On Wed, Jan 25, 2023 at 12:21 AM Alex Murray <alex.mur...@canonical.com> wrote: > > Hi Ubuntu Backporters Team, > > The Tech Board is hoping to progress the ratification of a charter for > the Ubuntu Backporters Team as discussed previously on a number of > occasions. My understanding is that these previous discussions between > the Backporters Team and the Tech Board have not been able to reach a > consensus on both the level of detail and the requirements that would be > stipulated in the Charter. > > The previous drafts at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuBackports/Charter > seemed to contain a mix of both high level statements/directions for the > team as well as lower-level policies for the operation of the team. I > notice that now most of these lower-level details have moved into > https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuBackports/Policies but there is still no > higher level Charter outlining the purpose and guiding principles for > the team. > > As such I propose the following as a starting point, which is based on > the previous proposal from rbasak[1] but which tries to reduce any > potential burdens placed on the team by such an overall Charter: > > > * Establish and manage an effective process to handle backport > requests based solely on their technical merit.
I'm not sure this is correct, to handle requests *solely* on technical merit. For example, part of the backport process is the expectation that the backport requestor/uploader will remain responsible for further backports as needed; if an uploaded backport seems technically correct but the backports team does not believe the uploader would be responsible for further uploads, the backports team should be able to reject the upload on that basis. Stating "solely on their technical merit" places undue restrictions on our team, I believe. > > * Maintain the backports pocket based on this process, with an aim to > ensure all requests are responded to in a reasonable amount of time. What does "reasonable amount of time" mean? > > * Maintain quality in the backports pocket, where the definition of > quality is driven by the team, but decided by consensus within the > wider Ubuntu developer community. I'm not quite sure what this statement is trying to achieve, or what it would mean in practice. Can you clarify? > > * Handle process reform and membership management internally, ensuring > that any responsibility can be carried by any contributor who > demonstrates the required capacity and competence. I think this statement is even harder to read, can you clarify and/or reword it? For example, if we must handle process/membership "internally", does that mean we can't get outside input on those subjects? If not, then what is the point of the statement at all? > > > I hope this can serve as a basis to reach a consensus that is amendable > to both the Backporters Team and Technical Board. As a counter proposal, what do you think of this simple "charter": * Maintain the Ubuntu "backports" pocket. > > I welcome any feedback from all involved (please note I am not > subscribed to the ubuntu-backports list so please CC me directly on > responses). > > Thanks, > Alex > > > [1] > https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-backports/2022-February/022687.html > > -- > ubuntu-backports mailing list > ubuntu-backpo...@lists.ubuntu.com > Modify settings or unsubscribe at: > https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-backports -- technical-board mailing list technical-board@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/technical-board
