Re: [gentoo-project] Re: [gentoo-dev-announce] Agenda for Gentoo Council meeting on 2014-02-25

[hasufell]

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Mart Raudsepp:
> On N, 2014-02-20 at 22:00 -0600, Donnie Berkholz wrote:
>> gtk USE flags =============
>>
>> (20 minutes)
>>
>> chithanh has asked whether QA can make decisions about USE flag
>> naming and usage. I interpret that to mean whether QA has
>> authority over tree policy.
>>
>> Vote: Confirm whether QA has authority over tree policy,
>> including USE flag naming and usage.
>>
>> References: -
>> http://article.gmane.org/gmane.linux.gentoo.devel/90291 -
>> http://article.gmane.org/gmane.linux.gentoo.project/3321 -
>> https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/GLEP:48
>>
>>
>> ulm requested that the council examine QA's decision.
>>
>> Vote: Do we affirm QA's decision?
>>
>> If not:
>>
>> Vote: What should the USE flag usage be?
>>
>> - 'gtk' only (maintainer chooses optimal version) - 'gtk2',
>> 'gtk3' etc but without 'gtk' - subpoint: 'gtk' == 'gtk2' for ease
>> of porting - 'gtk' is a USE_EXPAND like python versions - 'gtk'
>> is mandatory for *any* version, gtk2/gtk3 pick which
>>
>>
>> References: -
>> http://article.gmane.org/gmane.linux.gentoo.project/3319 -
>> http://article.gmane.org/gmane.linux.gentoo.devel/90291 - (2005)
>> http://marc.info/?l=gentoo-dev&m=111212920310822&w=2
>
> As the Gnome team lead, which maintains gtk+, I hereby request that
> any decision point concerning the gtk USE flag be removed from the
> agenda of shortly upcoming next council meeting. This implies the
> suggestion to suspend QA decision on this matter for the time being
> (irregardless of tree policy authority of QA team - such authority
> could be fine, given due process), and allow a proper process to
> take place before maintainers are asked to completely swap around
> their approach, only to perhaps end up with something completely
> different a month later.
>
> We, at the Gnome team, are dissatisfied with the way QA team
> discussed this point without consulting the Gnome team. Calling me
> into a meeting, just because I happened to be around for a few
> words, unprepared, is not consulting, and proclaiming a policy that
> is against current Gnome policy with no explanation nor logs of
> relevant discussion and technical demonstration just demonstrates a
> complete lack of formal thinking. This all started with a friendly
> approaching on changing our internal policy to be tree-wide, and
> all of a sudden a couple weeks later we have the complete opposite
> of the status quo of 10 years being declared policy.
>
> We acknowledge that our policy may not have been perfect but we
> need time to analyze claims brought up by/to the QA team to
> construct a proper proposal for a better policy that would satisfy
> everyone; hopefully in co-operation with a QA team.
>
> My suggestion is that someone from the Council or the QA team
> takes leadership in this issue and revitalizes technical
> discussions that happened in the mailing lists again via actually
> summarizing the points mentioned and concretely forming a good
> thesis of one or another approach is better than the other.
>
> Additionally it appears that we all in Gentoo need to think through
> and understand what exactly USE flags are, for what they are used
> and so on. The same oddly appears to slightly be the case for SLOTs
> and when to use which (SLOT or USE). Are USE flags just for
> expressing external dependencies from configure switches, or are
> they for expressing features (e.g, USE=gui).
>
>

I agree with a lot of points you mentioned.

But I disagree with the general request. This discussion did not just
start now. The gnome team had quite enough time to make things clear
(last discussion I started about this was in 2012), yet they did not,
but only said this is a "recommendation". That is like saying "QA
maybe, or not".

The first response from QA when I contacted them recently about this
another time was "bringt it up to the council, this is probably not
even a QA issue". Then they started throwing out some policy as well.

I'm not satisfied with any of this and I think we need the council to
end this. It has already wasted enough attention. It's not such a big
deal, really. The cards are all on the table and we all voted the
council, because we believe they are knowledgeable enough to make
decisions.
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