From Fedora Project Wiki
Roll Call
- Present: Christopher Aillon, Bill Nottingham, Dimitris Glezos, Mike McGrath, Dennis Gilmore, Matt Domsch, Paul Frields
- Regrets: Josh Boyer, John Poelstra, Tom 'spot' Callaway
Last meeting
Meeting:Board_meeting_2009-10-01
Proposed Agenda
Trademark license agreement update
- Current status
- Pam Chestek did collaborative editing on the wiki with input from FAB
- Final version has been created
- Multiple recipients in queue to receive it
- Door is open for new signers in the future
- We will also offer to current holders so that they have the option of switching to the new agreement
Commercial non-software goods license
Meeting:Board_meeting_2009-09-10#t10_Sep_13:25
- Current status report via Paul
- No time in Comm-Arch team schedule for a Finance meeting
- Paul re-tickled Max, we will set up a meeting to find out whether we can set up a receiving fund for Fedora
Target audience for distribution
- Paul: The context is "Where do we want to be"
- Need to have more definitive list of the things we expect the target audience to be able to do with the Fedora distribution
- Installation/upgrade
- Specific core tasks (reboot, connect to Internet, system update, browse, IM/IRC)
- and what the functional tolerance is -- meaning what is acceptable performance for each of these
- Time might be one criterion, errors/fallback might be another
- This helps us make better release criteria, determine blockers, etc.
- mmcgrath: Some people think Fedora is for everyone, some don't.
- Chris - The conversation may actually not be about who Fedora is for, but rather people just being unhappy with the updates.
- General agreement that releases are not known for quality, updates after a release get even worse.
- Paul: Probably ad-hoc decisions about updates, blockers, prioritization
- Example - we provide help via IRC but a default install didn't include a IRC client
- Jesse posted his idea for an unfrozen rawhide and better-managed current release target repo
- Board agrees: GO FORTH AND DO.
- Paul: We should set the audience before setting the process
- caillon: but if we don't fix the process, our target will suffer no matter who they are
- Paul agrees, you can't do one and not the other
- Paul: Our vision should be: "to better fit the needs of *this* audience"
- People voluntarily switching to Linux, not really "my aunt Tessie"
- People who are not necessarily hackers, but are familiar with computers
- People who are likely to fix something that is not working (or at least collaborate or report when it's not working)
- List of tasks one can do?
- web browsing, email, office productivity, graphic arts, publishing, audio listeners, web serving, collaboration & communication, software developers
- There may be network benefits of this approach - by targeting these, we may be more usable for other cases, even if they're not our goal.
- dimitris: Perceived lack is around polish. We may not be missing broad targets horribly, but there's a lot of fine tuning that needs to be done better.
- mmcgrath: A big thing we're missing is self-control with updates.
- mdomsch: (channeling skvidal) You as a Fedora packager essentially have root access on millions of systems. Treat them with appropriate care
- mmcgrath: have FESCo and/or QA come up with a mandated policy around stable release updates.
- caillon: also need to make sure that people follow those policies; see also https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-advisory-board/2009-October/msg00100.html
- Decision item needed.
- What is our target audience? (see above)
- The Board will now pursue goals for process changes that make quality higher for that target
- mdomsch: Board focus on quality instead of quantity of packages
- mmcgrath: how can we measure quality?
- How many update breakages?
- How many updates overall? (This is more symptomatic than root-cause related)
- This is an area where we can learn from others.
- critical path packages need push approval for stable releases. Perhaps we don't have the resources in place to do all packages.
- dimitris: If we increase visibility when a breakage happens, it's less likely people will be careless. Are we giving enough visibility to breakage, or do we just fix it quietly?
- Sheriffs will help in this visibility.
- mmcgrath: How do we prevent "Daddy says no, I'll ask Mommy"
- caillon: With sherrifs, this has not been a big problem. All nos get logged, so that should be referenced before saying yes.
- mmcgrath: how can we measure quality?
- ACTION: Paul will follow note publishing with a summary to FAB of the agreed points:
- Target audience statement from above, which represents broadest consensus, to be further specified collaboratively
- Board will set update discipline goals and look to FESCo to help design/implement
- Board concurs with Jesse Keating's expanded explanation of the "Unfozen Rawhide" proposal and will work to make it happen fully in the F13 cycle.
New Business
Elections
- mdomsch looking for someone who might like to take up Fedora election coordination work
- Which groups are up? Board 1/2, FESCo 1/2, Ambassadors (all?), F-13 name... who else?
- What events need to be held?
- When will they be held?
- start elections after FUDCon, which closes Dec. 7
- use FUDCon for an additional in-person town hall meeting
- ACTION: MDomsch will kick this off on FAB, and look for existing and new volunteers to drive it
Next meeting
- AGREED: 2009-10-29 UTC 1600