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(B) After some very productive discussion in the nova meeting and IRC
channel this morning, I have updated the nova-specs patch introducing
the "Core Liaison" concept [1]. The main change is a drastic edit of the
README to include a "Core Liaison FAQ". Other changes of note:

* We're now going to make distinct use of the launchpad blueprint's
  "Definition" and "Direction" fields. As such, we can still decide to
  defer a blueprint whose spec is merged in the 'approved' directory.
  (Which really isn't different than what we were doing before; it's
  just that now we can do it for reasons other than "oops, this didn't
  get finished in time".)
* The single-core-approval rule for previously approved specifications
  is removed.

(A) Note that the idea of capping the number of specs is (mostly)
unrelated, and we still haven't closed on it. I feel like we've agreed
to have a targeted discussion around spec freeze time where we decide
whether to defer features for resource reasons. That would be a new (and
good, IMO) thing. But it's still TBD whether "30 approved for 25
completed" will apply, and/or what criteria would be used to decide what
gets cut.

Collected odds and ends from elsewhere in this thread:

> If you do care reviewing a spec, that also means you do care reviewing
> the implementation side.

I agree that would be nice, and I'd like to make it happen, but
separately from what's already being discussed. I added a TODO in the
spec README [2].

> If we end up with bags of "spare time", there's loads of tech-debt
> items, performance (it's a feature, let's recall) issues, and meaningful
> clean-ups waiting to be tackled.

Hear hear.

> Viewing this from outside, 25 specs in a cycle already sounds like
> planning to get a *lot* done... that's completing an average of one
> Nova spec per week (even when averaged through the freeze weeks).
> Maybe as a goal it's undershooting a bit, but it's still a very
> impressive quantity to be able to consistently accomplish. Many
> thanks and congratulations to all the folks who work so hard to make
> this happen in Nova, cycle after cycle.

That perspective literally hadn't occurred to me from here with my face
mashed up against the trees [3]. Thanks fungi.

> Note that having that "big picture" is I think the main reason why
> historically, until very recently, there was a subgroup of the nova core
> team that was the specs core team, because what was approved in specs
> could have wide impacts to nova and thus knowing the big picture was
> important.

Good point, Matt. (Not that I think we should, or could, go back to that...)

efried

[1] https://review.opendev.org/#/c/685857
[2] https://review.opendev.org/#/c/685857/4/README.rst@219
[3] For non-native speakers, this is a reference to the following idiom:
https://www.dictionary.com/browse/can-t-see-the-forest-for-the-trees