[Gluster-devel] Maintainers 2.0 Proposal

Sat Mar 18 11:17:51 UTC 2017

On Sat, Mar 18, 2017 at 1:20 AM, Amar Tumballi <atumball at redhat.com> wrote:

> I don't want to take the discussions in another direction, but want
> clarity on few things:
>
> 1. Does maintainers means they are only reviewing/ merging patches?
> 2. Should maintainers be responsible for answering ML / IRC questions
> (well, they should focus more on documentation IMO).
> 3. Who's responsibility is it to keep the gluster.org webpage? I
> personally feel the responsibility should be well defined.
> 4. Can a component have more than 1 owner ? 1 maintainers etc?
>

More than 1 maintainer is the best case we should aim for. I see EC benefit
tremendously because of this. Work keeps moving because at least one of
Xavi/I are available for discussions.

>
> Some of these questions should be clearly answered in document IMO.
>
> Regards,
> Amar
>
>
> On Fri, Mar 17, 2017 at 11:55 PM, Amye Scavarda <amye at redhat.com> wrote:
>
>> Posting in line, but it may be pretty hard to follow.
>> Apologies if I miss something.
>>
>> On Fri, Mar 17, 2017 at 11:06 AM, Niels de Vos <ndevos at redhat.com> wrote:
>>
>>> On Wed, Mar 15, 2017 at 10:12:18PM -0400, Vijay Bellur wrote:
>>> > Hi All,
>>> >
>>> > We have been working on a proposal [1] to make the lifecycle
>>> management of
>>> > Gluster maintainers more structured. We intend to make the proposal
>>> > effective around 3.11 (May 2016).
>>> >
>>> > Please review the proposal and let us know your feedback. If you need
>>> > clarity on any existing aspect or feel the need for something
>>> additional in
>>> > the proposal, please feel free to let us know.
>>>
>>> I'll just include the proposal here and add inline comments. I'm not
>>> sure if this is the best way, or if you would like anyone edit the
>>> document directly...
>>>
>>> > Thanks!
>>> > Amye & Vijay
>>> >
>>> > [1]  https://hackmd.io/s/SkwiZd4qe
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> > # Revised Maintainers for 3.11
>>> >
>>> > AI from Community Meeting, March 1:
>>> > amye to work on revised maintainers draft with vbellur to get out for
>>> > next maintainer's meeting. We'll approve it 'formally' there, see how
>>> it
>>> > works for 3.11.
>>>
>>> The next maintainers meeting happens when many maintainers are at VAULT.
>>> I would not expect a large attendance at that time. Also, Amye sent an
>>> email with a different target date?
>>>
>>
>> Feedback target date of 30 days, that's what I was indicating. This was
>> reviewed in the maintainers' meeting on March 8 and we're now expanding out
>> to the larger group.
>>
>>>
>>> > ## Goals:
>>> > * Refine how we declare component owners in Gluster
>>> > * Create a deeper sense of ownership throughout the open source project
>>> > * Welcome more contibutors at a project impacting level
>>>
>>> It would be good to make a distinction between the Gluster Community and
>>> the GlusterFS Project. "Gluster" refers in my understanding to all the
>>> projects of the Gluster Community. This document looks most aimed at the
>>> GlusterFS project, with some Gluster Community references.
>>
>>
>>
>> Is this distinction relevant? We're talking about how we define a
>> maintainer for contributing to the Gluster community overall. As I work
>> through this, I see your confusion. I don't think that we'd be able to make
>> this call for 'all related projects', but for committing back into Gluster
>> proper, yes.
>>
>>
>>>
>> > ## Definition of Owners + Peers
>>> > * Commit access to the project is not dependent on being a maintainer.
>>> A
>>> >   maintainer is a leadership role within the project to help drive the
>>> >   project forward.
>>>
>>> "the project", is that the glusterfs git repository, or any repository
>>> that we maintain? How would we see this for projects that contain
>>> Gluster modules like NFS-Ganesha and Samba? Or are those not considered
>>> as "our" components?
>>
>>
>> I think initially, we'd want to limit this to just the Gluster project.
>> Too much expansion and we'll have too much change too quickly.
>>
>>
>>>
>> > * Owner - Subject matter expert, help design large feature changes and
>>> >   decide overall goal of the component. Reviews patches, approves
>>> >   changes. Responsible for recruiting assisting peers. Owner of
>>> >   component. (Principle Software Engineer - unconnected to actual role
>>> >   in Red Hat organization)
>>>
>>> I would say a "subject matter expert" can give a +2 code-review in
>>> Gerrit, and the "owner" of the component would honour that opinion. I
>>> fail to see what "Principle Software Engineer" has to do with this if it
>>> is not connected to a role at Red Hat (hmm, I need to talk to my boss?).
>>>
>>>
>> I've gotten feedback that we should revisit the 'Principal' vs 'Senior'
>> framing - apologies. It was not the intention to make it Red Hat centric in
>> this way, but it was shorthand for responsibility areas. I'm happy to
>> revisit.
>>
>>
>>> > * Peer - assists with design, reviews. Growing into subject matter
>>> >   expert, but not required to be engaged in the overall design of the
>>> >   component. Able to work largely without day-to-day supervision.
>>> >   (Senior Software Engineer -  unconnected to actual role in Red Hat
>>> >   organization)
>>>
>>> A "peer" would do code-review +1 on the proposed design and/or change.
>>> That means it still needs a "subject matter expert" to really approve
>>> the change. Hopefully all the straight forward points have been checked
>>> by peers for changes (coding style, basic error checking and resource
>>> allocation/freeing, test-case, ...).
>>>
>>> Correct. This person could also be your backup for making sure the
>> feature moves forward!
>>
>>
>>> > ## Additional changes:
>>> > * Carving out new components needs Project Lead + Community lead
>>> >   approval  - we can expand this as needed.
>>>
>>> Yes, please expand. Are new projects (like the recent gluster-block) new
>>> components? Who is/are Project Lead and Community Lead, are these the
>>> same people for all projects in the Gluster Community?
>>>
>>
>> Expand meaning - as we adopt this for Gluster project. Not including 'all
>> the various connected projects'. Too far for this particular rollout.
>>
>>>
>>> > * Project Lead and Community Lead should watch out for people owning
>>> >   lots of components with no peers. This may lead to burn out. Identify
>>> >   these owners and assist them in getting new peers.
>>>
>>> This means that for the GlusterFS project the MAINTAINERS file needs to
>>> be maintained very well. How do you plan to keep track of all the other
>>> related projects?
>>
>>
>> The maintainers file does need to be regularly reviewed and updated.
>> Think of it like the 'phone tree' for the project.
>>
>>> > * Owners can pick peers for their components with just an announcement.
>>>
>>> I do not think "peers" should need approval. Is not everyone allowed to
>>> review designs and patches? Sending an announcement for new contributors
>>> that just reviewed their first patch does not sound scalable. New
>>> "peers" can review proposals for any component. I must be missing
>>> something here, a better explanation would be most welcome.
>>>
>>> We'll need to know who we'd go to for a backup. A peer would be someone
>> you'd trust to be able to maintain a feature in your absence. Better
>> clarification?
>>
>> > ## Transition
>>> > * Current maintainers get to choose between ownership/peer of
>>> components
>>> >   they're listed as owners.
>>>
>>> Well, yes, hopefully everyone being an "owner" or "peer" does so
>>> voluntary. Obviously certain companies have an interest in getting their
>>> employees to volunteer to do the work (and hopefully the tasks are part
>>> of their official job).
>>
>>
>>> > * Have people focus on maximum of two components as an owner. If they
>>> >   have more, they should be strongly suggested to invite new people as
>>> >   peers to be trained as future owners. If current owners consider
>>> >   somebody as being ready to take over as owner of a component that
>>> they
>>> >   are managing, please announce new owners with appropriate
>>> >   justification on maintainers ML.
>>>
>>> Why two components? The majority of people listed in the glusterfs
>>> MAINTAINERS file already have more. And that is only for the glusterfs
>>> project, many will  have additional projects they are responsible for.
>>>
>>> We started with two to see how many people will be affected by this -
>> just limiting to Gluster.
>>
>>
>>> > * It's okay to drop a component if they are not able to find
>>> >   time/energy. Owners are requested to minimize disruption to the
>>> >   project by helping with transitions and announcing their intentions.
>>>
>>> Yes, of course :)
>>>
>>> > * Project Lead and Community Lead are responsible for maintaining the
>>> >   health of the community. This includes balancing work for component
>>> >   owners or choosing which components aren't included in the cycle in a
>>> >   way that minimizes disruption to the project.
>>>
>>> What "cycle" is meant here?
>>>
>>
>> Release cycle.
>>
>>
>>>
>>> > References:
>>> > https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/about/governance/policies/modu
>>> le-ownership/
>>> > https://www.drupal.org/dcoc
>>>
>>> Maybe also see how QEMU and the Linux kernel handle this? I'm definitely
>>> more familiar with those projects than Mozilla or Drupal.
>>
>>
>> Want to add in more detail from those? These were the initial references
>> from where I'd started, happy to see if there are features from other
>> communities.
>>
>>>
>>>
>> Thanks!
>>> Niels
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Amye Scavarda | amye at redhat.com | Gluster Community Lead
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Gluster-devel mailing list
>> Gluster-devel at gluster.org
>> http://lists.gluster.org/mailman/listinfo/gluster-devel
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Amar Tumballi (amarts)
>
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>

-- 
Pranith
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