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[Sorry for delay in posting, trouble getting subscribed] |
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Dirk R. Gently wrote: |
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> Thank you trustees for reading this. I am a Gentoo user and really enjoy |
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> the Gentoo distribution. Thank you trustees for making this available to |
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> me. As it is though, isn't working. |
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Well as another user, I disagree: Gentoo works better than it ever did. It's |
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a lot easier to maintain for a start. |
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> Gentoo remains drifting with little leadership. |
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Others seem to agree with you about this "vision" thing: again, I must |
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differ. Imo Gentoo is now a federal structure of "mini-Gentoos" -- herds. |
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They work exceedingly well, and are small close-knit groups around their |
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own channels (eg haskell, java or kde) with exactly the same sense of |
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involvement: interested users collaborate with devs on testing, bug-fixing |
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and general ebuild development. The results are then pushed to the main |
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tree. |
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The vision everyone seems to share is that of Gentoo as the "best" GNU/Linux |
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distro. We all have our various perspectives on why it's the best, though. |
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Perhaps the real strength is that Gentoo doesn't tie you to someone else's |
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vision, but empowers you to enact your own and find others who share it and |
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want to collaborate. As such, parallel and even conflicting visions are |
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healthy, so long as the Social Contract and the CoC are kept in mind. |
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After all, you never know when you might suddenly need someone else's work. |
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Since you are only stepping out of the room to another in the same |
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building, it's not hard to get that help. If Gentoo were specialised and |
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focussed on one vision, we'd lose diversity. |
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I haven't seen a convincing benefit that overrides that yet. |
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> I am a supporter of Daniel Robbin's offer to help get Gentoo |
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> into a proper leadership structure. |
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I see the Council as exactly that for the 95% of the work we're all |
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interested in: the software. |
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> Gentoo currently has alot of well trained users. I have often seen many |
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> good ideas come to the forums but often they stop there because there is a |
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> lack of a leadership structure that is able to implement them. Getting |
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> something done would require tracking down whom is responsible for the |
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> project (not always easy), discovering if that person is still active (or |
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> cares) about doing anything, and persuading that person into doing it |
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> (right now there is only a lot of talk.) |
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> |
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I agree it would be better if users did not feel so alienated. I don't see |
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how changing the legal structure will affect any of the social issues. |
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> I was not aware that the Foundation has missed yet another required duty |
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> to make the community/distribution run. |
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Thing is, we haven't had a Foundation since last summer (even if it can be |
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reinstated). If it were such an essential requirement to make the distro run, |
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would it not have stopped working long ago? |
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That's why I don't feel as panicked about this as so many other users seem |
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to be; yes, we need to have a legal structure sorted out for stuff like |
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domain and asset management. My feeling is that even if that lapsed |
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permanently, the people who currently manage infra would continue to do so, |
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and the devs would continue to code. They use Gentoo which is why they |
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maintain it. |
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-- |
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