Board efforts: scope, concept, and permission?

[Toshio Kuratomi]

On Tue, Feb 02, 2010 at 06:33:52PM -0600, Mike McGrath wrote:
> On Tue, 2 Feb 2010, Toshio Kuratomi wrote:
> 
> > On Tue, Feb 02, 2010 at 04:42:28PM -0600, Mike McGrath wrote:
> > >
> > > This is an excellent example.  Ford has several audiences and several
> > > products.  Now, imagine a world where Ford is forced to only produce one
> > > product.  That's the world we're in right now.  Lots of different people,
> > > lots of different needs yet we pretend we can produce something for all of
> > > them.
> > >
> > Bullshit.  Each of the SIGs is producing different products.  They pull from
> > the same resources but they produce different things.  Just look at the
> > KDE SIG's spin vs the desktop spin vs the Electronics Lab Spin vs the Games
> > spin.
> >
> 
> Then no one is actually using our products.  People don't use spins after
> they install them.  After install they're all pointed at the same thing.
> I'm a KDE user but I'm not using a KDE spin right now.
> 
I disagree.  Even though you all point at the same package set, you do not have
the same product installed.


> > * A user who downloads any one of these products gets a different experience
> >   than someone who downloads one of the others.
> > * Switching from one product to another is not an easy task of merely
> >   installing one package group and removing another.  You have to know what
> >   packages to install and what packages to uninstall and sometimes you also
> >   need to know what configuration switches to hit.
> 
> spins don't help this situation.
> 
They do.  I tried to switch from the Desktop spin to the KDE spin in F10 and
ended up without a usable desktop environment.  Reinstalled from the KDE
spin and it worked.  So "how do you get KDE on your computer?"  "Install
the Fedora KDE spin."  Easy answer.

> > * Each of these products has a different target audience and a different
> >   use.
> 
> Citation needed.  Both on what their target audience is *and* if they're
> succeeding.
> 
Don't know if they're succeeding and didn't claim that they were or weren't.
OTOH, target audience is a bit of a fudge -- The desktop and KDE spins seem
to be aiming at similar audiences.

"Fedora remains the sole linux distribution distributing FEL methodologies
for hardware design, simulation and verification. Thereby users tend to have
the one-stop linux distribution for advanced electronic design. "
  https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/ElectronicLab_Spin

OTOH, I wasn't able to find anything written for either the KDE or desktop SIGs
that can be construed as a statement of target audience so even if they
appear to be aiming at the same targets, we don't know for sure.  This
appears to be a definite lack that would help marketing and other people
trying to work at the product level instead of the project level.  So, why
doesn't the Board ask that a statement of target audience be added to the
checklist of things that each spin produces?

> > * The major packages that each of these products is showcasing up front is
> >   different as well.  Even if a minivan and a pickup truck have the same
> >  engine, drivetrain, and transmission under the hood they're still
> >   different products.
> >
> 
> A pickup truck with a minivan engine sucks bad.  Real bad.  That's why
> they don't make them.
> 
Are you drawing the conclusion here that it's time for us to split the
package collection so each SIG can work from their own packageset or are you
just nit picking an irrelevant point in mine?

> The above bullets say to me more then ever the spins are harming Fedora
> and not helping it.  They're a place for us to focus, spend time, QA,
> hosting, etc, and at the end of the day gain absolutely nothing.  Let the
> KDE sig focus on the KDE related packages and experience and not some
> crappy spin that no one who is reading this email right now is actually
> using.

Well, you're gaining nothing from them but other people are.

-Toshio
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