Meeting:Board strategic working group 2010-02-22

Roll Call

• Attendees: John Poelstra, Paul Frields, Matt Domsch, Colin Walters, Mike McGrath
• Regrets: Chris Tyler

Default Distribution Offering

• Owner: Paul Frields
• Question being answered: "On what basis do we have a default offering?"
• Original page: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/User:Pfrields/Different_default_offering
• Added page: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/User:Pfrields/Current_default_offering
• After some discussion group felt Paul should do a little more work on second page explaining:
  • why we ended up with the default we did, which combines a number of technologies into a platform:
    • GNOME Desktop Environment
    • Compiz (not actually a part of GNOME, but prominent in the UI)
    • Firefox and other third party apps
    • SELinux
    • kernel
  • Is this due to Red Hat as Fedora's main sponsor?
    • In part, because Fedora is driven by contribution, and Red Hat as a Fedora contributor drives a massive amount of free software innovation done directly in the kernel, tools, security, desktop, and elsewhere, and then quickly inherited into Fedora where it can be distributed in consumable form
    • R&D lab idea allows anyone to grow technology in Fedora
    • But other pieces of the platform are "best of breed FOSS" but not due to Red Hat or Fedora necessarily, e.g. Firefox
    • Not just about a desktop environment, but in the future need to give thought to how to design the whole system
    • We need to give thought whenever components change; and we have more room available now (> CD size)
• NEXT ACTIONS:
  • Paul will do more drafting and post back to Board

Clarifying Issues Around Spins

• Owners: Matt & Colin
• Can Spins/SIGS or Fedora remixes define their own target audience?
  • https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/User:Walters/SpinsSigsRemixes_TargetAudience
• Can Spins/SIGS or Fedora remixes change the code enough to meet their goals?
  • https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/User:Walters/SpinsSigsRemixes_ChangeDistribution
• http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/spins/2010-February/000996.html
• Summary of what Matt has tracked down so far https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/User:Mdomsch/SWG_Spins
• As part of the research for this this we tried to get a clearer picture of what the Spins SIG is responsibile for. We understand those responsibilities to be:
  • • Managing the approval process for new spins
    • spins pages
    • kickstart file is good
    • Coordinating Board trademark approval
  • Individual spin owners may not participate in the SIG, so will need to reach out to them directly.
• Spins pain points raised on this recent thread:
  • http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/advisory-board/2010-February/007975.html and following for many messages. These are additional to the questions we asked of them
• We still want to make sure that the work of the Spins SIG is not blocked
  • Fedora as a project may not be able to provide all necessary resources to every Spin
  • Spins are a way for contributors to gather connected communities of contributors, create more awareness and contribution to Fedora
  • Community building is primarily a problem of increasing people capacity, not simply working harder
    • Build infrastructure capacity, storage space, etc. -- technical blockers are critical path items
    • Enable easy processes (TM licensing/approvals, etc.) to help contributors without inducing mass chaos
      • alternately, do allow mass chaos where appropriate (Fedora Remix)
    • Make it easier for contributors to help anywhere they want -- lower barriers so that anyone can build the actual workforce in the Fedora Project
• NEXT STEPS:
  • Matt to email each of the spin owners with the original questions posed to the Spins SIG

Next Meeting

• March 1, 2010 @ 3 PM EST
• Discussion topics:
  • Follow-up to Matt and Colin's work on Spins