Community / distributors and release specs [Was: Queries about release specifications]

[Jeff Waugh <jdub perkypants org>]

<quote who="Michael Meeks">

> 	a) Release team says what goes, in private
> or
> 	b) The GEP process is used [ and incidentally we do some code 
> 				     review at the same time ].
> 
> 	You tell me which one of these processes has an (un)'elected' committee
> ;-)

    c) Non-bureaucratic discussion on desktop-devel-list and casual
    concensus.

> 	Ultimately it seems to me we're arguing semantics - the badge 'In the
> Gnome Core' is not to be haphazardly applied to things. That is the crux
> - and I believe that sound technical review by eclectic authors, in
> public, using the GEP is the only way to achieve that.


Option (c) above is the traditional method, and one I think works well, at
least (and the 'at least' is critical here) at the desktop level. For the
developer platform it's clearly a whole new level of commitment and
expectations, so the GEP process is appropriate.

In the end, what we ship in the community Desktop release may not matter one
iota to distributors, and I'd hate to see the GNOME community have a similar
response to distributor decisions as KDE has had towards Red Hat (null). If
we formalise the community process, it puts new expectations on
distributors.

Critical question: Are we (GNOME) shipping a finished product, or are we
shipping tarballs? What do distributors want from this process?

(Sorry to bring this discussion to the distributor level, but I think it's
important that we work out our position here...)

- Jeff

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