1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,000 Thank you for coming and waking up early for this BoF. 2 00:00:05,000 --> 00:00:08,640 Someone yesterday evening came to me and told me, 3 00:00:08,640 --> 00:00:14,830 "Oh, I have something... I would really like to come to the BoF. Actually, I have only one thing to say to you, 4 00:00:14,830 --> 00:00:18,710 so if I say it now, I can sleep." 5 00:00:18,710 --> 00:00:18,760 He is not here today. I will protect his identity. so if I say it now, I can sleep." 6 00:00:18,760 --> 00:00:24,310 He is not here today. I will protect his identity. 7 00:00:24,310 --> 00:00:29,710 Originally, when Zack started the DPL Helpers initiative, 8 00:00:29,710 --> 00:00:34,660 I think there were three big axes of motivation for that. 9 00:00:34,660 --> 00:00:37,480 The first one was to share the DPL workload, 10 00:00:37,480 --> 00:00:41,360 so that there's less work to do for the DPL, 11 00:00:41,360 --> 00:00:47,970 more tasks that usually fall into the DPL domain get done, 12 00:00:47,970 --> 00:00:54,470 more than just the ones that really must be done in any case. 13 00:00:54,470 --> 00:01:01,360 Also, there was the idea of giving prospective DPL candidates an idea of the DPL workload, 14 00:01:01,360 --> 00:01:04,740 and test themselves on the process. 15 00:01:04,740 --> 00:01:11,370 [to Zack] Does that reflect what you... [affirmative response] 16 00:01:11,370 --> 00:01:18,400 [Zack] Totally. It was also to be more transparent about what the DPL does, and actually show what's going on, 17 00:01:18,400 --> 00:01:26,760 It's possibly a sub-point of the second one, but yes. 18 00:01:26,760 --> 00:01:32,780 [Lucas] Yeah, but then it won't fit anymore, though I try. 19 00:01:32,780 --> 00:01:38,610 (...?!) 20 00:01:38,680 --> 00:01:48,270 I've tried to go through my current to-do list and pick out items that could be done by someone else. 21 00:01:48,270 --> 00:01:51,510 For some of them it's really easy for someone else to do them, 22 00:01:51,510 --> 00:01:57,670 for some of them it's much harder to see "Oh, someone else could do it", but, well, let's see... 23 00:01:57,670 --> 00:02:02,830 I'm just going to go through them quite quickly, just so that you know what's even behind the descriptions. 24 00:02:02,830 --> 00:02:13,020 So, the first one is about, basically, the infamous library required to play encrypted DVD. 25 00:02:13,020 --> 00:02:17,270 We have legal advice how to package it in Debian. 26 00:02:17,270 --> 00:02:24,010 The package is ready; it needs to be reviewed by FTPmaster, then SFLC, so that it can get into Debian. 27 00:02:24,010 --> 00:02:31,430 It's currently blocked in that state for the last three months, so needs some poking. 28 00:02:31,430 --> 00:02:37,700 The second one is that we have this great new NM website, developed mainly by Enrico. 29 00:02:37,700 --> 00:02:42,030 We have the DM workflow, which is completely separate. 30 00:02:42,030 --> 00:02:51,250 It would make sense to try to fit the DM workflow inside the NM website, see how we can do that. 31 00:02:51,250 --> 00:02:58,820 Then, there are several things that are related to delegation. 32 00:02:58,820 --> 00:03:01,410 The release team is not delegated currently. 33 00:03:01,410 --> 00:03:05,880 It would make sense to have it delegated so that its powers are more explicitly stated. 34 00:03:05,880 --> 00:03:14,820 For example, when they decide to remove packages from testing, or to... 35 00:03:14,820 --> 00:03:19,930 That's the kind of thing that can be quite controversial inside a project. 36 00:03:19,930 --> 00:03:23,460 It would be nice to have a way to say "Yes, they can do that." 37 00:03:23,460 --> 00:03:29,990 Same for the trademark team: we have a brand-new trademark team. 38 00:03:29,990 --> 00:03:35,430 I need to prepare... well, someone needs to prepare a draft of the delegation. 39 00:03:35,430 --> 00:03:40,330 We have some ideas written down, but they still need to be consolidated. 40 00:03:40,330 --> 00:03:54,850 d-i is quite... There is not really active development around d-i, so 41 00:03:54,850 --> 00:04:00,320 a call for help should be prepared and posted to appropriate mailing lists. 42 00:04:00,320 --> 00:04:03,030 We can try to recruit a volunteer for it. 43 00:04:03,030 --> 00:04:11,960 We just need to write a job description, and work on that with KiBi, who is currently the most active person on d-i. 44 00:04:11,960 --> 00:04:24,610 The Debian-Events team is... I was told the Debian-Events team is kind of MIA, so we just need to ping it, see what's the problem, see what could be done, etc. 45 00:04:24,610 --> 00:04:28,610 The Press team delegation needs an update. 46 00:04:28,610 --> 00:04:39,920 Someone stepped down. There's someone who could be convinced to increase the activity, maybe... It's not clear. 47 00:04:39,920 --> 00:04:47,060 Related to the Code of Conduct discussion, there is the question whether listmasters should be delegated. 48 00:04:47,060 --> 00:04:55,270 If they make the decision to ban someone from the list, and are not delegated, that's a bit strange. 49 00:04:55,270 --> 00:05:02,660 Maybe it's not necessary, but we need to think about it. 50 00:05:02,660 --> 00:05:07,450 Then, there is a big set of items that are about easing contributions. 51 00:05:07,450 --> 00:05:12,490 I think this is something that is very important for the project. 52 00:05:12,490 --> 00:05:21,970 Most of them are quite... 53 00:05:21,970 --> 00:05:40,240 Voilà. Do you have questions on some of them? I think the label is more explicit than for the first set. 54 00:05:40,240 --> 00:05:44,140 Some of them are really packaging-related. 55 00:05:44,140 --> 00:05:49,550 Since I originally wrote a packaging tutorial, I have some items that are related to that, 56 00:05:49,550 --> 00:06:00,550 but that's clearly something that could be... The DPL doesn't need to maintain the documentation. 57 00:06:00,550 --> 00:06:03,920 And then, various items: 58 00:06:03,920 --> 00:06:07,480 I did some usage statistics about testing. 59 00:06:07,480 --> 00:06:12,100 With ftp.de logs it would be interesting to confirm those results. 60 00:06:12,100 --> 00:06:20,010 With other logs... There's Amazon Cloudfront, which is used as part of http.debian.net, 61 00:06:20,010 --> 00:06:26,980 and also ftp.mx, to provide the logs for that. 62 00:06:26,980 --> 00:06:34,980 I have to... The DPL has to write, or someone has to write for the DPL, a paragraph for the DebConf final report. 63 00:06:34,980 --> 00:06:41,040 I think it's more than one paragraph, actually. I haven't looked at it yet. 64 00:06:41,040 --> 00:06:53,980 DSA tends to require a lot of small expenses, such as buying cables or shifting servers around. 65 00:06:53,980 --> 00:07:00,630 It's a bit stupid that each time they do that and ask for 100 Euros, they need to go through DPL approval. 66 00:07:00,630 --> 00:07:12,970 They wondered if we couldn't have something like, they are allowed to make expenses of no more than 200 Euros every seven days, 67 00:07:12,970 --> 00:07:19,300 so that they don't need to stop when they start working on something, to ask for DPL approval. 68 00:07:19,300 --> 00:07:24,300 Of course, notify DPL and auditors that this is happening, 69 00:07:24,300 --> 00:07:31,600 In the worst case, that means they spend 200 Euros on something we don't really want, 70 00:07:31,600 --> 00:07:35,160 but we can afford that. 71 00:07:35,160 --> 00:07:40,930 This needs to be raised on -project, 72 00:07:40,930 --> 00:07:44,910 so that we can have a project-wide discussion about it. 73 00:07:44,910 --> 00:07:51,320 And then, some mediation. Well, one mediation specifically: 74 00:07:51,320 --> 00:08:00,080 In the lxc package there is a debian template that is quite different from what upstream provide, 75 00:08:00,080 --> 00:08:04,000 and apparently many users are quite unhappy about that, 76 00:08:04,000 --> 00:08:06,380 and prefer to use the Ubuntu package. 77 00:08:06,380 --> 00:08:12,610 Also, that template was broken in Wheezy, which is a shame. 78 00:08:12,610 --> 00:08:16,690 Someone needs to talk to the lxc maintainer about that, and see what can be done. 79 00:08:27,890 --> 00:08:33,040 So, really I think that those tasks are quite different in nature, 80 00:08:33,040 --> 00:08:36,680 and not all of them could be addressed the same way. 81 00:08:36,680 --> 00:08:36,760 For example, for some of them, the role of the other person would be to write the draft, provide the draft to the DPL, and not all of them could be addressed the same way. 82 00:08:36,760 --> 00:08:48,680 For example, for some of them, the role of the other person would be to write the draft, provide the draft to the DPL, 83 00:08:48,680 --> 00:08:51,490 modify it and send it to d-d-a, for example, 84 00:08:51,490 --> 00:08:58,270 (...?) 85 00:08:58,270 --> 00:09:01,470 That would be quite broken. 86 00:09:01,470 --> 00:09:11,350 For some of them it's about doing all the actual work, actually write and submit a patch, or maintain a packaging tutorial. 87 00:09:11,350 --> 00:09:18,300 Doesn't need to be done by the DPL; there's no special authority required to do that. 88 00:09:18,300 --> 00:09:31,090 For some of them it's more like coming up with a summary of options while looking into an issue, and recommending something to the DPL. 89 00:09:31,090 --> 00:09:36,460 And for some of them it's more about looking into an issue and providing detailed feedback on an idea. 90 00:09:36,460 --> 00:09:40,960 The last two are quite similar, actually. 91 00:09:40,960 --> 00:09:51,050 There are more people in the room than the sum of people who ever attended the DPL helpers BoF. The obvious question is: 92 00:09:51,050 --> 00:09:56,710 What are your reasons for not taking a DPL helper task yet? 93 00:09:56,710 --> 00:10:02,260 Then, how can I help you pick one? 94 00:10:11,810 --> 00:10:17,610 maybe we should think about reducing our expectations of what the DPL does. 95 00:10:17,610 --> 00:10:17,640 That's also something that we... 96 00:10:17,640 --> 00:10:19,640 If the answer to the first two questions is, "It's not possible; I would never do that", That's also something that we... 97 00:10:19,640 --> 00:10:20,090 That's also something that we... 98 00:10:20,090 --> 00:10:20,200 It might be a good thing to allow people with more diverse personal... work... That's also something that we... 99 00:10:20,200 --> 00:10:33,500 It might be a good thing to allow people with more diverse personal... work... 100 00:10:33,500 --> 00:10:37,060 ...day job and stuff like that, to apply for DPL, because... 101 00:10:37,060 --> 00:10:51,080 we have kind of a shortage of people in French academia to run for DPL, so... 102 00:10:51,080 --> 00:10:59,290 Maybe one question related to that: maybe the DPL should just try harder to offload work to the relevant teams. 103 00:10:59,290 --> 00:11:04,660 The problem is that the relevant teams are usually teams that are already quite busy with lots of other things, 104 00:11:04,660 --> 00:11:10,210 so it's not really... it's just moving the problem to the next step. 105 00:11:10,210 --> 00:11:21,890 So, maybe start with that, who wants to comment about that. 106 00:11:27,220 --> 00:11:32,080 [Wookey] I guess I'm fairly typical in that I may be interested in helping, 107 00:11:32,080 --> 00:11:33,810 but I have 46 other things to do, 108 00:11:33,810 --> 00:11:36,370 I don't really need to do any DPL tasks, 109 00:11:36,370 --> 00:11:39,330 I'd like to help, but mostly I'm too busy 110 00:11:39,330 --> 00:11:41,270 with all the other things I was supposed to be doing already, 111 00:11:41,270 --> 00:11:44,050 not even necessarily just for Debian. 112 00:11:44,050 --> 00:11:48,010 I guess that applies to quite a lot of people. 113 00:11:48,010 --> 00:11:51,580 I don't really have any answers, I'm just saying that's why I haven't done anything yet. 114 00:11:51,580 --> 00:11:53,740 So I'd kind of turn up and listen and see what's going on. 115 00:11:53,740 --> 00:11:57,380 I've taken more of an interest in this than I used to, for the last seven years, you know. 116 00:11:57,380 --> 00:12:02,100 I have actually come to this, I've been to at least one IRC meeting, 117 00:12:02,100 --> 00:12:07,320 so, you know, I'm approaching actually doing something, maybe. 118 00:12:19,900 --> 00:12:26,780 [Marga] For some of the tasks, I don't see why they are listed as DPL tasks, 119 00:12:26,780 --> 00:12:33,050 like the packaging tutorial thing or the ITP template. 120 00:12:33,050 --> 00:12:38,630 [Lucas] For many DPL tasks, there is no strong reason for the DPL to make them, 121 00:12:38,630 --> 00:12:43,790 but if the DPL doesn't do them, usually it doesn't happen. 122 00:12:43,790 --> 00:12:45,700 It might be that they are not important enough, 123 00:12:45,700 --> 00:12:52,970 but I think that most of the people in the project agree that we have a problem attracting new contributors and that we could do better. 124 00:12:52,970 --> 00:13:01,480 [Marga] I'm not saying that those are not tasks that should be addressed, I just don't see why they are DPL tasks. 125 00:13:01,480 --> 00:13:06,880 Maybe they are just things that we should do, but anybody can do them. 126 00:13:06,880 --> 00:13:15,840 [Lucas] The point of having them there... 127 00:13:17,310 --> 00:13:22,950 They are there because they are basically things that I would like to keep an eye on, and make sure that things progress. 128 00:13:25,310 --> 00:13:34,920 Clearly, in terms of priority, what's there about teams... 129 00:13:34,920 --> 00:13:43,940 I'm going to try to do that before working on the HTML version of the packaging tutorial. 130 00:13:56,970 --> 00:14:02,420 [RichiH] I do actually help with the trademarks, but from this perspective, 131 00:14:02,420 --> 00:14:10,190 if you had asked, "Hey, I need someone to do DPL work", that's a big and scary thing. 132 00:14:10,190 --> 00:14:13,790 But you asked, "Is there someone to help with trademark?", 133 00:14:13,790 --> 00:14:16,470 and that's a clearly defined sub-problem, 134 00:14:16,470 --> 00:14:19,570 and I thought, "Yes, I am able to do this." 135 00:14:19,570 --> 00:14:27,980 Maybe a little bit in the same direction: DPL helper talks are big and scary, 136 00:14:27,980 --> 00:14:37,040 and clearly-defined problems of domain X are not as scary, if you are somewhat familiar or happy with that particular problem domain. 137 00:14:37,040 --> 00:14:42,500 Maybe that's one of the approaches to better define the problems, 138 00:14:42,500 --> 00:14:46,330 and simply put out that these are the things which are currently open, 139 00:14:46,330 --> 00:14:51,880 and they may not even be DPL helper tasks, they may just be Debian tasks, 140 00:14:51,880 --> 00:14:51,920 which no-one actually does at the moment, because if I understood you correctly, and they may not even be DPL helper tasks, they may just be Debian tasks, 141 00:14:51,920 --> 00:14:57,700 which no-one actually does at the moment, because if I understood you correctly, 142 00:14:57,700 --> 00:15:06,480 you more or less said it needs to be done, so you just pulled the task to you because somebody has to do it. 143 00:15:06,480 --> 00:15:14,340 I've tried to describe tasks (not really there because I want to keep it short, but...) 144 00:15:14,390 --> 00:15:21,640 in a quite actionable way so that people understand that what they would be supposed to do if they agreed to do something. 145 00:15:21,640 --> 00:15:32,320 One problem with that, though is that, from my point of view this takes a lot of time, everything teams-related, 146 00:15:32,320 --> 00:15:39,580 and actually, this is not the most fun thing to do. 147 00:15:39,580 --> 00:15:49,880 Doing a mix of this is more interesting from my perspective than finding people to do all of that and then getting stuck with it myself. 148 00:15:49,880 --> 00:16:01,990 Those are probably harder to split into... a quite large amount of work that could be transferred. 149 00:16:01,990 --> 00:16:05,270 Individually it's quite easy, but then 150 00:16:05,270 --> 00:16:15,260 sending a call for help on d-d-a for that, and waiting for people to volunteer, 151 00:16:15,260 --> 00:16:34,300 Sending a call for help for someone responsible for preparing delegations for the next six months, that's a bit strange was well. That might not work - I'm not sure I would get volunteers for that. 152 00:16:34,300 --> 00:16:45,350 [Zack] I think an important point here is that on the one hand, the role of the DPL is something people look up to. It's a cool thing you do, you're representing the Debian project, and so on, and so forth, 153 00:16:45,350 --> 00:16:55,790 but on the other other hand, it is also a kind of a dumping ground where we as developers push stuff which is not funny to do and which is not something we would like to work on. 154 00:16:55,790 --> 00:17:08,080 and in some ways, that's fine. Actually that's part of the constitutional definition of the DPL. It's some sort of "decision garbage collection". Not only "decision", because it's also some sort of "action item garbage collection". 155 00:17:08,080 --> 00:17:13,260 The important point I think is that here in Debian we do ourselves, as volunteers, 156 00:17:13,260 --> 00:17:16,360 a lot of stuff which other projects have other ways of doing, 157 00:17:16,360 --> 00:17:22,780 usually by having some corporate support, or by hiring some paid staff for this kind of stuff. 158 00:17:22,780 --> 00:17:30,870 I think here what's at stake is really: "Are we really able to be sustainable as a project and work on this kind of stuff, or not?" 159 00:17:30,870 --> 00:17:35,260 If we want to be, and I think it's truly important to be independent, 160 00:17:35,260 --> 00:17:40,250 we need some sort of collective awareness that this stuff needs to be done. 161 00:17:40,250 --> 00:17:47,460 There have been, in the past, DPL tasks that took 4 years, 5 years to complete, but there was stuff on which the project was blocked. 162 00:17:47,460 --> 00:17:55,370 I guess the question is: "How do we make people realise more often that everyone needs this kind of stuff to be done?" 163 00:17:55,370 --> 00:18:04,010 It is just insane to think that one person at a time, the one who is elected as DPL, can reasonably make progress on all of them. 164 00:18:04,010 --> 00:18:09,690 I think the question is: "How do we collectively realise that we need progress on this, 165 00:18:09,690 --> 00:18:13,020 and then how do we attract volunteers to work on this?" 166 00:18:13,020 --> 00:18:16,720 I think it's not only a matter of "It's not fun to work on that", sure. 167 00:18:16,720 --> 00:18:23,560 I think it's really trying to make people understand that we need progress on this as a project. 168 00:18:36,550 --> 00:18:42,600 [Wookey] I'm sorry I missed the beginning of this, but have we considered paid administration for some tasks? 169 00:18:42,600 --> 00:18:46,160 Has anyone thought about how that might work? Are there jobs? 170 00:18:46,160 --> 00:18:48,240 Again it's the question of job divisibility. 171 00:18:48,240 --> 00:18:51,010 Is there a little blob that you could actually give somebody? 172 00:18:51,010 --> 00:18:55,640 I guess it's the same problem as paying developers. 173 00:18:55,640 --> 00:18:58,320 It's tricky in a project with a culture like this. 174 00:18:58,320 --> 00:19:06,450 [Lucas] If you start going in that direction, The other problem is that you get less diverse... 175 00:19:06,450 --> 00:19:14,820 Who would be interested in that work? For example, I cannot easily give up my current position, probably. 176 00:19:14,820 --> 00:19:19,760 I could try, but the process of giving it up requires at least one year. 177 00:19:19,760 --> 00:19:31,640 due to French administration latency. [Wookey] I wasn't suggesting that we pay the DPL, I was suggesting that they had a paid serf, a PA, that kind of concept, 178 00:19:31,920 --> 00:19:37,230 and if that person stuck around, you might get some useful continuity out of it. 179 00:19:37,230 --> 00:19:43,330 I don't know, it's not very Debian-ish. 180 00:19:43,330 --> 00:19:49,060 Just wondering... If we've already decided it's nonsense, then we definitely shouldn't do that. 181 00:19:50,270 --> 00:19:59,460 [buxy] My problem with DPL helpers is that we see lots of administrative work mainly, 182 00:19:59,460 --> 00:20:12,360 Sometimes it's not even much. I mean, I could probably spare the time to go and ask the Debian-Events team what's going on and report back to you, 183 00:20:12,360 --> 00:20:24,650 but when I see the DPL, I elect him based on a vision and some direction where I want him to steer the project to, 184 00:20:24,650 --> 00:20:36,300 and if I want to help the DPL, I would like to help him do that, and not really... 185 00:20:36,300 --> 00:20:48,500 If you had on your list some item "Steer the discussion on the Code of Conduct", this could be interesting for me, but this is not really. 186 00:20:48,500 --> 00:20:55,340 So, maybe you should broaden the list of stuff to do, 187 00:20:55,340 --> 00:21:03,110 because even if it means some of the administrative stuff will not be done right now, 188 00:21:03,110 --> 00:21:09,490 it means at least you have the opportunity to attract people within your team to help you do some interesting stuff. 189 00:21:09,490 --> 00:21:14,250 [Lucas] Yeah. I think that we are kind of... 190 00:21:14,250 --> 00:21:24,410 During DPL elections actually we kind of forget that most of what the DPL does is not-so-interesting tasks, 191 00:21:24,410 --> 00:21:32,180 and he or she needs to demonstrate an ability to work on that kind of things also, 192 00:21:32,180 --> 00:21:37,490 and we don't evaluate that, actually, during DPL elections. That's really broken. 193 00:21:37,540 --> 00:21:41,380 We might end up with someone who has a great vision for the project, 194 00:21:41,380 --> 00:21:47,060 but who totally sucks at doing that kind of boring daily stuff. 195 00:21:47,060 --> 00:21:51,170 That would be really harmful for Debian. 196 00:21:51,170 --> 00:21:55,520 How I see that is that... Basically, if I... 197 00:21:55,520 --> 00:22:04,490 Let's say for some reason I could not dedicate as much time as I currently do to Debian suddenly. 198 00:22:04,490 --> 00:22:13,130 The things that I need to do, not all of them are really that important, but 199 00:22:13,130 --> 00:22:16,460 some of them are very important and I still need to do them. 200 00:22:18,720 --> 00:22:22,370 I don't think that being the DPL, 201 00:22:22,420 --> 00:22:25,470 giving lots of great ideas about the project, 202 00:22:25,470 --> 00:22:30,280 and pushing a vision without doing the actual work behind it 203 00:22:30,280 --> 00:22:34,760 would be seen as something positive by the rest of the project. 204 00:22:34,760 --> 00:22:42,340 So I just want to... [buxy] Delegate the interesting part! [Lucas] Hmm? [buxy] So you have to delegate the interesting part. 205 00:22:42,340 --> 00:22:45,670 [Lucas] So I have to delegate the interesting part. That's... 206 00:22:45,670 --> 00:22:50,430 That's why I'm interested in delegating this, so that I can do some of the interesting parts. 207 00:22:50,430 --> 00:22:55,930 But I just wanted to clarify also that... 208 00:22:55,930 --> 00:23:03,880 in Debian, some people are great at pushing their own ideas, own projects. 209 00:23:03,880 --> 00:23:08,680 Some of them are not so great at that, but still have great ideas. 210 00:23:08,680 --> 00:23:13,350 Only the pushing part, they are weaker at. 211 00:23:13,350 --> 00:23:20,010 And I think that it's really important to clarify that everybody is welcome to come to a DPL helpers' meeting, 212 00:23:20,010 --> 00:23:25,180 and describe ideas and ask for feedback, 213 00:23:25,180 --> 00:23:28,000 and "How should I go forward with that?", 214 00:23:28,000 --> 00:23:41,820 and I think that having a place where you can get feedback on your ideas and how to push them to the project as a whole, that's quite useful for many project members. 215 00:23:41,820 --> 00:23:51,620 It's not really OK that, in Debian, if you have a great idea you need to be good at pushing it so that it can reach completion. 216 00:23:57,440 --> 00:24:06,040 [Richi] Maybe if you have some kind of bugtracker for these tasks, and even make them release-critical in some sort of sense? 217 00:24:06,040 --> 00:24:14,820 Maybe in your "Bits from the DPL" just note "OK, guys, these are still open issues, and nobody volunteered this month", 218 00:24:14,820 --> 00:24:18,060 "How about next month, how about next month, how about next month?" 219 00:24:18,060 --> 00:24:23,790 Of course, you run the risk of just generating noise which gets ignored at a certain point, 220 00:24:23,790 --> 00:24:34,600 but still this would keep up the awareness of "Hey, there's too much work to be done, this guy needs help." 221 00:24:34,600 --> 00:24:44,220 [buxy] I think it's a good idea. You could share your to-do list on d-d-a (debian-devel-announce), 222 00:24:44,220 --> 00:24:48,750 but I don't think anyone will grab anything written like that. 223 00:24:48,750 --> 00:24:57,710 But if you prepare a little bit of work, in terms of "What's the next step in this specific project?", 224 00:24:57,710 --> 00:25:03,030 and if you give a longer introduction to to explain context and everything 225 00:25:03,070 --> 00:25:12,920 (because not everybody will understand what it means to talk to Anibal about the new NM website - they don't even know there is a new NM website), 226 00:25:12,920 --> 00:25:20,040 so I think it would be interesting to have some sort of tracker with a longer explanation and a next step. 227 00:25:20,040 --> 00:25:27,340 So even if you don't handle the whole item, you can at least do the first step. 228 00:25:27,340 --> 00:25:29,740 And, it means you have a log. 229 00:25:29,740 --> 00:25:36,400 If I query Anibal, I send a mail and ask him to respond to the bug report, 230 00:25:36,400 --> 00:25:41,160 and someone else can pick it up later. 231 00:25:41,160 --> 00:25:49,760 [Lucas] So, one issue with that... [buxy] Not all issues can be discussed publicly, that's true. 232 00:25:49,760 --> 00:25:59,970 [buxy] At least most of them here look like they would fit. Probably... 233 00:25:59,970 --> 00:26:00,160 [Lucas] Yeah, yeah, public now, but not the next step, for example. [buxy] At least most of them here look like they would fit. Probably... 234 00:26:00,160 --> 00:26:04,220 [Lucas] Yeah, yeah, public now, but not the next step, for example. 235 00:26:04,220 --> 00:26:13,190 For some of them, the next step is how to get people to agree on something on which they currently disagree. 236 00:26:13,190 --> 00:26:20,490 [buxy] ...which in consensus is often done in public, sometimes it won't work, but sometimes... 237 00:26:20,490 --> 00:26:28,070 [Lucas] You can always (?) [buxy] It's often about people more than technical stuff. 238 00:26:28,070 --> 00:26:32,690 There are people that support it, and others that don't. 239 00:26:32,690 --> 00:26:39,490 It's true that I could try to be a bit more verbose about what's the current state, and what's the next action, 240 00:26:39,490 --> 00:26:52,610 but for example, for those two, we have a draft, a list of items, for delegation. 241 00:26:52,750 --> 00:26:59,270 It needs to be rewritten to proper text, and then go through the respective teams. 242 00:26:59,270 --> 00:27:06,430 They can provide feedback and iterate on that. 243 00:27:08,000 --> 00:27:22,130 [Lucas] That cannot... that could happen... [buxy] Well, even if you have only the bug report with a link to the TitanPad draft, it's still better than the current status. 244 00:27:30,880 --> 00:27:38,000 [Franklin] I was suggesting to have a public to-do list, maybe not the whole to-do list but, the same way as said, 245 00:27:38,880 --> 00:27:44,380 focus on some items you want to achieve in the next month. 246 00:27:44,380 --> 00:27:52,190 Since usually one nice way of having things done is to not do it yourself, 247 00:27:52,190 --> 00:27:54,640 (or not do it at all, actually) 248 00:27:54,640 --> 00:28:01,620 I'll read the line: "Write a call for help for the d-i team". 249 00:28:01,620 --> 00:28:08,410 Maybe you could just send a mail, very short, to the d-i list, and say: 250 00:28:08,410 --> 00:28:18,860 "The d-i is not having much attention at this time; could one of you prepare a mail, and send it to debian-devel?" - just offload, 251 00:28:18,860 --> 00:28:22,830 and, by saying this, it's also... 252 00:28:22,830 --> 00:28:27,550 There's also another thing I wanted to say: "DPL helpers" is a bit scary. 253 00:28:27,550 --> 00:28:31,750 I wouldn't get into the whole thing. 254 00:28:31,750 --> 00:28:36,510 I don't want to attend meetings every week, but if there are some items, 255 00:28:36,510 --> 00:28:40,950 like, having more people in the d-i team, it's something I could be interested in. 256 00:28:40,950 --> 00:28:45,940 If you said, "The d-i team needs more help", then I would send a mail. 257 00:28:45,940 --> 00:28:50,470 [Lucas] I could push more of the work to the relevant teams. 258 00:28:50,470 --> 00:28:55,090 I said for d-i, the problem is they are too busy. 259 00:28:55,090 --> 00:29:02,530 Many people in our teams in Debian are past the point where they are able to ask for help themselves. 260 00:29:02,530 --> 00:29:14,690 [Franklin] People who are overloaded sometimes need someone to say, "Hey you, you can't do it yourself anymore, just do ask for help, and maybe you should send this very small e-mail", and it would trigger the thing. 261 00:29:18,800 --> 00:29:27,120 [Wookey] I was just wondering about the concept that's been mentioned a few times. There's a difference between the leadership and the administration. 262 00:29:27,120 --> 00:29:32,110 I mean, they're quite closely tied, and that makes them difficult to separate. 263 00:29:32,110 --> 00:29:35,260 You can be good at administration, you can be good at leadership, 264 00:29:35,260 --> 00:29:41,310 and we haven't got that many people who are great at both - and, it's a lot of time. 265 00:29:41,500 --> 00:29:50,600 Could we try having the Debian Administrator as well as the DPL? If we made another position, would that help? 266 00:29:51,020 --> 00:29:59,750 (Kind of additionally... Or is that not really... Because you'd just spend all your time communicating. It would have to be someone you get on with, I guess, otherwise it wouldn't work.) 267 00:30:03,270 --> 00:30:06,040 [Lucas] It would be interesting. 268 00:30:06,040 --> 00:30:11,260 [Stefano Rivera] I've always been a bit surprised (no, not surprised)... 269 00:30:11,260 --> 00:30:16,580 I see there's a bit of a conflict in DPL elections, that we are electing someone to be our leader, 270 00:30:16,580 --> 00:30:20,370 but most of what we expect them to do is be an administrator. 271 00:30:20,370 --> 00:30:24,570 However, the leader has no teeth without the administrative powers. 272 00:30:24,570 --> 00:30:29,060 Would anyone listen to someone who just made a lot of noise, saying "We should do these cool things"? 273 00:30:29,060 --> 00:30:32,520 We've got some crazy people who do that on the lists all the time, and we ignore them. 274 00:30:38,350 --> 00:30:40,100 To some degree, yes. 275 00:30:43,520 --> 00:30:49,990 Wookey said the authority comes from doing all the boring work; that's probably true. 276 00:30:49,990 --> 00:30:58,360 But maybe it does make sense to split the administrator from the leader, because they are totally different things, suited to different people. 277 00:31:01,360 --> 00:31:07,970 [Richi] In such a case, you have the problem of how to determine who is the administrator, and how long will it stay the administrator. 278 00:31:07,970 --> 00:31:13,930 If this person is, like our secretary, going on and on and on for years, 279 00:31:13,930 --> 00:31:19,530 to be the de-facto administrator and the de-factor Power That Be, 280 00:31:19,530 --> 00:31:25,860 this person gains more and more power, both implicit and explicit, over time. 281 00:31:25,860 --> 00:31:30,110 So, this may be a real risk, 282 00:31:30,110 --> 00:31:35,060 as in: even if this person doesn't even intend for this to happen, but still... 283 00:31:35,060 --> 00:31:40,190 You kind of... it doesn't feel right. That's the short version. 284 00:31:44,450 --> 00:31:49,250 [Wookey] You could deal with that by effectively having the administrator come with the DPL. 285 00:31:49,250 --> 00:31:53,260 You get a pair for that period. 286 00:31:53,260 --> 00:31:56,440 Continuity is actually useful in an administrator, 287 00:31:56,440 --> 00:32:03,870 but as you say, there is the problem that they'll slowly acquire stuff, which could become an issue after a while. 288 00:32:03,870 --> 00:32:08,000 I don't know... I guess we press on with this "helpers" concept for a while, 289 00:32:08,000 --> 00:32:13,150 and see whether we get enough traction in general assistance distributed through everybody, 290 00:32:13,150 --> 00:32:16,180 which seems a better concept, if we can make it work. 291 00:32:16,180 --> 00:32:25,580 If it's still not working in another year or two, then I think we need to think harder about another position. 292 00:32:25,580 --> 00:32:35,180 [Lucas] We have had DPL assistants in the past, or a second-in-charge, but I'm not sure how the split of powers worked between them. 293 00:32:39,560 --> 00:32:49,400 [Zack] Right. There was a point we discussed that you forgot to mention at the beginning was that the idea of the DPL helpers team was actually to have more continuity than a single year, 294 00:32:49,400 --> 00:32:52,090 and that your comment now made me remember that. 295 00:32:52,090 --> 00:32:58,900 The problem with the DPL assistants is that if they are tied to the same period of one year, which is relatively short, 296 00:32:58,900 --> 00:33:09,340 to learn how to get around. So then you still have the problem that every year you start from scratch, with inertia and common mistakes and whatever. 297 00:33:09,340 --> 00:33:20,460 That's part of the reason why a hypothetical, more-stable DPL helpers team would need to be longer than a DPL election term. 298 00:33:20,460 --> 00:33:28,610 [Lucas] Zack, did you read the DPL-archives about how the second-in-charge and the DPL interacted in the past? 299 00:33:28,610 --> 00:33:36,230 [Zack] Partly, yes, so I think the question is: "How did they work?" 300 00:33:36,230 --> 00:33:38,890 I remember only the last time, 301 00:33:38,890 --> 00:33:42,360 and I think they both read leader@debian.org, 302 00:33:42,360 --> 00:33:47,680 and they just coordinated via the same address. I haven't checked the AJ case in the past. 303 00:34:14,900 --> 00:34:24,230 [Franklin] You have a whole list of tasks. How to get on now? 304 00:34:24,230 --> 00:34:29,760 Do you intend to publish them in some way so people can grab them? 305 00:34:29,810 --> 00:34:34,150 Not just today - you could shout and say "Yes, it's on here!" That's one choice. 306 00:34:34,150 --> 00:34:39,930 [Lucas] So, what I've been doing during the last DPL helpers' meeting, and the one before, I think, 307 00:34:39,930 --> 00:34:42,200 was to publish that to-do list, 308 00:34:42,200 --> 00:34:44,200 which actually is quite a lot of work, 309 00:34:44,200 --> 00:34:50,100 because rewriting your to-do list that you write using more direct words 310 00:34:50,100 --> 00:34:57,540 into something that you can put in a gobby document... 311 00:34:57,540 --> 00:35:02,720 It's at least an hour of work to write this down and find the... 312 00:35:08,630 --> 00:35:18,060 DPL helpers happen once every two weeks, and in the future I plan to continue to publish that kind of to-do list, probably a bit more verbose. 313 00:35:18,060 --> 00:35:24,020 Feel free to attend the meetings and ask for details about some items. 314 00:35:26,430 --> 00:35:32,440 One of the questions is: in Debian we tend not to do IRC meetings that often. 315 00:35:32,440 --> 00:35:38,580 That's not really something that's really common in Debian culture, 316 00:35:38,580 --> 00:35:42,740 except for some teams like the DebConf orga team. 317 00:35:42,740 --> 00:35:50,410 Is it a blocker for you that meetings are on IRC at a specific time, that you have to be there if you want to participate? 318 00:35:51,570 --> 00:36:03,400 We could try to better at changing the time each time so that everyone can participate, or try to move to mailing list discussions. 319 00:36:08,160 --> 00:36:11,350 Nobody feels strongly about that? 320 00:36:15,600 --> 00:36:23,650 It's not really about problems about IRC. It's about holding the meetings on IRC at a specific time. 321 00:36:26,840 --> 00:36:30,530 [Stefano Rivera] Of course, there is the usual problem that these groups end up self-selecting, 322 00:36:30,530 --> 00:36:35,390 and the people you've got here are people who've found these meetings happen at times that suit them. 323 00:36:35,390 --> 00:36:41,990 Other people might have taken one look at DPL helpers, but decided maybe [?] was more interesting, because they never got involved. 324 00:36:50,640 --> 00:37:02,750 [Zack] Just a general comment: I feel personally pretty strongly about the usefulness of a periodic IRC meeting, especially in this case because it's a place where you have tasks that have been lingering for a long while. 325 00:37:02,750 --> 00:37:11,210 So having a periodic reassessment, "Are we doing progress or not?" is pretty useful, but your mileage may vary. 326 00:37:11,210 --> 00:37:13,210 [Lucas] I fully agree with that, 327 00:37:13,210 --> 00:37:16,240 but we could do that via e-mail as well. 328 00:37:16,240 --> 00:37:25,390 I send monthly e-mails to d-d-a; we could have the same kind of e-mails sent on a regular basis to... 329 00:37:25,390 --> 00:37:30,060 I agree, it's better to have IRC meetings for that reason. 330 00:37:33,900 --> 00:37:38,430 [Richi] I guess it makes sense to have the IRC meetings because it's just easier to sync up quickly, 331 00:37:38,430 --> 00:37:44,160 but there's no harm in having a back-up place on e-mail lists, 332 00:37:44,160 --> 00:37:52,660 where you can go through issues a little bit earlier, and then do the actual more involved discussion in real-time. 333 00:37:52,660 --> 00:38:00,800 Maybe it would even be a possibility to put DPL helpers discussions onto debian-devel or debian-private, 334 00:38:00,800 --> 00:38:05,420 to kind of force people to keep seeing those issues popping up. 335 00:38:05,420 --> 00:38:10,040 So, not to move it away to a place where only those people who really care, 336 00:38:10,040 --> 00:38:15,400 and who really decide, "Yes, this is not scary enough for me to run away," see this, 337 00:38:15,400 --> 00:38:21,230 but so that everybody continually sees there is stuff which needs to be done, this is happening, 338 00:38:21,230 --> 00:38:25,760 "They may need help here - hey, that's something I can do." 339 00:38:28,250 --> 00:38:34,310 [buxy] I wanted to say there is also the Technical Committee which is doing regular meetings in the same way. 340 00:38:34,310 --> 00:38:37,450 but I really feel some difference between both, 341 00:38:37,450 --> 00:38:45,170 because on one side there is a team who is trying to find a solution and reach consensus and what is the best way to go forward, 342 00:38:45,170 --> 00:38:53,860 whereas in the DPL helpers meeting, it looks more like you asking each volunteer individually, "How far are you?", 343 00:38:53,860 --> 00:38:59,260 and not so much a discussion or decision-making group. 344 00:38:59,260 --> 00:39:09,990 While it's useful to ping people, I don't think it needs to happen over IRC always, at least. 345 00:39:09,990 --> 00:39:18,680 If you move some of the management to a bug tracking system, 346 00:39:18,680 --> 00:39:25,980 then you can at least use the "owner" feature to record who is working on each entry, 347 00:39:25,980 --> 00:39:41,830 and at least some people can help on a specific item without subscribing to the whole DPL helpers infrastructure. 348 00:39:41,830 --> 00:39:52,600 [Richi] That's actually a very good point. Most of the things we did within the trademark team could be done on the mailing lists, 349 00:39:52,600 --> 00:39:56,810 and it was more or less just reporting back to you what the actual status is, what we did, 350 00:39:56,810 --> 00:40:02,310 what we came up with, and just pinging you, "That's the actual status". 351 00:40:02,310 --> 00:40:09,010 What we did a few days ago while sitting around, that's something which is better suited to IRC, where you just have real-time communication, 352 00:40:09,010 --> 00:40:11,690 and the whole team is better than just one of the team, 353 00:40:11,690 --> 00:40:19,590 but all the other preparation and especially the "this is the status" can be done asynchronously. 354 00:40:19,590 --> 00:40:25,320 That would probably make it easier both for you and for others. 355 00:40:39,650 --> 00:40:48,800 [buxy] Someone help me... [giggling in the background] I changed the topic, just a question for you for the fun: 356 00:40:48,800 --> 00:40:56,110 Would you consider delegating someone to steer the discussion concerning the Code of Conduct? 357 00:40:56,110 --> 00:41:04,560 For example, Wouter started it. Would you mind giving him some sort of official status to try to bring it to a conclusion? 358 00:41:04,560 --> 00:41:09,320 [Lucas] Hmmm, good question. Well... 359 00:41:09,320 --> 00:41:12,420 [buxy] Assuming you're happy with what he's doing... 360 00:41:12,420 --> 00:41:21,200 [Lucas] Can you think of another occurrence of someone being delegated to steer the discussion? 361 00:41:21,940 --> 00:41:23,880 It doesn't really sound... 362 00:41:26,660 --> 00:41:30,950 I don't think we need that. 363 00:41:33,540 --> 00:41:39,320 I fear that that would be a way for that person to push his views quite strongly, 364 00:41:39,320 --> 00:41:47,360 and it doesn't really make sense, especially for Code of Conduct discussions. 365 00:41:48,890 --> 00:41:56,510 [Richi] To put a finer point on this, if this happens, as you said, there is the possibility of that person just strong-arming their way into the direction which they want, 366 00:41:56,510 --> 00:41:58,870 instead of trying to reach consensus. 367 00:41:58,870 --> 00:42:03,120 I just lost my point... Sorry. 368 00:42:04,050 --> 00:42:10,290 There would be a lot more discussion about "Hey, you delegated - or mini-delegated - this person, 369 00:42:10,290 --> 00:42:14,540 why not mini-delegate someone else?", so you would just... 370 00:42:14,540 --> 00:42:20,040 If people are aware of this person having this leaning, or this type of agenda, 371 00:42:20,040 --> 00:42:25,860 it would just move the discussion about who gets to really decide and lead. 372 00:42:25,860 --> 00:42:33,120 [buxy] Well, I say delegated, but not in the official sense - just like you try to delegate those tasks. 373 00:42:34,550 --> 00:42:39,590 Just that it will happen in a framework, so that he... 374 00:42:39,590 --> 00:42:42,270 You ensure that there is some progress made, 375 00:42:42,270 --> 00:42:46,850 and you can annoy him, "Hey! Did you miss something?" 376 00:42:46,850 --> 00:42:55,580 [Lucas] One thing that could help with the Code of Conduct discussion is to find a group of three to four people, 377 00:42:55,580 --> 00:43:01,640 who care about it and who disagree on some aspects of it, 378 00:43:01,640 --> 00:43:11,220 and ask them to push it forward together, trying to reach consensus between themselves, before it gets too much larger. 379 00:43:11,220 --> 00:43:18,580 Mailing list discussions are difficult to converge. 380 00:43:19,720 --> 00:43:24,180 That smells of a working group, which doesn't have to be a bad idea, 381 00:43:24,180 --> 00:43:28,570 but then you have to make sure that the working group keeps and remains open, 382 00:43:28,570 --> 00:43:36,130 because else you would more or less exclude the rest of the project from the pre-selection or pre-discussion. 383 00:43:36,130 --> 00:43:43,820 and then are fed maybe even foregone conclusions, which will probably get quite a resistance within Debian. 384 00:43:43,820 --> 00:43:51,040 [Lucas] What often happens in Debian is that everybody thinks that something is quite important, 385 00:43:51,040 --> 00:43:55,700 but nobody feels particularly empowered to work on it. 386 00:43:55,700 --> 00:44:01,780 and for the Code of Conduct, for example, I think that was the case for... 387 00:44:01,780 --> 00:44:08,660 I'm not sure Wouter even feels like... 388 00:44:08,660 --> 00:44:17,400 I'm not sure of his motivations for working on that, but he might not feel very empowered to work on it himself. 389 00:44:17,400 --> 00:44:19,400 He's pushing it, which is great, 390 00:44:22,360 --> 00:44:29,820 Having a more explicit way of saying "Thanks for pushing it; please continue", that could be quite good. 391 00:44:31,980 --> 00:44:35,860 [buxy] Yes, I guess encouraging him is a good idea, 392 00:44:35,860 --> 00:44:43,420 because I fear he is going to run out of time after DebConf, 393 00:44:43,420 --> 00:44:46,120 and this will not go further, which is a shame, 394 00:44:46,120 --> 00:44:52,400 because, while we've made a bit of progress, it would be nice to go to the end. 395 00:44:54,020 --> 00:44:59,020 [Lucas] OK, I think we are out of time, so thanks a lot for attending. 396 00:44:59,020 --> 00:45:03,570 I will watch the video and prepare some minutes for the BoF, 397 00:45:03,570 --> 00:45:06,880 which I will send to... 398 00:45:06,880 --> 00:45:11,370 Probably I will provide the link in my next d-d-a bits. 399 00:45:11,370 --> 00:45:13,660 [unidentified audience member] There is a DPL helpers mailing list? 400 00:45:13,660 --> 00:45:17,580 Oh I see, yeah, there is a DPL helpers mailing list, 401 00:45:17,580 --> 00:45:19,580 I will post the notes there, 402 00:45:19,580 --> 00:45:23,490 and provide a link to that in my next d-d-a bits. 403 00:45:23,490 --> 00:45:25,490 Thank you. 404 00:45:25,490 --> 00:45:28,600 [thunderous applause]