Re: Political policymaking
Bruce:
> [Ian touches] on the difference between our two viewpoints.
>
> I am not asking for _votes_ when I want to hear from the developers.
> I am asking for _logical_argument_. Not "I like this", but "this is
> (or is not) a good idea because", followed by a list of consequences.
> We argue this way until the group comes to a consensus, or until there
> is no more logical argument forthcoming and I make a judgement based on
> the argument I have already heard.
If I'm not mistaken you're saying that you think this is the right
thing to do for all or most (important) decisions.
I don't think this is the case. I see different kinds of decision:
* Routine technical decisions should be taken by the person
responsible, who is expected to evaluate the technical arguments and
determine in their own mind what the consensus is. For a package the
responsible person is be the package maintainer - here, authority
through action applies. This is currently the case and I don't plan
to change it.
* Matters of technical policy or major design should be resolved by
consensus amongst interested developers - this is what debian-policy
is for, and I don't plan to change this.
* Technical disputes (whether between package maintainers, or between
maintainers and submitters of bugs, or about the best policy to have)
should be resolved by some team of technical experts. Currently there
is no mechanism for doing this other than (for minor issues) to have a
shouting match on debian-devel or (for major issues) to have the
leader issue a decree by fiat. This has resulted in in some recurrent
flamewars (e.g. the Pine base64 bug) and some decisions that I thought
at the time were somewhat hasty and were really taken to stop a
repetitive discussion (when IMO attempts to focus the discussion would
have been more useful).
* Major `political' decisions about what the projects' goals are, how
we structure ourselves, &c, don't have a single `right' answer.
These should be made democratically by the developers - ie, by voting.
Currently these are taken almost entirely by the project leader, who
is expected to determine in their own mind what the consensus is.
Voted decisions are not so large a part of my plans as they might
appear from the volume of discussion on various topics - for example,
practically noone has said anything about my plans for a technical
disputes committee. Thanks for giving me a hook to clarify this.
Ian.
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