Re: [postgis-users] [postgis-devel] Vote On Project Sponsorship
> I do think that if we initially set a narrow scope for what > the funds could be used for (similar to the above list) then > that would be good. > I'm tempted to vote +1, except for the fact that I know that > I would be struggling to find any extra time to put into the > management side of this... maybe a +1 in principle? > > > ATB, > > Mark. > Mark, What is this management side you speak of? I invision 20% going to OSGEO of which they will take care of the management of funds, our trac hosting etc (e.g. collection and setting aside the remaining 80% for PostGIS related activities). I invision dice that will be thrown when we come up with a set of ways to spend the money and can't decide which way to use said funds. If the dice fail us, like they fall under the table so we can't see what numbers are face up, then the money sits in OSGEO coffers to be used at a later time or for some all benefiting OSGEO activity like the super duper OSGEO buildbot. Am I missing something? I'm sure I am since I try to avoid thinking too far ahead since there are too many permutations of what can happen. Thanks, Regina ___ postgis-users mailing list postgis-users@postgis.refractions.net http://postgis.refractions.net/mailman/listinfo/postgis-users
Re: [postgis-users] [postgis-devel] Vote On Project Sponsorship
On 09/09/11 11:45, Paragon Corporation wrote: So does this mean a +1 from you and Mark for project sponsorship as long as we focus whatever fundings come in to 1) Improved testing, building infrastructure 2) That includes possible cloud hosting for windows 32/64 bit (actually all we need is 1 64-bit box). I'm runnning a 64-bit Windows 7 and build fine for 32-bit. This would be shared with OSGEO (per Frank's suggestion) 3) Money for events -- code sprints, subsidizing for PostGIS developers to attend events, like those Europeans we are so fund of that we are going to miss at this year's FOSS4G. Hmm possibly in the future a small PostGIS code sprint would be nice :) 4) One other thing I forgot to mention I think money could be well spent on is the accredation to get our newer versions of PostGIS to be OGC certified. This I think is a big selling point for large companies and much easier sell for consultants consulting for large companies if we have a piece of paper saying it instead of just that we follow the specs. Thanks, Regina I do think that if we initially set a narrow scope for what the funds could be used for (similar to the above list) then that would be good. I'm tempted to vote +1, except for the fact that I know that I would be struggling to find any extra time to put into the management side of this... maybe a +1 in principle? ATB, Mark. -- Mark Cave-Ayland - Senior Technical Architect PostgreSQL - PostGIS Sirius Corporation plc - control through freedom http://www.siriusit.co.uk t: +44 870 608 0063 Sirius Labs: http://www.siriusit.co.uk/labs ___ postgis-users mailing list postgis-users@postgis.refractions.net http://postgis.refractions.net/mailman/listinfo/postgis-users
Re: [postgis-users] [postgis-devel] Vote On Project Sponsorship
So does this mean a +1 from you and Mark for project sponsorship as long as we focus whatever fundings come in to 1) Improved testing, building infrastructure 2) That includes possible cloud hosting for windows 32/64 bit (actually all we need is 1 64-bit box). I'm runnning a 64-bit Windows 7 and build fine for 32-bit. This would be shared with OSGEO (per Frank's suggestion) 3) Money for events -- code sprints, subsidizing for PostGIS developers to attend events, like those Europeans we are so fund of that we are going to miss at this year's FOSS4G. Hmm possibly in the future a small PostGIS code sprint would be nice :) 4) One other thing I forgot to mention I think money could be well spent on is the accredation to get our newer versions of PostGIS to be OGC certified. This I think is a big selling point for large companies and much easier sell for consultants consulting for large companies if we have a piece of paper saying it instead of just that we follow the specs. Thanks, Regina > -Original Message- > From: postgis-users-boun...@postgis.refractions.net > [mailto:postgis-users-boun...@postgis.refractions.net] On > Behalf Of Sandro Santilli > Sent: Friday, September 09, 2011 4:34 AM > To: PostGIS Users Discussion > Subject: Re: [postgis-users] [postgis-devel] Vote On Project > Sponsorship > > I'm happy if "generic" funds go to setting up and improving a > testing infrastructure. > Also, getting buildbot back up on OSGEO would be even better, > so it's up for more projects. > > I've done some experience with buildbot recently taking up > the one for Gnash [1], btw; only didn't find time to work on > the OSGEO one yet. > > [0] http://wiki.gnashdev.org/BuildBot > > --strk; > > Free GIS & Flash consultant/developer > http://strk.keybit.net/services.html > ___ > postgis-users mailing list > postgis-users@postgis.refractions.net > http://postgis.refractions.net/mailman/listinfo/postgis-users > ___ postgis-users mailing list postgis-users@postgis.refractions.net http://postgis.refractions.net/mailman/listinfo/postgis-users
Re: [postgis-users] [postgis-devel] Vote On Project Sponsorship
I'm happy if "generic" funds go to setting up and improving a testing infrastructure. Also, getting buildbot back up on OSGEO would be even better, so it's up for more projects. I've done some experience with buildbot recently taking up the one for Gnash [1], btw; only didn't find time to work on the OSGEO one yet. [0] http://wiki.gnashdev.org/BuildBot --strk; Free GIS & Flash consultant/developer http://strk.keybit.net/services.html ___ postgis-users mailing list postgis-users@postgis.refractions.net http://postgis.refractions.net/mailman/listinfo/postgis-users
Re: [postgis-users] [postgis-devel] Vote On Project Sponsorship
-Original Message- From: postgis-users-boun...@postgis.refractions.net [mailto:postgis-users-boun...@postgis.refractions.net] On Behalf Of Mark Cave-Ayland Sent: Thursday, September 08, 2011 10:49 AM To: postgis-users@postgis.refractions.net Subject: Re: [postgis-users] [postgis-devel] Vote On Project Sponsorship On 02/09/11 21:36, Paragon Corporation wrote: > 1) I'm a bit pessimistic we would garner enough funds to fund a > particular feature. > So lets just not go there. It's talking about stuff that may never > happen And those things may best be dealt with between two individuals > if we can't come to an agreement. > ... > I do not see this as a free money, but more as a simple answer to > people when they ask "If I want to fund the project, who do I give > money too?" > > This is an extremely frustrating question to not be able to answer and > I don't think any of us would Feel comfortable saying "Give it to me > directly" I agree that while assigning financial resource to development tasks is going to be tricky and require quite a bit of time, I do like the idea of things like sponsorship for travel to code sprints (hey - I'm in Europe!) and also some funding some kind of build infrastructure. For example, I think it would be useful to fund Win32 and Win64 cloud instances so that I can help Regina with the Windows builds when she gets stuck. Orthodox build machines for all the supported platforms: +1 (not that I count). In terms of "accepting money", I think that people wanting to fund something specific may (read WILL) want the community to supply the best person for the task at hand. So figure it out even if it's hard. Clearly there are some things which are general, but everyone has their own speciality. A raster related task should cause a different personnel assignment than a topology related task, for instance. It also should provide a central mechanism for managing feature enhancement requests accompanied with $$$: part of the process should be to get the PMC to sign off on a proposed approach before work starts, giving the customer some degree of assurance that the final result has been peer reviewed and will be carried forward with the main codebase. And of course, reviewing the design needs to be reimbursed. Clearly, translating a feature enhancement into a design and a realistic level of effort should also be a community, consensus-based activity. Even if the users want to pick an item off of a "menu" (such as the list of features on the WKTraster page), it's not exactly obvious who is free and who isn't or even who can be hired and who can't (e.g., are the university folks for hire, or are they wrapped up by supporting their own projects?) "Directed funds" like this are going to require more accountability than generic donations to a common pool. Some identifiable organization needs to be responsible for delivering on the promise, and this organization needs to represent the community as a whole rather than an individual or an isolated company. Conversely, they need to be able to tap any of the current members of the community or bring on outside help for the duration. The psychological difference between having the community take on the task and the customer willy nilly hiring some totally unrelated person to do a one-off job is quite large. Also, note that if you do develop the capability of handling directed funds, you also have the capability of handling undirected funds. Developing a "menu" of needed tasks / desired features not only gives potential customers a way to put their money where their mouth is, it also gives the community a list of items to which undesignated funds may be applied. I would suspect, however, that the boring gruntwork should receive the bulk of the undirected funds, while the flashy shiny hi-vis tasks should be accomplished on directed funds. Bryce ___ postgis-users mailing list postgis-users@postgis.refractions.net http://postgis.refractions.net/mailman/listinfo/postgis-users
Re: [postgis-users] [postgis-devel] Vote On Project Sponsorship
On 11-09-08 02:48 AM, Mark Cave-Ayland wrote: I agree that while assigning financial resource to development tasks is going to be tricky and require quite a bit of time, I do like the idea of things like sponsorship for travel to code sprints (hey - I'm in Europe!) and also some funding some kind of build infrastructure. For example, I think it would be useful to fund Win32 and Win64 cloud instances so that I can help Regina with the Windows builds when she gets stuck. Folks, If you do pursue windows build/test instances I'd like to explore possibilities for sharing these with other OSGeo projects or even handling them through SAC (the OSGeo System Administration Committee). I've wanted to have some windows VMs for some time but I have modest experience administrating them and I'm not clear on how to set things up properly from a license point of view for development. Best regards, -- ---+-- I set the clouds in motion - turn up | Frank Warmerdam, warmer...@pobox.com light and sound - activate the windows | http://pobox.com/warmerda and watch the world go round - Rush| Geospatial Software Developer ___ postgis-users mailing list postgis-users@postgis.refractions.net http://postgis.refractions.net/mailman/listinfo/postgis-users
Re: [postgis-users] [postgis-devel] Vote On Project Sponsorship
On 02/09/11 21:36, Paragon Corporation wrote: Chris, I'm cc'ing regular users on this since it was several of them who had asked for this and that is the main reason I am pushing it. 1) I'm a bit pessimistic we would garner enough funds to fund a particular feature. So lets just not go there. It's talking about stuff that may never happen And those things may best be dealt with between two individuals if we can't come to an agreement. 2) I was thinking the money could be spent to support plane tickets and fees to say go to FOSS4G etc that many of our developers wouldn't be able to afford on their own. 3) I was thinking Refractions should be reimbursed in some way for providing hosting, build bot etc. And if we did have extra -- perhaps we can have build bots for other platforms So that these major changes we make aren't quite so painful (we catch them much earlier on). I do not see this as a free money, but more as a simple answer to people when they ask "If I want to fund the project, who do I give money too?" This is an extremely frustrating question to not be able to answer and I don't think any of us would Feel comfortable saying "Give it to me directly" I agree that while assigning financial resource to development tasks is going to be tricky and require quite a bit of time, I do like the idea of things like sponsorship for travel to code sprints (hey - I'm in Europe!) and also some funding some kind of build infrastructure. For example, I think it would be useful to fund Win32 and Win64 cloud instances so that I can help Regina with the Windows builds when she gets stuck. ATB, Mark. -- Mark Cave-Ayland - Senior Technical Architect PostgreSQL - PostGIS Sirius Corporation plc - control through freedom http://www.siriusit.co.uk t: +44 870 608 0063 Sirius Labs: http://www.siriusit.co.uk/labs ___ postgis-users mailing list postgis-users@postgis.refractions.net http://postgis.refractions.net/mailman/listinfo/postgis-users
Re: [postgis-users] [postgis-devel] Vote On Project Sponsorship
Chris, I'm cc'ing regular users on this since it was several of them who had asked for this and that is the main reason I am pushing it. 1) I'm a bit pessimistic we would garner enough funds to fund a particular feature. So lets just not go there. It's talking about stuff that may never happen And those things may best be dealt with between two individuals if we can't come to an agreement. 2) I was thinking the money could be spent to support plane tickets and fees to say go to FOSS4G etc that many of our developers wouldn't be able to afford on their own. 3) I was thinking Refractions should be reimbursed in some way for providing hosting, build bot etc. And if we did have extra -- perhaps we can have build bots for other platforms So that these major changes we make aren't quite so painful (we catch them much earlier on). I do not see this as a free money, but more as a simple answer to people when they ask "If I want to fund the project, who do I give money too?" This is an extremely frustrating question to not be able to answer and I don't think any of us would Feel comfortable saying "Give it to me directly" Thanks, Regina > -Original Message- > From: postgis-devel-boun...@postgis.refractions.net > [mailto:postgis-devel-boun...@postgis.refractions.net] On > Behalf Of Chris Hodgson > Sent: Friday, September 02, 2011 2:51 PM > To: PostGIS Development Discussion > Subject: Re: [postgis-devel] Vote On Project Sponsorship > > The actual money is handled by OSGeo for us, which is great. > But we do need to have well documented votes on where and how > to allocate the money. This is the part that seems a bit > worrisome to me, as well - being that some of the most likely > ways to spend the money would be to fund some of ourselves to > do work that we might have otherwise done for "free". > Additionally, it seems like there is some possibility for > contention on how the funds should be spent, I think we might > need some policy written up about how we come up with ways to > spend the money and how we decide who does the work. We would > end up needing to deal with contract management as well - > what rates do we set? How do we make sure that the work will > get done to the standard we are looking for? How do we keep > track of where the "free" works ends and the "payed" work > stops, and vice versa. We can't even assign a single contract > manager from among us, as any one of us might be on the other > end of the contract. > > While on one hand it seems silly to complain about having to > manage what is essentially "free money", but on the other > hand I also know the resentment that can build in a community > (or family even) from doing business between members. > > Here's the sort of decisions I worry about: > > - what to spend money on > - who should do it > - how much it is worth > - what about the work that other people will end up doing to > support it (building a new release, testing bugs around the > issue, documenting) > - who will scrutinize the work and what authority do they > have (how big does a bug have to be in order for us to hold > back payment) > - how will people feel when they do a bunch of work for free, > and then a donation comes in and somebody else gets paid to > do something they view as less important or not done to as > high a standard > > While "free money" sounds great, I think there are some risks > to our community, and also some additional costs to be borne > by the PSC. I'd like to give others the chance to assuage my > fears but for now my vote is +0. > > Chris > > Mark Cave-Ayland wrote: > > On 01/09/11 23:16, Paragon Corporation wrote: > > > >> I think we are coming close to having completed our work > to become a > >> full fledged OSGeo project and I would like to request the OSGeo > >> board to add us to the project sponsorship board. > >> Can we have a vote on this. > >> +1 > >> Thanks, > >> Regina > > > > I understand that this means we can get external > sponsorship (which is > > a good thing) but how do we manage the transfer of funds to > > developers? Do we need to have a treasurer of some description? > > > > > > ATB, > > > > Mark. > > > > ___ > postgis-devel mailing list > postgis-de...@postgis.refractions.net > http://postgis.refractions.net/mailman/listinfo/postgis-devel > ___ postgis-users mailing list postgis-users@postgis.refractions.net http://postgis.refractions.net/mailman/listinfo/postgis-users
