Re: [gentoo-project] Re: Trying to become a Gentoo Developer again spanning 8 years...

[Daniel Campbell]

(Targeting one specific comment here)

On 10/03/2016 11:04 AM, Rich Freeman wrote:
> [snip]
> Ultimately if you want to rejoin Gentoo you're going to have to
> convince either Comrel or the Council that you're not going to create
> trouble.
> [snip]

Are you speaking for William's specific situation, or in general? I
never (knowingly) spoke with any member of Comrel in order to qualify
for developer status (my mentors were pchrist and heroxbd, my recruiters
were jlec and zlogene). Granted, I came up mostly through proxy-maint
and haven't gone out of my way to stir the pot, but it seems to me that
William may have a point and it might be worth investigating Comrel's
role in Gentoo and whether or not it's a net positive for the project.
Do we have a transparent mission for Comrel? Is there a way to measure
their impact and progress? The wiki [1] has a few pages, but they appear
to be "ported over" from the old website. There are still mentions of
CVS, even, so it's clear they haven't been touched too much. It appears
ComRel is not related to the acceptance of a developer at all; instead
it's left up to Recruiters whether a new developer is satisfactory[2]:

(paragraph "Jumping the gap", fetched 2016-10-06)
> After your mentor and the Gentoo Recruiters have reviewed your quiz
> and deemed it to be of a suitable standard, you should send it along
> with a public SSH2 DSA key (e.g. id_dsa.pub) to the Gentoo
> Recruiters. If the Recruiters consider your quiz to be of a
> satisfactory standard, they will set you up with the services that
> you require.
>
> After this time, you enter a "probationary period" of 30 days during
> which your mentor is responsible for your actions, providing
> accountability - also, Gentoo Recruiters may reject new developers
> during this time if they feel it is appropriate.

Additionally, it appears that rejoining devs are merely treated like new
devs. Or at least, *should* be[3]:

> If the developer later returns, the same initial recruitment bug is
> used to track it. Returning developers are subject to the same
> criteria as a first-time developer and must go through the same steps
> to rejoin Gentoo.

Given the above, I have to question the validity of Comrel's involvement
and ask why things that (allegedly?) happened eight years ago are still
relevant. As a case study, who else has had to appeal Comrel or the
Council to rejoin Gentoo?

I think organizationally that each project deserves equal scrutiny into
its workings and whether or not they are improving Gentoo as a whole.
That includes Comrel and arguably *any* project within Gentoo, imo.

I'm only writing this because, for better or worse, the community side
of Gentoo's been put in the spotlight lately and if there are any
problems I hope that we can deal with them in constructive, adult ways.
If that means improving and clarifying the language in our policies --
hopefully simplifying and making them more concrete -- then I'm in favor
of looking more into this.

As usual, this is just my two cents, offered only because I hope I would
not be treated this way if I were to come back to Gentoo after leaving.
(That said, I have no current plans of leaving Gentoo. It's just
something to think about.) Thanks for reading.

~zlg

[1]:
https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Project:ComRel/Developer_Handbook/Etiquette_policy
[2]:
https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Project:ComRel/Developer_Handbook/Becoming_a_developer
[3]:
https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Project:Recruiters#What_does_the_recruitment_process_involve.3F
-- 
Daniel Campbell - Gentoo Developer
OpenPGP Key: 0x1EA055D6 @ hkp://keys.gnupg.net
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