Fedora Board Recap 2009-12-17 UTC 1700

[William Jon McCann]

Hey Mike,

On Sat, Dec 19, 2009 at 1:21 PM, Mike McGrath <mmcgrath at redhat.com> wrote:
> On Sat, 19 Dec 2009, William Jon McCann wrote:
>
>> Hey Paul,
>>
>> On Fri, Dec 18, 2009 at 5:07 PM, Paul W. Frields <stickster at gmail.com> wrote:
>> > https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Meeting:Board_meeting_2009-12-17
>> >
>> > == Roll Call ==
>> > * '''Present:''' Paul Frields, Christopher Aillon, Josh Boyer, Dimitris Glezos, Bill Nottingham, John Poelstra, Jon McCann, Tom "spot" Callaway, Matt Domsch, Mike McGrath, Dennis Gilmore
>> >
>> > == Last meeting ==
>> >
>> > https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Meeting:Board_meeting_2009-12-10
>> >
>> > == Updates/Installs presentation ==
>> > * William Jon McCann -- https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/JonMccann
>> > * Co-presenter: Christopher Aillon
>> > ** pointed back to whiteboard link: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Desktop/Whiteboards/UpdateExperience with new added "Impact" section with information from stakeholders
>> > ** document doesn't present implementation, but records opinions garnered from current contributors and stakeholders
>> > * General Board consensus is that we do need to establish criteria for updates, and empower FESCo to enforce them
>> > * Lots of spirited discussion around various details of the proposal, with conversation that covered a lot of different issues but the Board is not ready to issue hard guidance yet
>> > ** Unclear to what extent current pending changes (NFR, AutoQA) will impact any Fedora user's update experience, or how these changes are currently incorporated in the whiteboard
>> > ** The whiteboard correctly identifies several problems but it's not clear that it completely lists root causes
>> > ACTION:
>> > # Enumerate the problems that need to be solved -- as explicitly as possible, no focus on solutions
>> > #* Suggested method, repetitive "why" to make sure we're identifying the right root causes
>> > #* On list, get owners for each problem from the Board side
>> > # Then solicit ideas for proposed solutions
>> >
>> > == Next meeting ==
>> > * Thu Jan 07 2009 - 1700 UTC/12:00pm US Eastern (public IRC)
>>
>> OK, so who is going to be responsible for following through on these actions?
>>
>> There are a few things I'd really like to get some clarification on as
>> well.  In the meeting it was claimed that focusing on the user
>> experience was a "red herring."  It was also stated that the Fedora
>> project thinks a broken rawhide is not only a necessity due to lack of
>> QA resources but also desirable because it follows from our goals of
>> being first and fast.  It was also stated that since we have a
>> community to test rawhide and give us feedback when it is broken we
>> don't have to test it beforehand.  It was also stated that we've moved
>> to a system where we no longer compose rawhide but push out new builds
>> as they arrive and that should be what people are testing.  There was
>> also some disagreement between board members about what the role of
>> the board even is.
>
> I'm not even sure where to start with the above.  Saying stuff like "It
> was also stated that the Fedora project thinks a broken rawhide..."  I'm
> not sure the Fedora Project itself has thoughts.

That was stated by a board member and no other board members seemed to
take issue with it.

>>  Some stated that they shouldn't be discussing
>> implementation details and others said they shouldn't be setting goals
>> without first determining what the implementation details are.  Huh?
>>
>
> Did you think everyone on the board has the same thoughts about
> everything?

I really hope that you don't.  :)  When you and I talked about some of
these issues at FUDCon I thought we were pretty much in agreement
about a lot of things.  In particular, hearing about your wife's
difficulties with Fedora was really interesting (and a little
embarassing).

> I think you were met with such resistance because it was such a large
> proposal and you kept saying things like "Everyone I talked to agreed with
> X or Y".  It really felt like your goal in that meeting was to try to get
> the Boards rubber stamp on that whiteboard proposal so you could take it
> to FESCo and meet any resistance from them with "The board said it was
> ok".

My goal was to have a discussion about goals and direction for the
experience of updates in Fedora.  I was invited to the meeting.  I
didn't ask to come before the group.  I had similar goals at FUDCon
and the reception the ideas got at FUDCon was markedly different from
the reaction of the board.

> The whiteboard:
>
> https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Desktop/Whiteboards/UpdateExperience
>
> is almost entirely FESCo or other team based.

Exactly, the Chairman of board doesn't seem to agree with that.  I
don't really want to talk about implementation details so I'm not sure
why I'd want to talk to FESCO.  I'd much prefer to talk about
experience design and understand more clearly what goals the board has
for the project in this area.  Sure I realize that to many people
especially engineers who prefer to just get things done these are
fairly abstract, visiony things.  But they really do matter.  I think
these are things that the board could help us with.  I'm not saying
that the board is really prepared to be designing experiences or
positioning us for growth and establishing these kind of goals on its
own.  However, I do hope that the board has a desire to work in
partnership with the folks who think it is well past time we start
taking the user experience more seriously.

> The desktop team doesn't manage QA, Marketing, documentation or the releng
> teams.  If you want QA or marketing to do those things, why not take them
> directly to those teams?  You're asking us who's going to follow up on
> those actions?  It's your proposal, I'd assume if you're serious about it
> you would follow up.

I wasn't talking about my proposal.  Paul posted action items from the
meeting.  I'm wondering who on the board is tasked with those.

Thanks,
Jon