It's really exciting to see people let go of unnecessary authority, dismantle bureaucracy and resist building empires. I applaud the restraint the committee is using here. I think it speaks volumes about who they are as leaders.
As Brion suggests, it's important to retain the "idea of getting some active people to talk to each other regularly and go over stuff". I look forward to supporting grass-roots efforts to achieve just that. - Trevor On Fri, Jan 16, 2015 at 10:01 AM, Brion Vibber <bvib...@wikimedia.org> wrote: > Rob, thanks for starting this discussion! > > We definitely should be thinking about what kind of structures make sense; > the arch committee was a good "spike solution" which I think we've > determined doesn't quite work as it is, but the core idea of getting some > active people to talk to each other regularly and go over stuff is a good > impulse we should not discard! > > I'm currently in the process of disentangling myself from other projects > (we've got some awesome stuff coming up in the mobile apps!) to concentrate > more on MediaWiki core, so ideas about modifying or adding to that > structure are very welcome now. > > > In general, I feel a sense of urgency that seems lacking in the status > > quo. We've made progress over the past couple of years, but it > > doesn't feel like our progress is entirely up to the task. We have a > > collection of *many* instances of individual or small team excellence > > that are sadly the mere sum of their parts. My intuition is that we > > lose out on multiplicative effects as we fail to engage the wider > > group in our activities, and as we lack engineering-level > > orchestration. Team-level pride in fantastic work drifts into > > project-level despair, as many excellent engineers fail to grasp how > > to make big changes outside of their limited domains. > > > > ^ This. > > I think it's getting time to plan more aggressively for the future and work > towards our goals with a shared vision. That's a tall order, of course, but > I think we can make some ideas go around... > > -- brion > > > On Thu, Jan 15, 2015 at 8:04 PM, Rob Lanphier <ro...@wikimedia.org> wrote: > > > (Alright...let's try this again!) > > > > Hi everyone, > > > > The current MediaWiki Architecture Committee[1] has its roots in a > > 2013 Amsterdam Hackathon session[2], where we had a pair of sessions > > to try to establish our architectural guidelines[3]. It was there > > that we agreed that it would be good to revive our then moribund > > process for reviewing RFCs[4]. Since no one there really knew whose > > job it was to review these things, I believe I said "how about we > > start with everyone with 'architect' in their title at WMF?", which > > was met with uncomfortable shrugging that I interpreted as > > "consensus!", and no one corrected me. Thus Brion Vibber, Mark > > Bergsma, and Tim Starling became the founding members of the Arch > > Committee. > > > > Subsequent to that meeting, I pretended to proceed as though a > > decision was made. However, over the past year and half since then, > > there's been much more uncomfortable shrugging. Even Brion, Mark, and > > Tim have not seemed entirely comfortable with the idea. It was widely > > acknowledged that the group was heavily biased toward the lower parts > > of our server software stack. The committee agreed to add Roan > > Kattouw and Daniel Kinzler to the group as a means of providing a > > wider perspective, with the added bonus of adding at least one person > > who isn't a WMF employee. > > > > So, here we are today. I believe no one would dispute the credentials > > of every member of the group. Brion, Tim, and Mark have an extremely > > long history with the project, being employees #1, #2, and #3 of the > > WMF respectively, and all having contributed massively to the success > > of Wikipedia and to MediaWiki as general purpose wiki software. In > > most open source projects, one of them would probably be BFDL[5]. > > Roan and Daniel are more "recent", but only in relative terms, and > > also have very significant contributions to their name. All have the > > widespread respect of pretty much everyone in the MediaWiki developer > > community. > > > > Additionally, I hear quite a bit of relief that the previously > > moribund RFC process is doing much better now. Things are moving, and > > if you know how to work the process and aren't proposing anything too > > wild, you can get an RFC approved pretty quickly. The committee has > > made a lap through the entire backlog of RFCs. > > > > Still, the uncomfortable shrugging continues. The group is broader, > > but still lacks the breadth, particularly in front end and in the > > development of newer services such as Parsoid and RESTBase. This > > aspect is pretty obviously something that can be fixed. Another > > problem is that the scope of the group isn't clear to everyone. Is > > this group responsible for leading, or merely responsible for > > reviewing big ideas from others to ensure continuity and sanity? How > > big does an idea need to be before an RFC needs to be written (as > > opposed to just dropping a patch in Gerrit)? Defining the scope of > > the group is also a fixable problem. > > > > However, I don't sense much of a desire to fix things. The dominant > > meme that I hear is that we should go back to the day before > > uncomfortable shrugging led to a committee becoming BFDL. What I > > fear, though, is that we will develop a system lacking in conceptual > > integrity[6], as individual warring fiefdoms emerge. It's quite > > simple to argue this is already happening. > > > > So, where does that leave us? Do we need a BFDL? If so, who should > > pick? Should it be someone in the project? Should the WMF hire > > someone to lead this? If not, do we keep the committee? Do we just > > let this be consensus based? > > > > On the leadership front, let me throw out a hypothetical: should we > > have MediaWiki 2.0, where we start with an empty repository and build > > up? If so, who makes that decision? If not, what is our alternative > > vision? Who is going to define it? Is what we have good enough? > > > > In general, I feel a sense of urgency that seems lacking in the status > > quo. We've made progress over the past couple of years, but it > > doesn't feel like our progress is entirely up to the task. We have a > > collection of *many* instances of individual or small team excellence > > that are sadly the mere sum of their parts. My intuition is that we > > lose out on multiplicative effects as we fail to engage the wider > > group in our activities, and as we lack engineering-level > > orchestration. Team-level pride in fantastic work drifts into > > project-level despair, as many excellent engineers fail to grasp how > > to make big changes outside of their limited domains. > > > > Perhaps I'm being too hyperbolic. Perhaps the answer is "embrace the > > chaos; it's the Wiki Way(tm)" I don't buy it, but I'm probably one of > > the easier people to convince of this. I think if this is the way > > it's gonna be, someone needs to make the case how this is actually > > working now. Step up. > > > > Perhaps I'm also suffering from living inside the WMF echo chamber for > > too long. It could be that the general pessimism about the direction > > of MediaWiki (or lack thereof) is not shared out here. Perhaps people > > who get most of their news from this mailing list are perfectly happy > > with the status quo, and appreciate the balance we've struck with our > > weekly meetings and a committee whose membership is not entirely > > static. > > > > To be clear here: this is not an announcement about actually > > disbanding the committee. Even though I had a hand in creating it, > > it'd be dumb for me to unilaterally pressure the committee to disband. > > I may nudge and cajole (like I'm doing here), but I'm first and > > foremost looking to figure out what the consensus is, and then follow > > through on it. > > > > Discuss. > > > > Rob > > > > [1] https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Architecture_committee > > [2] > > > https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Architecture_meetings/Amsterdam_Hackathon_2013_Day_1 > > [3] https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Architecture_guidelines > > [4] https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Requests_for_comment > > [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benevolent_dictator_for_life > > [6] http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?ConceptualIntegrity > > > > _______________________________________________ > > Wikitech-l mailing list > > Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org > > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l > > > _______________________________________________ > Wikitech-l mailing list > Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l > _______________________________________________ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
