GNOME as the default desktop (was Re: Fedora Board Meeting Minutes - 2010-12-06)

[Christoph Wickert]

Hi Jared,

thanks a lot for speaking up. I agree to most things you wrote, but I
feel I need to clarify some.

Am Mittwoch, den 15.12.2010, 19:40 -0500 schrieb Jared K. Smith:

> What I can say is that for better or for worse, Gnome
> is still the default desktop environment in Fedora.  

I am not questioning GNOME as the default desktop. I do thing we need a
default and I do think it should be GNOME. However I'm questioning the
implementation and the consequences of this decision.

> Are there ways we
> can improve?  Absolutely!  Have there been mistakes and hurt feelings
> in the past.  Sure!

It's not about hurt feelings or such. I know there are people frustrated
out there and from time to time I am too. But frustration is not my
motivation. My intention is to move forward.

> The only way I see us moving forward, however, is
> to work together and communicate and cooperate rather than keep
> bringing up mistakes and misunderstandings from the past.
> 
> My job as the Fedora Project Leader is to ensure that the Fedora
> community is a welcoming environment.  Maybe it's the eternal optimist
> in me, but I would hope that we could find a way to move past the
> complaining and blaming and the rampant accusations and find
> constructive ways to communicate better and then *work* towards a
> better tomorrow.

This is the part I disagree. We must work together, sure. We must
communicate, that's what I demand all the time and what is happening
right now.

But it must be possible to speak about problems or mistakes openly. This
has nothing to do with complainants, accusations or even personal
attacks as some claim. If we want to improve, we need to analyze what
went wrong in the past. We need to learn our lesson from history in
order to not repeat the same mistakes again.

Regards,
Christoph