Open Stack

Doug Hellmann wrote:
> I won't be able to make the TC meeting this week because of travel,
> so I wanted to lay out my thoughts on the three PTL-less projects
> based on the outcome of the recent election (EC2-API, Winstackers,
> and Stable Maintenance).
> [...]

First of all, I think we need to recognize that with more than 50 
project teams, it's pretty likely there will always be people missing 
the nomination boat for one reason or another. Small and understaffed 
projects just make it even more likely, as the pool of candidates there 
is so small. I actually find it easier to excuse EC2API and Winstackers 
handful of contributors for missing it in Mitaka, than to excuse Magnum 
and its hundred of contributors for missing it in Liberty.

> The EC2-API project doesn't appear to be very actively worked on.
> There is one very recent commit from an Oslo team member, another
> couple from a few days before, and then the next one is almost a
> month old. Given the lack of activity, if no team member has
> volunteered to be PTL I think we should remove the project from the
> official list for lack of interest.

The EC2API project is a bit of a corner case: something we want to exist 
as an official project but which is critically understaffed. Missing the 
PTL nomination boat is more a sign of this understaffing than anything 
else. I suspect we still very much want this to exist, so I'm not 
convinced we should take this opportunity to remove the project.

If anything, I hope this situation that may remind the various 
stakeholders depending on that functionality to be present and 
maintained that it doesn't exist in a vacuum. Open source software is 
not magic ponies giving you free-as-in-beer software. You need the 
people who depend on the feature to support (directly or indirectly) its 
maintenance.

> The Winstackers project is much more active in the repository, but
> there doesn't seem to be much traffic on the mailing list. It's not
> clear why no one signed up to be PTL, and I couldn't find a notice
> that the current PTL is not running. I'm tempted to suggest removing
> Winstackers from the official project list for lack of participation
> in project governance, but perhaps a probation period is in order
> since it's a relatively new team. Probation would depend on having
> the team find a PTL volunteer, of course.

I suspect this one is more of a classic "didn't pay attention" case. 
Since I don't think we need Winstackers as an official project as much 
as we need EC2API, we should definitely have a discussion about whether 
it's still worth keeping as an official project or if it would be as 
good to just make it an unofficial project.

> The situation with the Stable Maintenance team is ironically shaky.
> The outgoing PTL has entered the Nova PTL election, though he has
> said he would take up the Stable team work again if he does not
> become Nova PTL. That election will not be over until 24 March, so
> I think we should wait before taking any action. If Matt becomes
> Nova PTL, and no other volunteer steps forward, I will take on the
> responsibilities, though I do want to keep the Stable team separate
> from the Release team. That said, I would very much prefer to have
> someone else be the Stable team PTL so I hope we can find a volunteer.

The situation with stable maintenance is a bit of a corner case too. 
Matt would have stayed PTL for stable if he wasn't elected for Nova, and 
Tony, being an election official, couldn't really throw his name in the 
PTL election hat at the last minute. I think this is a case where the TC 
looking at the potential names and making their choice will be working 
as intended.

-- 
Thierry Carrez (ttx)