Re: I guess I missed the whole point

[Maciej Stachowiak <mjs noisehavoc org>]

On 16Jun2001 10:25AM (+0000), Mathieu Lacage wrote:
> hi all,
> 
> I have gotten sick of the cross-posting: it was just too painfull. I
> really think this thread belongs to g-h, so moving it there.
> 
> Disclaimers:
> 	- I don't fucking belong to any company. I don't hate everyone.

I'm currently unemployed so I too am disqualified from corporate
conspiracies.

> 	- I have not read my mail regularly in the past 5 months.
> 
> However, I would like to point out two things which maybe got out of the
> picture in needless technical discussions:
> 	- there was no dicussion to change gnome-libs to use gconf (there were
> technical discussions where people were obviously not listening at each
> other and exchanging not very constructive criticism. The whole idea of
> bonobo-conf has been around for more than  year now and every time it
> comes around, it is for even more flaming than bonobo.)
> 	- we want to ship Gnome 2 in a very short schedule
> 
> The first point's goal is simply to stress that martin should not have
> done what he did: this is not acceptable. There is no single person
> deciding on the future of gnome-libs. 

I agree. I think Havoc should revert Martin's changes that replace the
usage of GConf in gnome-libs with bonobo-config. It would be better
still if Martin reverted it, but it sounds like he doesn't want to.

Havoc, I don't think you should let people fuck things up just because
you are polite and reasonable and like to discuss things and come to
agreement beore acting, and certain other people don't.

The plan we all agreed on or GNOME 2.0 was to use GConf, not
bonobo-config. Changing the planned architecture in this major way
without discussion is simply not acceptable.

It's sad that our decision-making process for major project-wide
architectural decisions consists of "whoever manages to commit to
gnome-libs last". Fortunately, we do have a final arbiter of these
things - the GNOME Foundation Board of Directors. Still, I really hope
the board will not have to get involved in technical decisions like
this - because that means the process has already failed.


But the saddest part of this situation is that it is part of a
recurring pattern on the part of some GNOME hackers (and this seems
particularly common among Ximian employees) of a total lack of respect
for the work of others - declaring it deprecated, rewriting it, taking
random digs at the code and the author, etc. Guys, do you really want
to drive everyone away from the GNOME project who is not part of the
club? Is that really the best thing for the project?

 - Maciej