[kwlug-disc] Debian governance (was:What is all this about systemd?)

[Khalid Baheyeldin]

On Tue, Oct 21, 2014 at 3:46 PM, Khalid Baheyeldin <kb at 2bits.com> wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 21, 2014 at 1:24 PM, Hubert Chathi <hubert at uhoreg.ca> wrote:
>> On Tue, 21 Oct 2014 12:14:41 -0400, Khalid Baheyeldin <kb at 2bits.com> said:
>>
>>> This is what he said:
>>
>>> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=5852295&cid=48188823
>>
>>> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=5852295&cid=48188887
>>
>> I saw those, and they don't seem to be referring to Debian's
>> governance.  While some of the "policy wonks" that he refers to may be
>> part of Debian's governance, I don't see him as talking about a problem
>> with Debian's governance itself.
>>
>> And his second message specifically denies that he's talking about the
>> systemd people (if you look at the parent message), and if I had to
>> guess based solely on those posts, his comment about "making [Debian] a
>> whore to Ubuntu" could be taken as an indication that he is talking
>> about the upstart people, despite him saying that he is beginning to be
>> wary of systemd.
>
> I did not say he said something about Poetterring et al, if that is
> what you understood.
>
> He was saying that Debian is the one that has management issues
> (alluding to the WAY that systemd was adopted in Debian).
>
> And saying that if it forks, he will check if the certain people
> managing it will go with Debian proper, or the fork and he (Bruce)
> will go the other way.

As a followup on this, there has been at least three resignations from
and within Debian.

First, you have Joey Hess, who specifically cites the Debian
constitution as a reason for leaving Debian

In the comments here, you will find links to his mailing list posts
http://linux.slashdot.org/story/14/11/08/1448234/joey-hess-resigns-from-debian
(He is pro systemd, so opposition to systemd is not the reason of him
leaving, but the process that led to its adoption is)

Then there is Tollef Fog Heen, who is not leaving Debian but resigning
as systemd maintainer
http://linux.slashdot.org/story/14/11/16/2142244/longtime-debian-developer-tollef-fog-heen-resigns-from-systemd-maintainer-team
In the comments, he answers questions, and he summarizes the process
of adopting systemd and all the problems it created within Debian's
team here
http://linux.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=6078013&cid=48398675

Which points to the pro systemd post by Russ Allberry
https://lists.debian.org/debian-ctte/2013/12/msg00234.html

And others pointed to the rebuttal by Ian Jackson
https://lists.debian.org/debian-ctte/2013/12/msg00182.html

Then today, you have Russ Allberry resigning from the Debian Technical Committee

http://lwn.net/Articles/620879/

Again, to avoid discussing things I am not saying: this is not a "they
resigned because of systemd itself", rather "the process that led to
systemd's adoption uncovered governance problems within Debian".
-- 
Khalid M. Baheyeldin
2bits.com, Inc.
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