[gentoo-dev] Re: Why aren't GSoC projects affecting ::gentoo discussed on regular mls?

[Benda Xu]

Dear Michał,



Michał Górny <mgorny@g.o> writes:



> I would like to ask our this year's GSoC mentors a single question:
> why weren't the GSoC proposals given proper discussion on our regular
> mailing lists *before* they were accepted?


> I can understand that most developers in Gentoo don't really care about
> GSoC.  However, both projects we have this year [1] involve major
> changes to ::gentoo that -- by policy -- require prior RFC.  In case
> of the BLAS/LAPACK project there was a RFC *after* the project was
> accepted, that was never fully answered.  In case of the MPI project,
> I'm not aware of any public RFC or announcement.


The proposal has been discussed in regular mailing lists.  



  https://archives.gentoo.org/gentoo-science/message/4d0186acdce6df538a2740e0f1146ae6



At the proposal stage it was not sent to gentoo-dev, because I thought

only science project was relevant to BLAS/LAPACK.  Later we find it to

be affecting more ebuilds, thus the RFC was sent to gentoo-dev.



  https://archives.gentoo.org/gentoo-dev/message/d917547f7a9e1226fca63632a1e02026



> I believe such decisions put all of us in a very bad position.  There is
> a major work going on, almost secretly.  In the end, we will either be
> forced to accept the result even if it doesn't meet our expectations, or
> reject it and turn GSoC into some kind of grotesque situation.


Michał, you were overreacting to the word "GSoC" since our original RFC

at gentoo-dev.  Please, just ignore GSoC when you are executing your

experise of QA.  Gentoo should be developed independently, regardless of

whether any development effort is supported by 3rd party.



> The former is of course unacceptable from my point of view.  It would
> mean that one or two developers are able to abuse paid programs such
> as GSoC to unilaterally push their preferences into Gentoo.  We would be
> forced to accept them unconditionally just because 'it's a done deal'.


See above.



> The latter means the students has wasted their summer doing work that's
> not going anywhere.  This is certainly demotivating and a bad PR for
> Gentoo.  I suppose it also reduces our chance of getting into GSoC
> again, if Google finds out that GSoC is spent on code going to trash.


That's why we are working together to find the best solution and reach a

consensus.



> So, again, why do single developers unilaterally decide on which
> projects third party money is spent, and never bother discussing whether
> those projects are really applicable beforehand?


I will leave this question to our GSoC manager.



Personally I don't regard the GSoC selection and decision process

interesting to all the Gentoo devs.  If you are interested in GSoC and

would like share your ideas to recruit student enthusiasts, you are more

than welcomed to join our team.



> [1]
> https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/organizations/6416323580526592/


Cheers,

Benda