> >> Which, to me, indicate that the language barrier is being use and >> abuse to mislead (*), and the underlying 'nationalism' is disturbing >> to me. the notion the TDF should be the UN with 'national >> representative' is pretty scary (**) :-( >> > Hi Norbert > > I think you make too much of the statement from one person. Some people > will leave in a huff, no matter what policies are in place. Drew, I quoted the statement above not for the specific of the case but for its illustration value: > > I also think that what you refer to as a problem with Nationalism is > not, let me narrow the quote: "One of them became a "brazilian" member of the BoD, with 70 votes, when brazilian accepted members in Brazil were less than 15 and most of them didn't vote for him."" isn't the author arguing that a BoD candidat that happen to have nationality X must have the majority support of the members that also share that irrelevant trait. and reciprocally, isn't the author complaining that the artificial (in our context) subgroup defined by that irrelevant criteria is not properly represented as such ? Considering that the irrelevant criteria in question is 'National Origin', how is Nationalism not an accurate description ? Maybe 'Chauvinism' ? To go back to the original issue: 1/ I have no problem with TDF developing alternative way to 'recognize' people. But that is more a Internal Marketing/Community Management topic than a MC topic. 2/ Volunteer can translate and help people that do not know any English, including our Statue/Bylaw and other Foundation related document, actually I'd encourage that, as it would help avoid some confusion, apparently. 3/ I have a practical problem receiving Application/Renewal request in anything but English. English is _not_ my native language, but that is a practical, and relatively simple(*), working language. And as much as I would like to, I cannot be expected to speak all the language of the planet, nor is any MC member. So, official/formal communication, like membership application and renewal, must practically be en English. I'm very open to review and correction so that we avoid Idioms and other complex formulation is such documents, but it shall still be in English nonetheless. (*)I've dabbled with few languages, by curiosity... I took German and Latin in middle school, I did a short stint of Spanish.. I even glanced at Russian, Japanese and Chinese... English, as it turns out if a pretty simple language. Very little grammar, almost no conjugation, no declination, fairly limited vocabulary... as a consequence it is fairly easy - compared to other languages - to reach a level that allow written communication. Norbert
Re: [board-discuss] membership application/language and supporters
On Tue, May 22, 2012 at 3:57 AM, Cor Nouws wrote: > Hi all, > > When inviting people in the Dutch language community to consider membership > of TDF, two items showed up. > > 1. Not all active people are familiar enough with the beautiful English > language to feel comfortable to use the application page (& related info). > > has partial translation been considered, and if not, can it be? >From a practical stand-point, the only actual prerogative of members is their ability to vote for BoD and MC. How could one make an educated decision as to whom to vote for without basic understanding of who the candidates are and what they stand for, hence, in most case, without understanding of basic English ? > > 2. Not all supporters are active in a way that they feel like applying form > membership. > > the idea 'supportive membership' has been mentioned before. > Has it been discussed too? I'm not sure what that means... can you elaborate ? Norbert PS: I do think that current member should 'invite' people they know to be active to become member (and drop a heads-up/recommendation email to the membership committee). PS2: the main problem with non-conventional 'activity' is the ability of the MC to objectively measure it... having existing member vouching for such activities would go a long way, I think, in making that happen.
Re: [board-discuss] next BoD call on Wednesday
On Mon, Mar 5, 2012 at 11:39 AM, Norbert Thiebaud wrote: > At the very least, one could, once and for all, until revoked, make a actually one _should_ , since missing a call is not always a planned event :-) Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] next BoD call on Wednesday
At the very least, one could, once and for all, until revoked, make a 'standing deputy list statement' for the record. like The internet, In case I cannot attend a meeting: I designate X to be my deputy if X is not available or already represent someone else, I designate Y if Y is not available or already represent someone else, I designate Z This list is valid until the end of my term, or until I revoke it. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] AB-Member and ESC-Member on TDF-Website
On Tue, Feb 28, 2012 at 1:58 PM, drew jensen wrote: > In the case of individuals a meeting of the AB in their capacity as > members of the ESC, no, no you are conflating two distinct issues. disclosure requirement for AB members and disclosure requirement for ESC member... Norbert PS: just being invited to speak at an AB meeting does not make one an AB member. -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] Rules of Procedure
On Mon, Feb 27, 2012 at 3:26 PM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi Norbert, > > Norbert Thiebaud wrote on 2012-02-27 20:35: > >> but please point me to the law that said that a Stifung cannot enter >> into any binding contract, have any internal procedures, that are not >> written in german... > > > Those Rules of Procedure and the Community Bylaws are both > included/referenced via the legally binding statutes of a German entity. > While these two documents itself are not subject to approval by the > authorities as the statutes have been, of course the authorities need to > have a chance to read them, otherwise we could write totally contradictory > things inside. Like, in the German statutes we write that objective criteria > must be met, and in the Aramaic addendum we write "We only add members if we > they pay at least 1.000 € in donations". > > Therefore a quick shot, although that might be the wrong quote: > § 23 VwVfG, Verwaltungsverfahrensgesetz: "Die Amtssprache ist deutsch." = > "The official langage is German." Section 1 Scope (1) This Act shall apply to the administrative activities under public law of the official bodies: 1. of the Federal Government and public law entities, institutions and foundations operated directly by the Federal Government, 2. of the Länder and local authorities and other public law entities subject to the supervision of the Länder where these execute federal legislation on behalf of the federal authorities, where no federal law or regulation contains similar or conflicting provisions. (2) This Act shall also apply to the administrative activities under public law of the authorities referred to in paragraph 1, no. 2 when the Länder of their own authority execute federal legislation within the exclusive or concurrent powers of the Federal Government, where no federal law or regulation contains similar or conflicting provisions. This shall apply to the execution of federal legislation enacted after this Act comes into force only to the extent that the federal legislation, with the agreement of the Bundesrat, declares this Act to be applicable. (3) This Act shall not apply to the execution of federal law by the Länder where the administrative activity of the authorities under public law is regulated by a law on administrative procedure of the Länder. (4) For the purposes of this Act "authorities" shall comprise any body which performs tasks of public administration. But even if it was applicable Section 23 Official language (1) The official language shall be German. (2) If applications are made to an authority in a foreign language, or petitions, evidence, documents and the like are filed in a foreign language, the authority shall immediately require that a translation be provided. Where necessary the authority may require that the translation provided be made by a certified or publicly authorised and sworn translator or interpreter. If the required translation is not furnished without delay, the authority may, at the expense of the participant, itself arrange for a translation. Where the authority employs interpreters or translators, they shall receive remuneration in accordance with the appropriate provisions of the Judicial Remuneration and Compensation Act (Justizvergütungs- und –entschädingungsgesetz, JVEG). (3) If a notice, application or statement of intent fixes a period within which the authority is to act in a certain manner and such notifications are received in a foreign language, the period shall commence only at the moment that a translation is available to the authority. (4) If a notice, application or statement of intent received in a foreign language fixes a period for a participant vis-à-vis the authority, enforces a claim under public law or requires the fulfilment of an action, the said notice, application or statement of intent shall be considered as being received by the authority on the actual date of receipt where at the authority's request a translation is provided within the period fixed by the authority. Otherwise the moment of receipt of the translation shall be deemed definitive, unless international agreements provide otherwise. This fact should be made known when a period is fixed. only means that if we wanted to enter the bylaws as evidence, we would need to provide the german authority a translated version, not that that translated version has to be our official 'master' version. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] Rules of Procedure
On Mon, Feb 27, 2012 at 3:29 PM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi, > > Norbert Thiebaud wrote on 2012-02-27 20:35: > >> Our bylaws are an internal non-german-legal document that we use as >> _our_ constitution. it is not meant to be used in court. > > > wrong. > > I recall one rule where the board is not allowed to change the bylaws in > case of a dispute, until that dispute is settled. (Don't nail me down on the > exact wording here...) If the worst case happens, someone could claim that > in court. Yes but what would be disputed in court if anything would be the fact that the BoD did not honor the block, which should be a statute side thing, and not the object of the block (i.e the actual change of the bylaw. iow the things being blocked could be a logo (no language), and the rational still apply. the court does not need to understand the content of the change to rule on whether the change was procedurally correct. In my mind the court should be involved only to rule on the form of the decision process, not on the content of the bylaws. furthermore, isn't there already a wordage to indicate that the bylaws cannot overrule the statue. iow we could have a bylaws that says: in order to be a member you need to pay a $1000 fee. Such rule would be valid as long as it does not contradict the statues... My argument is not that the bylaws have precedence over the statute, but that the English version of the bylaws is the reference version: if there is a doubt in what the bylaws means, the English version govern, since that is the one that _has_ been approved by the membership and not the version translated in German or any other languages. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] Rules of Procedure
On Mon, Feb 27, 2012 at 12:45 PM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > > I told you how the legal system works. You can either believe it or not. > However, it makes sense you trust the local guy, which is me. ;-) > I'm not a trusting guy, and that kind of answer is exactly what I want to avoid. The 'because I said so' argument did not work for me in Sunday's school when I was a kid, it is still not working for me now. but please point me to the law that said that a Stifung cannot enter into any binding contract, have any internal procedures, that are not written in german... (note: this has nothing to do with 'Florian'. these are precedent setting decisions... and who knows who will be the one in the future that will hold the 'because I said so' pulpit ) > Nobody said running an international entity is an easy task, but I think > we're doing good. As long as we have proper translations, everything is > allright. No it is not, we already had some 'oops what the German version _really_ means is' moments. So how do you expect me and other members to vote on something when I do not know what I am voting on ? My understanding is that the German legal system is there to enforce the statute: that is the part that explain how we select the board, how we kick a board member out, how we alter the statute. Our bylaws are an internal non-german-legal document that we use as _our_ constitution. it is not meant to be used in court. it is meant so that members can have an informed opinion about what can be done, how it is done, and decide if the executive branch (BoD) is within the bound of the spirit of these bylaws or is going astray... at which point the membership has the ability to ultimately kick the BoD out and _that_ process is legally described in German, so that it can get enforced by the German court. No German court (or any other court for that matter) should be involved in 'deciding' what our bylaws means. that is a reserved right of the membership as a whole. If the membership disagree with the interpretation of our bylaws by the BoD it has the ability to preempt that decision and/or to 'recall' a BoD member and/or to amend the Bylaws. no external entity involved. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] Rules of Procedure
On Mon, Feb 27, 2012 at 12:23 PM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi, > > Norbert Thiebaud wrote on 2012-02-27 19:14: > >> May i ask that the official languages for anything but the official >> statute be English(*). >> >> iow. the binding version of the rule of procedure, bylaws etc.. >> (everything but the official berlin state approved statues) be the >> English one. >> >> There is nothing more frustrating than 'oh, but the German version >> does not quite say that, it really does not translate quite well, what >> it_really_ means is...' > > > unfortunately, the documents referenced by the statutes of our German entity > need to be German in their main, legally binding version. Why ? these are extra-internal documents not subject to Berlin state review right? So they can be in Sanskrit if we choose to. You cannot ask our membership to vote to approve a text they cannot read. the community bylaw that will be vote upon _have_ to be the english one. that is the only version that is voted-upon and agreed to by the membership, hence it _is_ the binding version. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] Rules of Procedure
On Mon, Feb 27, 2012 at 5:40 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > > I have the version the German association uses here. It will not fit 1:1, > but it might serve as a starter. I'm sending it to you via private mail, > Charles, as well as all other German BoD members. Maybe someone can help > with translating, since it's in German only. Otherwise, Google translate > might be a starter for a (very) rough overview. ;-) > May i ask that the official languages for anything but the official statute be English(*). iow. the binding version of the rule of procedure, bylaws etc.. (everything but the official berlin state approved statues) be the English one. There is nothing more frustrating than 'oh, but the German version does not quite say that, it really does not translate quite well, what it _really_ means is...' Norbert (*) common English, not legalese English. that is the meaning of the words must be the commonly understood meaning, not a special legal-context meaning, even if that require more words to express. These documents are our own, they should not require a law degree to interpret, nor should it be acceptable to have argument like 'you're not a lawyer... trust me this _really_ mean:...) = Ce qui se conçoit bien s'énonce clairement - Et les mots pour le dire arrivent aisément. [whatever is well conceived is clearly said... and the words to say it flow with ease. ] L'Art poétique (1674) Citations de Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] AB-Member and ESC-Member on TDF-Website
On Mon, Feb 27, 2012 at 4:36 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > > So, while I agree this is also theoretical, the more we can make public, the > better it will be, the more it will serve our matter of transparency. I understand and agree with your argument and the scenario described. My main concern is this case (only wrt to the ESC.): John Doe is employed by Microsoft-Luxemburg as a pre-sale support for IIS (I'm making that up) during is leisure time he like to contribute to open source, and doing a great job at doing so in LibreOffice, he is offered to seat on the ESC. Since his work on FLOSS is not sponsored by Microsoft nor necessarily approved by it, he does not want to/ is not allowed to involve the name of his employer into the process. What should his 'affiliation' then be ? iow. Should we rely solely on self-described affiliation ? In which case, the take over scenario described earlier can only be dwarfed if observers manage to independently determine 'real' affiliation based on name to detect a conflict otherwise ill-intended committee stuffing would certainly avoid dissimulating one's affiliation, and the 'official' affiliation list would not be useful for the purpose of detecting such situation. Let me put it that way: I would expect that + for most sponsored people we do have an affiliation (most sponsor want to advertise that they do) + ESC member can choose to be classified publicly as 'Independent', with the understanding that other ESC members are privately confident that such ESC nomination is not jeopardizing the ESC balance, wrt the 30% rule. + such implicit affiliation can be shared with the BoD. (pretty much how it works today) For the AB: I honestly do not care that much either way... I'll leave that in the capable hand of the BoD :-) Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] AB-Member and ESC-Member on TDF-Website
On Sat, Feb 25, 2012 at 3:38 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Helllo, > > Norbert Thiebaud wrote on 2012-02-25 00:59: > > >> ESC member are there in an 'individual' capacity. Their company >> affiliation is only relevant to the extent that we try to avoid one >> company having too much weight... > > > the way I read § 8 IV of our statues (documentfoundation.org/statutes.pdf), > there is no legally binding requirement per se to have only a limited number > of affiliated people in the ESC, The ESC is intentionally _not_ a 'legal entity' of TDF, that does not prevent us from adopting sane rules to safeguard the integrity of the ESC purpose :-) Furthermore the guiding document here is our bylaws, which explicitly set a 30% limit "At any time, no more than thirty per cent (30%) of the members of the ESC may work for the same company, organization or entity (or any of its subsidiaries) as employees or affiliates. " > although it is highly suggested to have > similar rules as for foundation bodies there as well. Plus "The board of > directors can to resolve the conflict of interest by expelling the necessary > number of members from other committee at once, and/or replace member by > other members of such committee.", so I propose that we enforce comparable > rules. Indeed... We (the ESC) already do enforce it, in accordance with our bylaws. > This, of course, requires disclosure of the ESC members' affiliation, > if it affects his role there (but only then). Yes, Then again, since we know each other and when new people are suggested for the ESC, they also are usually well known of the dev community (including their affiliation) that is not really a problem... but certainly we can/should mention the affiliation internally when informing the BoD of the composition of the ESC. The question was should that be published/advertised... I have no strong objection to it... I just mentioned that it was not essential. I suspect that people that are sponsored by their employer to contribute would want their affiliation known... but I can imagine case of people that _do_ contribute, but do not want or cannot have their employer name associated with it. > > >> For the AB, that is exactly the oposite. people are there representing >> company, so the affiliation is the mandatory information... the name >> of the individual representing that company is less important and >> susceptible to change at the discretion of the AB-member. so trying to >> keep that public list up-to-date with individuals name is an >> unnecessary burden IMO. > > > Thinking about it a second time: The same paragraph as cited above foresees > that only 1/3 of the AB has the same affiliation. Therefore, I think knowing > the seat holders by name in public is important, so everyone can verify that > (remember our rule of transparency). I'm confused... how would 'everyone' verify if John Doe is an employee of entity X... or for that matter a contractor for entity X (the representative of entity X does not necessary has to be an employee of that company) Beside by definition of the AB there should be 1 company = 1 seat no ? how can you have more than 1/3 unless the AB is reduce to 2 or less member ? Or are you considering the affiliation of the AB representative of entity X to be the actual employer. so for instance if SPI send John Doe as their representative and John Doe happen to work for ATT for a living, would you consider his affiliation to be SPI or ATT ? if it is the former then the 1/3 rule is moot for AB. if it is the latter then that can be an issue, since AB member would be restricted in whom they choose to represent them based on other AB member respective choice... choice that can change at any time at their discretion... iow: I think the balance in the AB composition should be achieve by the BoD when they _accept_/_renew_ entities on the AB, considering that a given representative is affiliated to the entity he represent, irrespective of other affiliations he may have. This is especially harmless since the AB is purely an 'advisory' entity and cannot make binding decisions on behalf of TDF. > > Without knowing who is member of the ESC and/or AB, nobody could, so to say, > "challenge" their composition. Well: if you can infer/verify the company from a name in the case of the AB, then surely you can do the reciprocal for ESC... and if you can't, knowing the 'declared' affiliation will not help you to verify/challenge the composition. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] AB-Member and ESC-Member on TDF-Website
On Fri, Feb 24, 2012 at 9:53 AM, Andreas Mantke wrote: > Hi all, > > I looked on the TDF-Website and found out that there is no entry about the > member of > the AB and of the ESC. Although they are no organs of the TDF (like BoD, MC > or Board > of Trustees) they are very important for TDF and the development of > LibreOffice. I > think we should create special sections on the TDF-Website for them and > publish the > AB-Member and ESC-Member (the information is currently a bit difficult to > find only > in the wiki or blog) on the website. > > But before we create such sections on the TDF-Website, we should ask the > AB-Member > and the ESC-Member, if we should publish only the companies / institutions or > also > the representatives and what information they want to chare about themselfes > / their > company (in relation to TDF/Free Software) with the public. ESC member are there in an 'individual' capacity. Their company affiliation is only relevant to the extent that we try to avoid one company having too much weight... As for disclosure. The minimum is the Name (one cannot be an 'anonymous' ESC member) I guess that public disclosure of the affiliation, if any, could be optional (someone may work for a company but do not what the company name mentioned because his participation to the ESC is not a company sanctioned/sponsored activity) We will bring that topic-up on the next ESC call and provide a list with the appropriate/agreed-to details to this ML. For the AB, that is exactly the oposite. people are there representing company, so the affiliation is the mandatory information... the name of the individual representing that company is less important and susceptible to change at the discretion of the AB-member. so trying to keep that public list up-to-date with individuals name is an unnecessary burden IMO. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] General questions
On Thu, Feb 23, 2012 at 5:07 PM, drew wrote: > Hi, > > A few questions: > > The Advisory Board > > 1 - Where would I find a rooster of what corporations constitute the > board and who their representatives on the board are? I think the list has been advertised... but I not sure the actual names of the people delegated to represent such companies are relevant. An AB seat is bound to the sponsoring entity, and they get to designate whom-ever they want at any time to represent them. AB is the only entity where people are not there as individual but as representative of some other entity. So I agree that the list of entity should be public, but the individual's name of the representative... not so sure it is required. > > 2 - Minutes from AB meetings, where would I find those? I don't think that such minutes are published, nor should they. If you want honest and frank advices/opinions from big corporation, you can't have these advice being published publicly. Similarly in order to get advice from these actors, I expect our representatives to present to them ideas, line of inquiry, nascent projects that are being considered... most of them in a state of development that would render them premature for public disclosure at that time... So once you remove all that meat from the minutes, you would be left with nothing substantive... I don't see the point. > > Current Budget (expenses paid primarily) > > 1 - Where, or when will financial statements become public, either for > general availability (my preference but I know that cuts across the > grain form many), or restricted to TDF membership? Since we are collection money from the public, under charitable status, I think we should publish publicly at least a top-level 'Income Statement' and Balance Sheet. Members on the other hand should have the ability to audit the full detailed accounting ledger, provided some confidentiality requirement (every member is entitled to see the books, but not to publish or disclose to non-member information contained herein that has not otherwise been made public. the idea is to empower the membership to trust-but-verify, not to allow competing entity to gain inside knowledge) Otoh the stifung was just created... up to now the accounting were somehow mixed with frodev... so I would no expect to have anything published for a while. Realistically public disclosure of some accounting would prolly be an end-of-fiscal-year event... since the work needed is already done for tax purpose it would not be an extra burden on our volunteers. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] call recordings or only minutes?
On Mon, Jan 16, 2012 at 9:18 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hello, > > I was wondering whether we should upload call recordings as we did in the > past, or only keep them internally until the minutes are done, and then > upload them to the wiki. > > I seriously doubt anyone listens to the recordings, as the minutes provide a > much easier way to keep up to date. actually, I do, when I'm not on the call itself... Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] A New LibreOffice Bounty!
On Wed, Jan 11, 2012 at 5:48 PM, Rich Jones wrote: > Hello, Document Foundation! > > Somebody has posted a bounty to fund some development of LibreOffice on > Gun.io. I'm not sure if this was by you or a member or your community or > not, but I thought perhaps you'd be interested in either donating to it, > publicizing it, or working on it yourselves! "Unfortunately, payments can only be made to US residents for the time being." That is kind of a turn off... Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] PostgreSQL project <-> Document Foundation liaison
On Tue, Dec 13, 2011 at 3:17 AM, Lionel Elie Mamane wrote: > Hi, > > As main maintainer of PostgreSQL-SDBC, the native driver for > LibreOffice to connect to a PostgreSQL database server which is going > to be bundled with LibreOffice 3.5, I'm putting myself as "manager" of > the "The Document Foundation" organisation on the postgresql.org > website and related resources. sure... go for it :-) Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] [RESULT] New Membership Committee voted by the board
On Wed, Nov 9, 2011 at 7:28 AM, Andre Schnabel wrote: > Hi Thorsten, * > >> Datum: Wed, 9 Nov 2011 14:08:21 +0100 >> Von: Thorsten Behrens > [...] >> We would like to ask all successful candidates to formally accept >> their vote, by replying to this email. > > I do accept that vote and am looking forward to working with the other > established and new memers of the MC. Ditto. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] Membership Committee
On Sun, Nov 6, 2011 at 12:03 PM, Dennis E. Hamilton wrote: > I am not questioning the prerogatives of the TDF to govern itself in any > manner. Norbert is correct that I have no standing in the matter. I don't think that was the meaning of my reply, if that is what you take out of it, allow me to apologize for my failure to communicate. I did not meant to imply that _you_ are 'questionning the prerogative of TDF', and even less challenge question of your standing. > > Norbert, you can make my note mean whatever you want. I stand by it as > written. I'm not following... you must have read in my message something more personal than it was intended. > > One more thing. I have found folks on ooo-dev who are cynical about the > honesty and character of TDF members, too, but nothing so blatantly virulent > as was just inserted here. I'm sorry, since you are top-posting, it is hard to known which part exactly you are objecting to. Are there any facts in dispute ? Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [board-discuss] Membership Committee
On Sun, Nov 6, 2011 at 1:01 AM, Dennis E. Hamilton wrote: [...] > > First about the ASF. This is not about ASF. ASF is just a mean to an IBM goal in that story. > > Now, some individuals This is not so much about individuals either... AOOo owe its existence to Corporate politics and interest. It was by no stretch of the imagination a grass root movement. [..] > in the public interest. Can you spare us the marketing line. Every similar 'Foundation' operate under the same 'public interest' banner, which is a very broad one, and does not means, contrary to what one would expect, 'in the interest of the public'. (1) [..] > There are no recriminations, there is no litmus test, You mean except signing an iCLA ? > Drew will always be welcome to contribute in any manner he chooses. Sure, but If Drew ask to be named V.P. of Community Development at Apache, will he automatically get the job ? oh wait, no; I suppose he has to, at least, become ASF member first... wait, how one does become member at Apache ? humm... seems pretty vague one cannot 'apply', one need to have buddies in the place already to be 'proposed' for membership more like a Guild... In the mean time Drew _is_ a member of TDF and as such is entitled to run for BoD or MC, and of course to 'contribute in any manner he chooses'... actually that later one does not even require membership, or even signing up open ended liability agreement. The question at hand is -- to avoid running BoD and MC election concurrently, which would be a bad idea due to the necessary oversight of each body on the election of the other -- how best organize the transition to an elected MC. One proposition, that seems to be favored, is to postpone the MC election to the middle of next year and to re-conduct the current MC in the interim. The problem is that the current MC does not have enough member to conform to the foundation statute, as amended to fit the Host State requirement. So we need to fill 1 MC member position and 3 MC deputy positions. Out current Bylaw provide that it is the prerogative of the BoD to make such appointments. The only restriction established in the ByLaw is that such appointees must be TDF members. So every TDF member is eligible to such position, but none have any 'right' to it. >Just the same, I thought it strange that there was a question of any conflict >seen in Drew Jensen's participation on Apache projects. Since it is BoD's members prerogative to make such appointment, it does not seems strange at all that they'd ask questions, publicly or privately, to prospective candidate and other interested party to make that decision. And surely, when seeking a position of representation of the membership -- which is the case of the MC, which represent the membership in the process of evaluating the somewhat subjective criteria of 'substantive contribution' -- it is expected that a higher scrutiny be applied to questions of allegiance and purpose. Of course all that will become moot in few months, when the membership at large will be called-upon to make that decision. Still I would not be surprised if that sort of questions -- if still of relevance -- were to pop-up during the election cycle. Norbert (1) One could create an 'Charitable Association' whose purpose is to help anyone prepare and fill software patents. That would most likely fit the tax requirement to get a 'Charitable' tax-exempt status, which is a 'public-interest' Association... It is nevertheless very arguable whether that Association would be 'in the interest of the public'. -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to board-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/board-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Preparing elections for the membership committee
On Tue, Nov 1, 2011 at 9:37 AM, Tom Davies wrote: > Hi :) > I have assumed that Thorsten has not stepped down from MC or something. > Whatever he was stepping down from was in order for him to be able to do some > work that he is being blocked from doing anyway right? So until the job > needs to be started i think Thorsten is still on whatever it was he was going > to step down from. > > Sorry, i just got a bit muddled. The MC is in charge of supervising the BoD election so clearly someone running for a BoD possition cannot be member of the MC The MC is in charge of supervising "Solemn Address and Impeachment of the Board of Directors". again that create a conflict of interest if one is allowed to be BoD member and MC member. So, MC membership and BoD membership and candidacy are mutually exclusive. This has been overlooked during this election cycle. Thorsthen should have resigned of his MC position as soon as he declared his intention to run for a BoD position. I don;t think that there is any suspicion that this 'irregularity' had any impact on the election, and clearly Thorsten election and behavior are beyond reproach. Still, The forms do matter, and even the impression of impropriety can create un-welcomed drama/suspiction/FUD etc... Hence the necessity to rectify the situation, hence Thorsten stepping down from his MC responsibilities. Does that clarifies it ? Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] freezing membership applications
On Sun, Oct 30, 2011 at 10:32 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hello, > > sorry for this much spam today. ;-) > > Duty of the newly elected BoD is to decide whether we should freeze > membership applications, or whether we should simply not allow members new > during the MC election period to vote. > > From my POV, it is much "cleaner" to not accept new members during the > election period, and freeze applications until the new MC is in place This > will prevent confusion who is eligible to vote and who isn't, and will also > prevent any possible conflict of interest, since it would be the existing > MC, from which some members might run for elections, to decide on these > applications. I do not see the conflict. Either way these MC members running for re-election can approve new member before the freeze-date Either way these MC members cannot benefit from approving membership after the freeze (they cannot stuff the ballot since anyone approved post freeze would not be eligible for that election) The confusion is minimal since any membership approval is timestamped: The date of the MC session that validated the membership. The only confusion would be if the MC were to hold a session on the date of the freeze, otherwise it is clear an un-arguable. On the other hand, freezing completely the membership process during election is not very nice for new potential members, as it would mean extending by 1 to 2 month the 'waiting period' of the one that picked a bad date to start contributing :-) Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] appointing Thorsten as election officer for MC
On Sun, Oct 30, 2011 at 10:51 AM, Simon Phipps wrote: > > On 30 Oct 2011, at 15:34, Florian Effenberger wrote: > >> Hi, >> >> Charles-H. Schulz wrote on 2011-10-30 16:34: >>> +1 from my side... do we only need one? >> >> IMHO one is enough, as we had it for the BoD elections. > > Note that, for the BoD elections, Thorsten operated the election software > under my supervision and with the MC observing (I actually asked multiple > members of the MC to validate the results). I recommend that the BoD > continue this approach, with all Election actions conducted in sight of the > full BoD. I agree: the BoD election should be supervised by the MC and vice-versa. The 'Election Officer' is just the point man, the 'executive officer'. He can be any member designated by the body having oversight of the election. Norbert PS: although I have no direct standing, +1 for Thorsten as Election officer for this MC election. PPS: To complement my previous message regarding a delay between MC and BoD election: Let's say the foundation is effective January 1st 2012. the new Bod would be in place until January 1st 2013 right ? We can designate the current MC as the 'initial MC' until June 1st, and have the soon to be elected MC enter in function June 1st 2012 to June 1st 2013 If the view is that the current BoD mandate expire End of October 2012, then the same reasoning apply except that the new MC become 'active' April 1st. -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Preparing elections for the membership committee
On Sun, Oct 30, 2011 at 10:28 AM, David Emmerich Jourdain wrote: > > IMHO, I don't see why can we not adopt this option. The current MC proved > that was (and is) impartial and deeply focused on meritocracy, essential > factors for an MC. > > For me, the current MC proved that's fully deserving of this gentlemen's > agreement. With the caveat that Thorsten must resign as MC-deputy, since one cannot be BoD and MC member at once. On Sun, Oct 30, 2011 at 10:33 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: >I have full trust in the current MC, no doubts about that. The issue that >makes me favor the other option (wait until the new MC is in place) is that it >would avoid having elections very soon after the legal set-up, which is rather >time consuming. Maybe we can do with the current MC as 'initially designated' for the first 6 month of the foundation and organize a MC election then, since it would be a good idea to have BoD election and MC election somewhat separated to avoid 'oversight'/'membership' issues. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Preparing elections for the membership committee
2011/10/26 André Schnabel : > > We had some discussion, if we should freeze again the membership process. > BoD should decide on that (I personally would not like to have again some > weeks where we do not accept new members, at the other hand it might be easy > to challenge the vote, if we don't freeze.) 'Freezing' the membership does not necessarily means stop processing applications, but just that the list of eligible member for the election is 'frozen' at that date. The list of member can still grow, but people that get membershp after the freeze date are not eligible to vote in that election. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] renaming this list
On Wed, Oct 26, 2011 at 9:17 AM, Friedrich Strohmaier
wrote:
> Hi Florian, *,
>
> Am 26.10.2011 15:32 schrieb Florian Effenberger:
>
>> since the Steering Committee will soon cease its existence, and the
>> newly elected BoD will be officially in charge, I would like to rename
>> this list.
>
>> My proposal would either be:
>
>> 1. core-discuss@tdf
>> 2. board-discuss@tdf
>
> 3. bod-discuss
>
> "bod" has kind of brand at least in my perception and is less generic
> than board.
>
>> I am in favor of #2. Thoughts?
>
> # 3 :o))
Not #1 ('core' is being used and abused in many way and does not
convey clearly enough, I think, the purpose of the list).
But #2 or #3 are fine with me :-)
Norbert
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Re: [steering-discuss] Candidacy for Board
On Sun, Oct 9, 2011 at 4:22 AM, David Nelson wrote: > Hello Norbert, > > >> No amount of documentation will turn a 'non-geek' into a core dev. >> Clean, well written code, with the least amount of 'trick' is the best >> documentation: It is by definition accurate, complete and >> authoritative. Quality that no Documentation ever equaled no matter >> how much effort you put into it. > > No, the very best is clean, well-written code accompanied by > good-quality documentation. Sorry, you will not convince me that > design documentation is unnecessary. I'm not trying to convince you of anything. I'm merely giving you my opinion, grounded on having been in the trenches, designing software and writing code for a living for the past for 20 years... Anyway, I am apparently in good company: http://kerneltrap.org/node/5725 "A "spec" is close to useless. I have _never_ seen a spec that was both big enough to be useful _and_ accurate." Linus Torvalds I'd also refer you to : http://www.agilemodeling.com/essays/agileDocumentation.htm#ProjectSuccess > [..] code base is *not* fully > implementing the best principles of an Open Source project. Ask the > FSF for an opinion about this. I've been hacking gnu make recently... please do point me to such documentation (no, not the _user_ documentation, the supposedly indispensable 'design spec' ) so... I don't know about their opinion, but I do know about their practice... > > > No, I am not going to s*d off and reverse engineer the code base > myself. I am asking three of our leading devs whether they would be > willing to collaborate with me on this perfectly-justifiable > initiative. We must have a different definition of 'collaboration' than me. If you you are "not going to s*d off (what-ever that means) and reverse engineer the code base" yourself, it sound that you conception of collaboration is 'do as I said... I'm watching', or as we say in french 'Armons-nous et partez" > >> What do you expect the BoD to do ? issue an Edict ? Give you a >> size-able budget to hire technical writer ? If your proposal attract >> people from the community (our even better attract new people to it) >> then your proposal will become reality, regardless of the BoD opinion. >> That is how it is supposed to work. > > I put my question to three of our leading devs, and I will wait for > them to reply to the original posts. Then this is the wrong list... if you want to ask devs, you should do that on the dev mailing list. > > Sorry, Norbert, but your responses do not change my views in any way. I have no such hope. I merely re-stated to you the reality of a volunteer based effort. If you want something to happen, you need to roll-up your sleeves and _make_ it happen. Trying to extract election promises out of some people, on ground completely unrelated to the office they seek, is not going to get you there. > > Your arguments resound with the sideways logic and suave patter of a > dishonest used car salesman combined with the moral values of a > larcenous banker. :-D > > (Above to be read tongue in cheek with a smile.) You can add all the smiles you want to an insult it is still one. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Candidacy for Board
On Sat, Oct 8, 2011 at 9:38 PM, David Nelson wrote: > Hi, :-) > > Minor addition after a few hours sleep and before starting work: > > This kind of design documentation is really essential for various reasons. > > What would happen if there was some kind of disaster and we were to > lose the essential core of our lead devs for some horrible reason? Seriously ? for a distributed open source software, _that_ is your doomsday scenario ? If that were to happen, it would probably means that your immediate problem would be survival: finding food and shelter. Computer software will be the least of our problem for few generations... > We'd be scuppered. Among the other members of the LibreOffice project, > is there anyone who knows how the thing works? Is there any record, > useable by a non-geek No amount of documentation will turn a 'non-geek' into a core dev. Clean, well written code, with the least amount of 'trick' is the best documentation: It is by definition accurate, complete and authoritative. Quality that no Documentation ever equaled no matter how much effort you put into it. >, of the state of evolution of the code base? > > We say that people are free to take the source and do what they want > with it, but - at the moment - they'd have to reverse engineer the > whole code base. How "open" is that? Reading source code is not 'reverse engineering'... That is what any software engineer do on a daily basis to maintain existing code. It is 'open' because anyone have access to the source code and therefore _can_ read it and figure out how it works (or doesn't). > > No, I apologise for insisting, and I realise that this initiative will > take some initial footwork, and will require on-going maintenance, but > it really should be considered to be essential work. > > But I firmly believe there will be a pay-off in quite a few ways. > > In any case, I'll be at the next couple of SC/BoD meetings to follow > up and discuss the idea. There is no need for that. You can find volunteers and start working on that without the blessing of anyone. It _is_ free software, and _this_ is a meritocracy. If you _do_ something in that line -- the wiki is a perfect place for you to make that work available and gather with like minded volunteers -- no-one will get in the way. What do you expect the BoD to do ? issue an Edict ? Give you a size-able budget to hire technical writer ? If your proposal attract people from the community (our even better attract new people to it) then your proposal will become reality, regardless of the BoD opinion. That is how it is supposed to work. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Candidacy for Board
On Sat, Oct 8, 2011 at 10:39 AM, David Nelson wrote: > Hi Italo, > > On Sat, Oct 8, 2011 at 6:33 PM, Italo Vignoli wrote: >> I do not think that this discussion should happen during the election >> time, as it might have an influence on the election outcome based on >> parametres which are not relevant for being a director (based on bylaws). > > I regret that I don't really agree. People are standing as candidates > for the BoD and TDF members have a right to ask questions and learn > what candidate's policies and attitudes are with regard to issues of > concrete importance to the community... But here you are taking advantage of the fact that these candidates happen to also be core developer to corner them. Their candidacy to the Board and the task they propose to tackle is completely orthogonal to your proposal, the best proof is that you did not ask such commitment from Italo. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Re: [tdf-announce] BoD Election Candidates
On Tue, Oct 4, 2011 at 3:01 AM, John Rose wrote: > I applied to be a candidate 5 days ago. Please advise me as to why I am not > on the list below. You did inded and Simon answered to you >John: Are you a TDF Member as per the election rules[1] please? I can't find >you on the list[2]. > >Cheers > >Simon >-- >Simon Phipps >Election Officer, TDF 2011 Elections One pre-requisite to be a candidat for the BoD of the Foundation is to be a Member of the said Foundation, as you can see in our ByLaws. http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/CommunityBylaws Another, implicit this time, prerequisite to hold a position of Board Member of the Foundation is to be familiar with its ByLaws, which one would be tasked to enforced. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] [tdf-discuss] Seat at the BoD
On Fri, Sep 23, 2011 at 9:23 AM, Jim Jagielski wrote: > If people feel that it would be helpful to TDF to have a board member > who has a tight "relationship" with Apache, I would accept a > nomination if it would be useful. http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/CommunityBylaws#Voting_to_Elect_Members_of_the_Board_of_Directors "Candidates must be either Members of any of the Foundation's Projects or Contributors to the Foundation" Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Base - a new mailing list?
On Tue, Sep 13, 2011 at 2:05 AM, David Nelson wrote: > Hi, > > On Tue, Sep 13, 2011 at 9:47 AM, Jonathan Aquilina > wrote: >> Why not find a way to integrate connectivity to all the major databases such >> as mysql and MsSQL servers? > > Yes, that would be great indeed. > > I can hear Michael Meeks thinking, "Well start developing the code then." > > Anyway, I think it would be a great pity to give up on Base, because > it has the potential to be an enormous power feature of the > LibreOffice suite. > > As a general thing in the LibreOffice project, I think we need to > think seriously about a determined recruitment drive, for Base and for > various other areas of the project. Just waiting for people to > volunteer does not seem to be enough to cater to our needs for > contributors. > > Marketing guys, can you give this consideration? yes but not _here_ Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Base - a new mailing list?
On Sun, Sep 11, 2011 at 12:41 PM, Tom Davies wrote: > HI :) > Base needs to have some documentation to help devs understand what it's > trying to do. > > With the other apps it's much easier to have an overview even without having > any documentation but Base is a lot more complex. Also there needs to be > some discussion between devs and other people to decide what to use instead > of java, and the direction to take generally. Apparently the default HqSql > back-end is fairly troublesome but there is a new project "MariaDb" that is a > drop-in replacement for MySql that might be much better as a back-end. > MariaDb is basically almost the entire community that worked on MySql > including some of the original people plus a load of new people that joined > since the project broke free from Sun/Oracle. MariaDB is like MySql, so it is a nice and powerful database, but too heavy weight(*) for a 'default' back-end. SQLite sound like a much better match for the task. (*) by too heavy weight, I'm referring to installation, configuration, need for started-task/daemon, need for periodic maintenance etc... > Anyway it needs a small team of people to try out different back-ends to see > which are viable as back-ends and which might be easiest to have as the > default one. Perhaps bringing their recommendation back to steering-discuss > to make an informed vote. That's not how it works... voting is not the answer... doing is. I'm pretty sure that if somebody step up to make a viable support for a self-contained back-end, it will fidn its way into the code by consensus, without the need for a 'vote', or getting the steering commity or future BoD involved in any ways. BTW this is already listed as an 'Easy Hack' : http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Development/Easy_Hacks#default_to_SQLite_not_HSQLDB_in_Base So clearly this is not a technical/political disagreement, but just a matter of someone stepping up to do the work... > > As i understand it the current infra-structure is leading to Base gently > crumbling away through neglect. It is not an infrastructure problem. it is a lack of interest problem. > Experienced devs steer well away from Base. New ones need to learn more >understanding about coding or about Base or about both. Every time an >individual joins and is keen to work on some aspect of Base they realise it's >a completely tangled mess and they would be the only person working on it so >they get discouraged and give-up. That is true for every part of the product. the effort needed to find your way in the code is high, and base is not special in that regard. I seriously doubt that it is easier to find your way around writer than it is to find your way around base. > > Yes it would be great to have input from the entire devs list but > 1. They are not interested in Base That is indeed a problem, but I fail to see how starting to section the community vertically ( vs horizontally like the ml are now) will help > 2. The non-coders that want to do non-coding work on Base (eg Documentation, > perhaps marketing, perhaps design of aspects of the UI that only appear in > Base, the wizards and so on) would be unable to understand. I don't understand what you mean with that paragraph... Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] SPI BoD meeting
On Thu, Sep 8, 2011 at 4:30 PM, Sophie Gautier wrote: > Hi all, > > The Board of Directors of Software in the Public Interest, Inc., will > hold a public board of directors meeting on Wednesday, 14th September > 2011 at 20:30 UTC. > > The agenda for the meeting is open for additions and is available at > http://www.spi-inc.org/meetings/agendas/2011/2011-09-14/ > I'll attend the meeting. sophi. I've been to the 'donation' page... http://www.spi-inc.org/donations/ and the credit-card based page linked from there https://co.clickandpledge.com/advanced/default.aspx?wid=34115 does not allow for a donation earmarked to libreoffice. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] LinuxCon Europe
On Fri, Aug 26, 2011 at 4:45 AM, Simon Phipps wrote: > > On 26 Aug 2011, at 10:32, Florian Effenberger wrote: > >> Hi Italo, >> >> thanks for your engagement! >> >> Italo Vignoli wrote on 2011-08-26 11:04: >>> Including food, I will spend a maximum of 300 Euro. I am asking the >>> Steering Committee to approve this reimbursement. >> >> Given that we can pay this from SPI (paying from FrODeV is a bit problematic >> when it comes to travel costs and foreign countries, due to tax regulations) >> - +1 from my side. >> >> The only point we should talk about is "food" - as a general rule, normally >> reimbursements should only contain hotel and transportation, but no food. >> TDF has no rules yet on this, but maybe we should limit it to that? > > That's an odd rule. A reimbursement for a guest or for an emissary should > include Travel, Accommodation and Living. The only place in recent memory > that has told me it does not pay for Living is TDF. Indeed, even the Tax-Man acknowledge that 'reasonable' meal re-reimbursement - during a remote mission - are tax-deductible (i.e. are not a 'compensation in kind'). Surely it is more a matter of 'reasonableness' and 'frugality' rather than a question of principle. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] decision on screenshots
On Fri, Aug 12, 2011 at 6:34 AM, Tom Davies wrote: > Hi :) > +1 > > Possibly omit the middle paragraph. I agree with that. The second paragraph serve no practical purpose. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] decision on screenshots
On Wed, Aug 10, 2011 at 7:25 AM, Simon Phipps wrote: > > > I think it is a mistake to state that the SC acknowledges a risk. It is a > hostage to fortune in the event of litigation, and it's not necessary to > state. > Unfortunately that ship has sailed... too late now, the harm is already done but sure, keeping it as a standing policy is worse. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] decision on screenshots
On Mon, Aug 8, 2011 at 8:43 AM, Tom Davies wrote: > Hi :) > I think that unnecessarily exposing TDF (or people doing work for it) to a > risk > in a way that could NOT be fix easily & quickly would be really dumb. It is > an > easily avoidable risk. I think it is unnecessary to worry about fabricated convoluted legal scenario without precedent. > > > The fact that one person is ignorant of the risk (or chooses to ignore it) > does > not mean the rest of the Steering Committee are. Did you pool the steering committee member individually ? what basis do you have to claim that just _one person_ think that this legal angle to force a POV is a strawman ? > Indeed, there was a meeting > that came up with the rough draft of the 2 paragraphs prepared by Florian. > There is still no mention of where the responsibility would lay if the > perceived > risk did happen but as the meeting wrote it, the potential threat should be > avoided by using Gnu&Linux if easily possible. using Linux and/or Gnu does not avoid the alleged risk. Neither own the copyright on icons that would be displayed in a screen-shoot. > > > With Gnu&Linux screen-shots there is NO risk. It also means the Documentation > Team can keep doing what they are already doing = aiming towards > professionally > consistent documentation. Yes the 'consistent' argument is indeed valid... but the so-called legal risk is a straw man > The licensing of Gnu&Linux tends to be copy-left > allowing people to copy and adapt anything they like. By contrast the Windows > Eula is very restrictive The Eula could demand that you give away your first born child, that would still not make that the Law. actually the French version of the EULA for Windows 7 Basic, Section 27, spell out clearly that Eula does not trump the Law of the Land. > and people in the discussion even highlighted > paragraphs that showed that any editing of screen-shots in a way that would > make > them useful for documentation would be a violation. > > There was a suggestion earlier in the discussion that if TDF did get clobbered > by MS for using screen-shots on their OSes then it could > 1. Let MS target individuals that produced the screen-shots or > 2. TDF could counter-sue the individuals themselves Apparently we don't even need Microsoft to conduct FUD campaign, we do just fine on our own :-( > The post also suggested that TDF should reject any documentation that was > produced using non-Windows screen-shots. > > > > In the MS vs TomTom case. TomTom were forced to pay substantial damages to MS > for saving data. What patent do screen-shoots infringe ? And how did you get access to confidential settlement terms ? http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10206988-56.html : "Specific financial terms were not disclosed. " [snip irrelevant US-patent non-sens ] > > Yes, everyone is exposed to a large number of unknown risks of a variety of > types but this is a known risk that is easy to avoid. Why ask people to beat > their head against a wall when they could just walk around the corner? Or just easily not enocurage those that manufacture brick wall in their path. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] funding for system operations meeting
On Fri, Jul 29, 2011 at 10:46 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi, > > Norbert Thiebaud wrote on 2011-07-29 17:35: >> >> Now you are getting me really confused. >> >> Who decided what, and who is paying what ? > > the board of directors of the German association, which will stay an > independent entity also after TDF has been funded, but in the meantime is > the legal entity behind TDF, decided that in their board of director's > meeting. > > So, a decision by the German association, *not* by the TDF SC. > > However, since more money then offered by the German association is needed, > and the weekend was for the TDF admins, I'd like to ask if the SC is > agreeing to spending some of the TDF money for it. > Ahh, so you're asking TDF to cover the 600 euro budget overrun. Now I get it :-) Thanks for the clarification Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] funding for system operations meeting
On Fri, Jul 29, 2011 at 2:43 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi David, > > David Nelson wrote on 2011-07-28 15:09: >> >> *Some* being the operative word... I never heard about this... Was it >> publicized at all on the website mailing list and I missed it? > > no, it was in first place a board decision of the German association, so it > was published in their meeting minutes (in German). However, since it > affects TDF, I wanted to raise the topic here. Now you are getting me really confused. Who decided what, and who is paying what ? Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/ Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Re: screen-shots Documentation Team
On Tue, Jul 12, 2011 at 5:57 PM, Bernhard Dippold wrote: > Hi David, all, > > David Nelson schrieb: >> [snip internal documentation team feud that is best solved on the documentation ML] > I didn't comment on the legal aspects on Windows and Mac, as Alex pointed > possible problems out. > (And even if the SC would recommend Windows screenshots, each contributor > would have to decide for him/herself if s/he would like to take the legal > responsibility on his/her own). That is the part of the argument that is loosing me... 1/ I did not see so far any idea that the SC would 'recommend Windows or something else'. All I saw was claim that using Windows should be 'forbidden' for allege legal reason and a request that the SC endorse that POV. 2/ "each contributor would have to decide for him/herself if s/he would like to take the legal responsibility on his/her own" What legal responsibility ? except the general hand-waving fact of life that lawyers can imagine that anyone can be sued by anyone for just about anything... but that is true for any developer that write 2 lines of code or for any artist that create a new icon etc... what is so special with windows screenshoot ? It seems to me that the consistency, and modernity arguments developed earlier should be able to stand on their own (and in my view they do), without involving some lawyery scare tactics. (PS: bear in mind that if the copyright holder of a given GUI, like microsoft, could sue you for incidental infringement in a documentation screenshoot, then so can any copyright holder having a stake in any GUI in any screen-shoot you publish - which in itself , I think, is evidence enough that such interpretation of Copyright Law is completely impractical and far fetched. Sure some lawyers are likely to come up with such non-sens complaint... but the different justice systems, by large, rarely hand-out such a dumb rulings And, with all its flaws, Microsoft is very unlikely to waste money litigating such a case which, no matter the outcome in court, would result in a PR loss. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Re: screen-shots Documentation Team
I think I need a reset: When and where did Microsoft ever sued a community driven documentation effort for using picture of a the community's own software running on Windows ? Did that really ever happened ? if so, did Microsoft ever actually win such ludicrous case ? (I'm not asking if by some convoluted legal rambling it is perceived as being _possible_ in some obscure jurisdiction) Note that if the concern is that 'it could happen' then it can happen with _any_ gui, including Linux-based GUI. And quite frankly if that were to happen, it would be a PR bonanza for us. 'Hiding' the offending 'gui' item under a black dot with 'Censured by Microsoft' on top... that will get us quite a bit a coverage, most of them sympathetic I bet. well worth the aggravation... Heck I'll even volunteer to add the 'Censured by Microsoft' sticker :-) IOW: let the documentation team use what-ever platform they want for their screenshoots, and stop muddying the water with convoluted-maybe-scare-issues... Otherwise we are going to have to revise the release schedule to take into account December 21st 2012. :-) There are enough real problems to deal with without inventing imaginary one. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] wording on TDF website
On Tue, Jul 12, 2011 at 3:50 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi, > > David Nelson wrote on 2011-07-12 03.59: >> My suggestion would be to replace the words "meritocratic Foundation, >> created by" with "meritocratic organization created by". Maybe that > > that would still create the impression that TDF is already an > organization by itself, which it legally isn't. it may not be a 'F'oundation (as in German Stiftung) yet but it certainly _is_ an 'organization' by all reasonable definition of the term. That being said... it has been 'inaccurate' for 10 month... it can certainly remain so for the few weeks left before it become finally 'accurate'. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Re: screen-shots Documentation Team
On Sun, Jul 10, 2011 at 6:30 AM, Alexander Thurgood wrote: > Le 09/07/11 23:26, Bernhard Dippold a écrit : > > Hi all, > > Someone suggested I sling in some caselaw or other references on whether > copyright protection is available for UIs : > > US > Just one caselaw review : > http://www.legalserviceindia.com/articles/crind.htm > > Europe > In European Union Court of Justice Case C-393/09 : > http://kluwercopyrightblog.com/2011/03/24/protection-of-guis-graphical-user-interfaces-some-comments-about-the-ecj-%E2%80%98s-preliminary-ruling-in-bsa-v-ministervo-kultury/ > > involving the BSA against the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic > relating tp television broadcasting of user interface. > > What the latter ruling states is that copyright is not available under > the Computer Program Copyright Directive 91/250/EEC, as that is intended > to protect code per se. However, copyright is available for UIs under > the more general Copyright Directive 2001/29/EC, providing that they > meet the criteria for awarding copyright, i.e. originality, author's own > work, etc. > What the ruling also say is: "In a second question, the ECJ was asked whether television broadcasting of a GUI “constitutes communication to the public of a work protected by copyright within the meaning of Article 3(1) of Directive 2001/29”. The ECJ answers that if a GUI is displayed in the context of television broadcasting of a programme, television viewers receive a communication of that GUI in a passive manner, without having the possibility to interact with the program. According to the ECJ, as individuals do not have access to the essential element characterising the interface, that is to say, interaction with the user, “there is no communication to the public of the graphic user interface within the meaning of Article 3(1) of Directive 2001/29”." That same rational apply to screen shoot in a documentation. iow common sens still prevail despite BSA's effort. > > So to all those naysayers who think that no-one sues anyone else over UI > elements - wake up, and take stock. Am I paranoid ? No, but people do > get sued. Do I represent the BSA ? No, but I know "peers" that do, and > believe me, love it or hate it, the BSA do sue people. > I'm sure that people sue, and some jurisdiction are indeed very prone to frivolous law suit... but does that means that we have to abdicate basic freedom and right ? If you are that concerned about liabilities, make sure that TDF itself does not author nor 'publish' any documentation... and have a money-less French loi-1901 association to do the publishing... The fact that TDF 'endorse' the content of a book does not make it liable for real or imaginary infringements in that book. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Re: screen-shots Documentation Team
2011/7/8 André Schnabel : > Hi Norbert, * > > Am 08.07.2011 15:15, schrieb Norbert Thiebaud: >> On Fri, Jul 8, 2011 at 7:19 AM, Simon Phipps wrote: >>> On 8 Jul 2011, at 13:09, Tom Davies wrote: >>> >>>> Hi :) >>>> Except screen-shots in Windows can't have any useful arrows or circles to >>>> point >>>> out the exact thing being talked about in the documentation. >>> Only screenshots of /Microsoft/ products. >>> >> Isn't that exactly what 'Fair Use' is all about ? > > > Absolutely. Unfortunately "Fair use" is not a term in each and every > juristications of this world. E.g. German law does not know about "fair > use" - but has other ways to prevent misuse of copyright. > > But: no matter what the real legal situation might be - Microsoft's > position is that all screen shots taken on a windows system need to > follow Microsoft's rules (what is quite exactly what Tom wrote). I don't really care about Microsoft's position (and it is doubtful that most of the EULA conditions actually would hold in face of real law - in most european jurisdiction private contract - especially the one not entered into freely and not negotiated on equal footing - do not trump common law), but: Use it and if Microsoft actually has legal standing, let's put 'censured by Microsoft' sticker on the screen-shoot in place of the 'offending' icons. and see how long it will take Microsoft PR department to weight to pros and cons of the situation. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Re: screen-shots Documentation Team
On Fri, Jul 8, 2011 at 7:19 AM, Simon Phipps wrote: > > On 8 Jul 2011, at 13:09, Tom Davies wrote: > >> Hi :) >> Except screen-shots in Windows can't have any useful arrows or circles to >> point >> out the exact thing being talked about in the documentation. > > Only screenshots of /Microsoft/ products. > Isn't that exactly what 'Fair Use' is all about ? Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Bootstrap BoD campaign (was: Joining the OASIS Consortium)
On Sat, Jun 18, 2011 at 5:13 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi Norbert, > [...] > Ideally, the future BoD can also cooperate with the existing SC, > so they get to "know how it works". That's better than a "hard cut". > I would imagine that there will be some overlap between the composition of the SC and the future BoD :-) so that should not be too much of a trouble :-) Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
[steering-discuss] Bootstrap BoD campaign (was: Joining the OASIS Consortium)
On Sat, Jun 18, 2011 at 1:58 AM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi, > > this is indeed a good point... what do the others think? We can give our +1 > as recommendation to the new BoD, but I guess it will indeed be hard to bind > them on decisions they have not taken. Talking about BoD, Maybe the SC could bootstrap the BoD campaign, by calling for candidate, so that the day the Foundation papers are finally completed, we could have an election and be fully operational ? I means, it is expected that potential candidates be given enough time to trow their hat in, and some time to communicate to the membership what they stand for and what they aim to achieve, iow 'campaigning' there is no reason not to start that in advance of the actual filing of the paperwork of the foundation. Maybe wait for the next MC meeting and freeze the eligible membership pool at that point(1). (the bylaws call for a 45 days notice minimum, and we must have the election done before Sep 28th (the one year anniversary of the 'public' launch)). Norbert (1) The freeze is not explicitly stated for general elections in the bylaws, but the rationale for that freeze is latent in the Impeachment section. This is needed, I think, to avoid even the appearance of conflict of interest between a role in the MC and being a candidate for a BoD position. Note the freeze is with regard to the member eligible to vote, but does not need to apply to eligibility to be a candidate (iow a member should be able to be candidate even if is not eligible to vote as long as he is a member by the time he propose his candidacy and that that candidacy is proposed in a timely manner. Deadline are not specified in the bylaws (which is fine bylaws don't have to be that detailed). I would suggest a 2 weeks period for people to declare themselves candidate, followed by a 3 weeks period of 'campaigning' and a 2 weeks period of 'voting' (that is 49 days, consistent with the mandated 45 days notice). I would also suggest that deadline be based on Wednesday 00:00 UTC And while I am on a roll, may I suggest that a election@ ML be setup so that the campaign related stuff be accessible easily and only if one is interested. -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] MC-meeting minutes 2011-06-16
2011/6/16 André Schnabel : > Hi, > > meeting minutes are at the wiki: > http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/TDF/Membership_Committee_Meetings#Minutes_2011-06-16 > > (Cor, Fridrich - please edit the wiki, if I forgot something important.) > > I'll inform the approved members (and rejected applicants) within the next > few hours and update the website after that. is there a reason not to announce new member on a mailing list ? (It is not that easy to scrub the web-site page to see what has changed...) and preferably with some indication on what these new fellow members work on ? Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] FYI: Apache Incubator is now voting
On Sat, Jun 11, 2011 at 2:06 AM, David Nelson wrote: > Hi, > > On Fri, Jun 10, 2011 at 23:09, Greg Stein wrote: >> * "non-binding" votes are from other participants in the conversation. >> Their "votes" are allowed as a measure and gauge over the broader >> community opinion, even though they will not actually be tallied in >> the final ballot. > > It's true that this could be a good way to "take the temperature" in > the community about issues being voted on... Maybe our LibreOffice SC > could think about this before the bylaws are fully stabilized? This is not a matter of bylaws. Such non-binding voting is 'already', if you want, in the bylaws in the sens that such 'non-biding vote' are an expression of free speech but are not counted toward the final tally. In that regard that is fully compatible with the current bylaws. Furthermore the bylaws are 'fully stabilized', and substantially have been so for few months now. changing/adding anything substantial at this point would mean doing the whole English-German translation dance with legal review... iow delay that much more the paperwork for the official legal registration of the Foundation. And if it wasn't for all that I would still suggest that bylaws should codify the 'minimum' required to maintain a functioning Foundation in case of discord... It should not be an attempt to codify _everything_ we do. Such 'tradition' (like the non-biding vote at Apache for example), is a matter of collective culture, something that evolve organically by tacit consensus... over time. You may have noticed that there is no 'biding -'1 in the current vote so far (unless I missed one) my understanding, is that they function a bit like a standard organization: such a -1 is required to be accompanied with precise objections... and in that case an attempt will be made to resolve such objections.. that is the 'consensus' model. So member with biding-vote that don't actively support the proposal, but don't want to delay the proceedings because their objections have already been expressed and cannot be 'resolved' tend to vote 0 (that is my perception of things.. I only have had few days to observe the Apache process... so I could be wrong). So you should not see such vote as a 'survey of the force in presence' but as a 'search where the consensus lies' Norbert PS: I don't think it is a good way to 'take the temperature' in the community. it is just, maybe, a good way to take the temperature among the people that follow a particular thread in a particular mailing list. PS2: you can check the Apache bylaws, you'll see that there is nothing in there about biding/non-biding votes. -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] FYI: Apache Incubator is now voting
On Fri, Jun 10, 2011 at 3:09 PM, Greg Stein wrote: > Hi all, > > I just wanted to bring an "FYI" that the Apache Incubator has begun > its voting process on accepting the OO.o proposal to become a > "podling" within the Incubator. Thanks for the update [...] > If you wish to make your voice heard, then I would encourage you to > respond to the [VOTE] thread on gene...@incubator.apache.org (I would > think gmane[2] is your best way to respond to the thread without > having to actually subscribe). I think I had the opportunities, as a guest fof he incubator mailing list to expression my opinions and sometimes more ;-) At this point, I feel it would be over-staying my welcome to interject myself in an Apache procedural vote. Have fun and Good luck with your brand new 'massive' baby :-) Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] About elections
On Fri, Jun 10, 2011 at 7:30 AM, Dave Neary wrote: > Hi, > Thanks for the explanations... [...] > Then we communicate the anonymous token to the voter, and tell him to > write it down somewhere so that he can check his vote later. how does one figure out what information is in the token ? iow. given my token, or any token for that matter can I independently verify what voe is encoded in it ? [snip] > > Funny - I *just* realised that you meant "tamper" - I honestly thoughht > you wanted to "temper" (ie harden) the process. Sorry - that just amused > me - not picking on your grammar or anything. :-D I'm painfully aware of my weak spelling/grammar, even in my native language I do a lot of these :-) It is not helped by my fingers inability to keep up with my thoughts... and my notorious laziness in proof-reading :) Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] About elections
On Fri, Jun 10, 2011 at 4:07 AM, Michael Meeks wrote: > > On Wed, 2011-06-08 at 07:02 +0300, David Nelson wrote: > I strongly suggest we simply copy the GNOME process here; this > generates a unique random key per person which is mailed out, and used > instead of a name when voting; thus the voting record can be published, > and independently analysed while keeping it anonymous (outside of the MC > that is). Just to make sure I understand it correctly: it is 'anonymous' but each voter know _his_ anonymous token and therefore can verify that his vote has been recorded accurately, by cross-checking the published details-values right? and that is the basis of the temper proof mechanism. It is incumbent on each member to make sure that he received his token and that is vote is correctly counted. (that his make sure that his email didn't get intercepted somehow, or that the MC did not received a spoofed email). I think that pgp/gpg-signing these email would remove some possibility to interfere with the process. (note that if you add encryption of the vote-email then you can even achieve end-to-end anonymous(1) voting as long as the group that verify the signatures is not the group that decode the encrypted vote) > > To analyse the results, OpenSTV is used I think, and the results > published: OpenSTV is GPL, but only available for download for a fee. It would be nice to find a way for anyone, or at the very least for Members, to be able to use the raw result and re-calculate the result for themselves... ( to temper proof the last step ) Norbert PS: Not that I am overly concerned about election tempering... but as the saying goes: Trust but Verify :-) and I'd like to avoid, as much as possible, any room for controversy on that topic. (1) Although we want to be open and transparent, open voting on issue is good, but when we vote on 'person, candidate', it is indeed probably better, to avoid 'poison', to keep that anonymous... but the worse is a partial anonymous, where things are anonymous except for the ones 'in the know'. And again this is not a concern about any individual.. processes we put in place should be design to to provide lasting stability, not relying on _everybody_ involved doing the right things at all time.. -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] About elections
On Tue, Jun 7, 2011 at 11:50 PM, sophie wrote: > > We were used to LimeSurvey, from what I remember it can be used on > invitation only and password protected generated by the survey admin. For me > it has several advantages, among them a simple UI that you can customize and > localize. UX could you use it also for their surveys. > But I'm open to other tools of course, this is just because I'm pretty used > to this one and we have already use it for voting campaigns > Oh, then it's all good I was just wondering about the logistic... looks like the MC has things under control... very good :-) carry on :-D Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] About elections
On Tue, Jun 7, 2011 at 5:08 PM, Florian Effenberger wrote: > Hi, > > FYI: We asked the Membership Committee to follow-up with some information on > membership status and elections soon, so stay tuned. :-) Practical question: Shouldn't the MC start collecting ssh public-key ? People having commit access to git or login to any infra box already have one available... but some member may not have one already on file and collecting them with some level of chain of trust may not be completely trivial, and more importantly, may induce some significant delay. I suppose the the election won't be conducted in-person, but presumably on-line... some level of temper-proof seems necessary, if for no other reason than to avoid FUD and smear campaign about the legitimacy of our process (there have been enough of that already in the blog of a notorious Big Blue employee) Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] About elections
On Mon, Jun 6, 2011 at 7:25 AM, Tom Davies wrote: > > > > > - Original Message >> From: sophie >> To: steering-discuss@documentfoundation.org >> Sent: Mon, 6 June, 2011 12:35:04 >> Subject: Re: [steering-discuss] About elections >> >> Hi Tom, >> On 06/06/2011 14:20, Tom Davies wrote: >> [...] >> > >> > Hi :) >> > Agreed. But the founders have shown good strategic planning and good >>planning >> > for the future as shown by the way things have played out in the last few >> > weeks. I think it would take time for newly elected people to have such >> > commitment to the long-term vision. >> Thanks for the flowers as we also say in French :) >> > >> > I have to point out that i am not a founder and not even a regular member. >>I've >> > had disagreements and arguments with founders but have always had good >>reason >> > to respect even the ones i disagree with. >> Even if no more a member of the SC, I will still consider me as a founder. >> But >>it's not what is important to my eyes. The importance for me reside in the >>fact >>that even if I'm not a SC member, I'll still have a say because I'm a member >>of >>the Foundation, and though can express my feeling and my wills for the >>present >>or the future of the foundation and it's community. >> And I'm sure that the new formed SC will take them into account, we're not >> new >>and have always shared our knowledge and experience. >> >> Kind regards >> Sophie >> > > Hi :) > True. Weirdly i hadn't thought of that point lol :) > > I think the important issue to vote on is the Apache issue. Vote on what exactly ? > I was wondering if > it might be possible to collaborate with them to put a wiki-page together on > the > TDF wiki so that the different lists can vote I don't think we have a say and even less a vote on what Apache Foundation is going to do. First we have to see what they decide and if they are indeed going forward with their plan to fork, (granted there is not much suspense there) Then we have to see _how_ they're going to do it Then we have to see _when_/_if_ the poddle graduate Then we have to see _what_ they end-up doing. Until then it is pretty much vaporware and there is not much to do, even less to vote about. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Re: OpenOffice.org Apache Incubator Proposal: Splitting^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^HREUNITING the Community?
On Sat, Jun 4, 2011 at 6:36 AM, Robert Burrell Donkin wrote: > On Sat, Jun 4, 2011 at 11:13 AM, Florian Effenberger > wrote: >> Hi Robert, > > Hi Florian > > (Copying in Charles since he asked a similar question off list) > >> I'm still reading a few messages and trying to reply to them, but wanted to >> join in here: > > Just like the rest of us :-) > > Noisy and open - everyone with an opinion is welcome :-) > >> Robert Burrell Donkin wrote on 2011-06-04 09.14: >>> >>> The TDF is in no position to accept a major donation of either >>> copyright or code today. Apache is. >> >> Why? > > AIUI [1] the TDF is not a legal entity today and is still in the > process of building it's legal, organisational and process > infrastructure. So it was urgent as in a matter of weeks ? > I accept it has strong legal backing but today no > (related) US non-profit corporation exists which could accept the > donation. How is 'US' relevant here ? > > The Apache Software Foundation provides a suitable legal no-profit > organisation and in place today a suitable process to accept large > donations of code from major organisations safely through the > Incubator. It has considerable experience of opening close source > projects and in working with rich downstream ecologies. Opening close source ? how is it relevant here ? The proposal is to relicense an open-source project... unless I missed something the proposal concern OOo.org not Symphony right ? > >> Can you elaborate? > > IMHO LibreOffice community finds itself in a similar position to the > Apache group in the mid-90s. Great community. Fantastic momentum. Cool > product. > > But establishing code provenance and the Apache Software Foundation > (ASF) took a(n unexpectedly) large amount of time and energy. > Establishing suitable licenses and agreements took time and energy > over several iterations. Establishing a sound Incubation process took > time and energy over many iterations. It took time for us to learn and > evolve secure processes which don't completely suck. That is all good, but irrelevant. we already have a license and we would not need to incubate anything: the code base you are trying to digest is our daily chore... It has already graduated as a top level project even better as THE top level project. > > The TDF is at the start of a journey that the ASF started a decade ago > and is yet to reach the end. As far as OOo.org is concerned, it is the other way around. > The TDF may wish to consider whether an > alternative path might achieve their aims faster... Well, take a look: http://www.libreoffice.org/download/ I'm pretty sure that we've got nice head start... Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Re: [Libreoffice] Hello! ... and lurking :-)
On Sat, Jun 4, 2011 at 6:01 AM, Sam Ruby wrote: > > Let me start with a request. If we are going to have a productive > discussion, it would be best if it were done using respectful terms. If, > however, as described below it is the intent of TDF [...] we can start by working under the predicat that, unless specified otherwise, any comments are the author's own and not representing anybody else? > OpenOffice.org is not uniformly licensed. [..] > > If is licensed to many under one license, and LibreOffice has continued with > that license. It is licensed to others under a different license. I thought we were talking about FLOSS here... not about what proprietary forks may or may not have done. > I believe that the key phrase in that comment is "objections to contributing > code to be used in proprietary apps". A fundamental goal of the Apache > license is to satisfy the needs of those that wish to include the code in > Free and proprietary software alike. Yes, I am aware of that 'feature'. I just happen to consider it a bug. > I believe that if we want to attract everyone alike to contributing to a > common code base -- wherever it resides -- then we need to establish this as > a common goal. How exactly encouraging proprietary fork will attract contribution ? you are relying on the ethic and moral sens of corporation ? If only we had real life examples to give us clues on how realistic that is... humm... > > If we do this, clearly there is much work that would need to be done. It > will involve getting the consent of those that participate in this > foundation and LibreOffice to relicense their work. It won't be easy, but I > will be a part of making it happen. The very reason I decided to show-up was because 1/ the license was copy-left and 2/ TDF dropped the copyright assignment. (of course I found many other reasons to stay... but that's another topic :-) ) So I'd say... yes it won't be easy indeed, but I guess it won't be harder than to convince AF not to cater to proprietary sink-hole... But there is another solution, one that has happened in the past: convince the company with a proprietary fork that if they are truly interested in community support and contributions, they should join that community under terms that protect both our interest, not just its interests. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
[steering-discuss] Re: [Libreoffice] Hello! ... and lurking :-)
On Fri, Jun 3, 2011 at 7:15 PM, Greg Stein wrote: > Hi all, > > > If you have any comments, questions, or concerns, then please feel > free to direct them my way (on whatever list). I'm here to listen and > understand, and to offer up answers where I can. I have a question: Why would Apache contemplate helping IBM pull a Jenkins/Hudson on us, fragmenting the license of a project that has been with a uniform licensing so far ? (Oracle could merge our changes... they elected _not_ to do so because they wanted a Copyright assignment on top of the code, but that was not a licensing incompatibility) You (Apache) are lending your good name to a nasty endeavor, for the benefit of a company that has an history of screwing you over (Harmony ?) Ironically what seems to be happening at Apache is very reminiscent to me to the ISO/MSXML debacle... Some corporation exploiting the letter of your governance to better abuse the spirit of it. (that is _if_ I understand what Apache stand for... but maybe I'm misguided) Norbert PS: I strongly encourage you to read: http://www.itworld.com/software/170521/big-winner-apache-openofficeorg#comment-9942111 That shed a very illuminating light on IBM's involvement in OOo, and why it is hard to take seriously their grandiose promises... that would by far not been the first time, and there is no reason to believe that the outcome will be any different this time around... except that both the OpenOffice brand and the Apache reputation will be tarnished in the process... -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Recent incomplete or non-existent records of SC meetings
On Wed, Jun 1, 2011 at 3:19 PM, David Nelson wrote: > Hi Norbert, :-) > > On Wed, Jun 1, 2011 at 23:12, Norbert Thiebaud wrote: >> That must have been a recent glitch, because I do recall having listen >> to these recording in their entirety a the time... >> actually I think that is a problem on your side. I just re-listen to >> http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/cgi_img_auth.php/1/16/Talkyoo-537138-2011-04-30-1473097.mp3 >> and it is fine and complete > > I have an excellent Internet connection, and looking at some of the > file sizes tells me that they really are incomplete... And I just actually _listen_ to one of the one you said was incomplete... and the last seconds of the record is 'ok then..this is all.. goodbye... goodbye... goodbye... ' (i'm paraphrasing) so it sounded to me that it was the complete call., furthermore I _did_ listen to every-one of these recording available on the wiki, and, at the time at least, none of them felt like they were truncated in anyway. So... I'm not disputing that your experience may have varied, but I provided a data point that tend to suggest that any problem would be on your side of the connection (and bandwidth is not the only thing involved, the OS, the browser, the plug-ins and any number of factor may be involved) >But, even > putting that aside, the lack of notes at some meetings and the falling > attendance are both indisputable... _I_ have not commented on that at all, hence I have not disputed your position on that either... but since you mentioned it. I would note that the lack of attendance seems to be correlated with whether the meeting was held on a week-end or on week-day. iow the usual conflict between volunteers schedules and full-staff schedule :-) Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
Re: [steering-discuss] Recent incomplete or non-existent records of SC meetings
On Wed, Jun 1, 2011 at 3:00 PM, David Nelson wrote: > Hi, :-) > > In addition to the recording of the SC meeting of 2011-05-12 [1] being > incomplete (which is a pity since it contained some *interesting* > discussion about the Brazilian community and about the MC), the same > also applies to: > > * 2011-05-06 [2] > * 2011-04-30 [3] > * 2011-04-21 [4] > * 2011-04-06 [5] > * 2011-03-26 (no recording at all) > * 2011-03-16 [6] > That must have been a recent glitch, because I do recall having listen to these recording in their entirety a the time... actually I think that is a problem on your side. I just re-listen to http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/cgi_img_auth.php/1/16/Talkyoo-537138-2011-04-30-1473097.mp3 and it is fine and complete Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
[steering-discuss] Announcing the ESC?
not to nit-pick, but I've just re-read the ByLaws, and nothing in there require member of the ESC to be Member of the Foundation. "The Engineering Steering Committee [ESC] is composed of developers who are appointed: they are not required to be elected, and the ESC can be staffed by as many members as necessary. " here is is 'members' as in member of the ESC, not Member as in Member of TDF. "The ESC is neither an elective body nor an elected committee: it provides technical guidance. It can be placed under administration by the BoD; in this case, the BoD will have the power to appoint a new ESC, in whatever manner it deems appropriate." e.g. the BoD could appoint Linus Thorvald if it wants, regardless of whether or not Linus filled a TDF membership request... or even is eligible. Granted that, since "The Engineering Steering Committee provides technological guidance on strategic matters and, hypothetically, will be composed of the Community's best engineers.", one could argue that ESC member are expected to be eligible (modulo the 3 month waiting period, and the 6 month 'moral' commitment :-) ) to TDF membership, but they don't have to be effectively Member in good standing. iow: the ESC composition could be announced independently of the advancement of the work of the Membership Comity. Norbert -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to steering-discuss+h...@documentfoundation.org Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette List archive: http://listarchives.documentfoundation.org/www/steering-discuss/ All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
