Candidacy: Murray Cumming

["Murray Cumming" <murrayc murrayc com>]

Name: Murray Cumming
Email Address: murrayc murrayc com
Corporate Affiliation: None (Freelance)

Summary:

I am a freelance software developer, originally British, and settled in
Germany. I've seen enough of non-free-software to truly understand how
wonderful GNOME is, and the great differences that it can make to our
world.

I have been an active member of the release-team for the last 2 years, and
I believe I've helped to make our process clearer and more efficient. I
have also maintained GNOME's C++ bindings for the last three years. I
created the Platform Bindings release set, allowing a whole new group of
people to coordinate their efforts.

I think I've shown already that I can help to build and identify
consensus, and make progress in a diverse and free community. Working
together towards common goals takes a little organisation, and it's the
Board's job to provide that environment.

I am very pleased with the performance of the current Board. In
particular, they have overseen the organisation of the sucessful GUADECs
and Summits, without which we would have less consensus, motivation, and
fun. The problems with the administration of our systems have also been
mostly solved, with involvement from the community. The Board recognises
the amazing talent and dedication in the GNOME community, and lets it
grow. I would like to give my time to help the Board continue this work,
rather than to change it.


But for the record, I should mention two specific things that I would try
to improve:

1. Although the Board delegates the release work to the release-team, it
does not seem to properly oversee this work. There is much scope for
improvement in GNOME's successful release process, with the potential to
increase GNOME's quality yet more. I support the proposal to open up the
release-team for public involvement and clearly assign responsible persons
for each release-team task at the start of each release cycle. This
transformation is already happening, but the Board should make its wishes
clear to make sure that it happens without delay.

2. The Board has failed to properly publish a list of desired GNOME
features, also known as the "roadmap". This would have help to coordinate
the work of GNOME developers and would give the outside world some idea of
our general future direction. I see no reason for the Board to do anything
but approve a roadmap that's generated by the community, and I see no need
for this to be a perfect document. This document should be published
regulary after consultation with the maintainers, near the start of every
release cycle, by a member of the community if the Board can't do it. In
general, the board should only take on tasks that would not otherwise be
done by the community.

Murray Cumming
murrayc murrayc com
www.murrayc.com
www.openismus.com