Gentoo Archives: gentoo-project

From: "Andreas K. Huettel" <dilfridge@g.o>
To: gentoo-project@l.g.o
Subject: Re: [gentoo-project] Re: A plan for Gentoo
Date: Wed, 06 Dec 2017 09:09:49
Message-Id: 1755777.5tCvIM8XfE@porto
In Reply to: [gentoo-project] Re: A plan for Gentoo by Daniel Robbins
1 Hi Daniel,
2
3 > First, Seemant is a fantastic guy and Gentoo would benefit greatly from his
4 > return. He was an incredible asset on the project.
5
6 Sure, sounds like a good idea, if he wants to.
7
8 > I am happy to get more involved with Gentoo. I've actually been working
9 > with several Gentoo devs on several development-related things and plan to
10 > continue to do so informally.
11
12 Sounds also like a good idea. Feel free to get in touch with the recruiters.
13
14 > I do think Gentoo could benefit from some positive energy and some
15 > additional support for development. I would like to assist with this
16 > effort.
17
18 A significant part of the "negative energy" comes from a generation conflict.
19
20 Strongly simplifying, we had "oldtimers" who were used to organically grown
21 rules (see games team, which by force of tradition ignored QA and council),
22 and we had the "new" developers like me, who were recruited over the years
23 according to developed procedures and were told to stick to rules. That led to
24 effectively two classes of developers, with more and more increasing clashes.
25 Devrel, mostly consisting of people who were around a long time, was not
26 helpful. What happened eventually that the oldtimers were so much in the
27 minority that they got overruled more and more. See games team, which was
28 dissolved by the council, and see toolchain, which was basically completely
29 abandoned for a year before re-forming with new people.
30
31 We are finally reaching the point where "new" people have a significant say in
32 Gentoo, and where rules apply the same to every dev and there are not a
33 selected few exempt. Which has already improved the overall mood a lot.
34
35 How do you want to contribute to this improvement?
36
37 > I think we do need to reach out to Google, who seems to have a habit of
38 > poaching our developers, and work out some kind of arrangement of
39 > cooperation. The sum total of stuff I've received from Google has been a
40 > prototype Chromebook, a $50 prepaid VISA card, and a google blanket. No, I
41 > am not making this up. I know these items were sent to me with the
42 > intention of saying thanks, and meant as the kindest of gestures -- but
43 > certainly, there are better ways for us to support one another?
44
45 I'm seeing this critical. OK I'm probably one of the few persons here who is
46 not hoping to get recruited by Google at some point. However...
47
48 One of the side effects of Google poaching our developers was that we ended up
49 with some mystery changes in core Gentoo stuff that noone ever explained, and
50 that possibly were added to support ChromeOS. Now, there's nothing wrong with
51 being cooperative. What is wrong is smuggling stuff in under the radar.
52 Disclaimer, I can't prove any of this, but a few times I had a rather odd
53 feeling.
54
55 And please don't listen too much to wltjr. Most of us stop reading a mailing
56 list thread as soon as he is involved.
57
58 Cheers,
59 Andreas
60
61
62 --
63 Andreas K. Hüttel
64 dilfridge@g.o
65 Gentoo Linux developer
66 (council, toolchain, perl, libreoffice, comrel)

Replies

Subject Author
Re: [gentoo-project] Re: A plan for Gentoo Roy Bamford <neddyseagoon@g.o>
Re: [gentoo-project] Re: A plan for Gentoo Daniel Robbins <drobbins@××××××.org>