[ogb-discuss] *You* are Open Source - Community Exemplification

[Alex Leverington]

This is an open letter to the OGB; an initial response to any proposal  
to restructure or otherwise re-engineer the OpenSolaris community. I  
hope that what is defined below can be discussed but at the very least  
is recognized in your concessions! It is, to me, an overview of how  
the community appears to work and I would eventually like to develop  
this into a document which fully describes how the "community of  
opensolaris communities" works, and not just my perception.  
OpenSolaris is a community like no other and has challenges for which  
there is no precedent. Feel free to comment...

There is a VERY big picture here for which Sun has made it apparent no  
one person is directly accountable for. This makes for a very  
interesting community and I think it's an underlying benefit which has  
yet to be made apparent and has possibly been neglected by the  
previous policies. The point is that only the community at large is  
held accountable for OpenSolaris. While no one person is held  
accountable for OpenSolaris, the OGB is held responsible for the  
community. The neglect I've observed has likely been a result of  
chicken/egg paradox and I doubt it's been avoidable.

While I have no hard facts to back this up, the idea of a complete  
restructuring is supplicated to fail, unless it is discussed at  
length. The discussion should be among the OGB but the idea of  
"changing everything and then seeing what happens and changing it  
again based on the results" is a bad idea. My impression at the summit  
was that "we will tweak these things and incorporate the results and  
feedback into a continual process of tweaks until everyone is  
content". The inevitable result being a restructure, but I don't  
believe the majority idea was to "blow things up and ask questions  
later". I'm not saying there is a problem here per se, but let's just  
be clear that whatever happens, none of us want to see regression. / 
opinion

Let's clarify for the record, the following people who are held  
accountable for the OpenSolaris community:

- END USER: These folks are going to leaving Linux for OpenSolaris or  
be old Solaris users transitioning to the new Solaris
- CUSTOMER: Someone who (in)directly pays Sun, having bottom line  
interests and may or may not care about anything else
- CONTRIBUTOR: These folks submit code, docs, or knowledge which is  
substantial
- ENGINEER: Someone who works for Sun and whose contribution is likely  
a contract of their employment
- PACKAGE MAINTAINER: This person updates their package when they  
update their software, or os.o requires pkg be updated
- CORE CONTRIBUTOR: A contributor who works on significant tasks  
similar to that of an ENGINEER
- ADMINISTRATOR: This person's contributions are with regard to the  
overall availability and functionality of the os.o infrastructure
- PROPONENT: Self-explanatory including social, external proponents  
(which may indirectly include a customer or partner)

- OGB MEMBER: Liaison to Sun, granted all powers, elected to be  
responsible for the operation and sustenance of the community
- SUN MICROSYSTEMS: A publicly traded company
- APP DEVELOPER: non-existent and outside the scope of opensolaris  
(notes on this below, I encourage comments on this)

This community was previously the majority of Sun's operating system  
business units and has now been uprooted, opened up, and placed into  
the hands of any who wish to contribute. Transplanting anything  
organic is tedious and exploits the fragile nature of the organism's  
dependency on it's environment. It's apparent to me that after three  
years, Sun is now in the final phase of this transition for  
OpenSolaris. To that end, these are the people who will make the  
community work. They all have distinct needs and the processes which  
govern their efforts should address those needs.

The basic needs for each of these roles are:

- End users need to be able to resolve issues, get support,  
documentation, and/or support each other
- Customers need to be able to voice their request for product  
features, similar to end users, but they fund this whole operation.  
Obviously, the Customer is not a responsibility of the community, they  
are Sun's responsibility. As the engineers and contributors are a part  
of this community, it is obviously their objectives to meet the  
demands of customers.
- Contributors need to be able to share their knowledge and  
innovations (ie, functions or features)
- Engineers need to be able to do their job
- Package maintainers need to be able to update their package when  
they update the software enclosed in the package, no matter what the  
reason (feature, bug, security, adaption to dependent system change)
- Core contributors are committed to the community's sustenance as  
well as share their knowledge and innovations
- Administrators facilitate that OpenSolaris is available and  
accessible, including the "package repository", documentation, and  
"source repository"
- Proponents take care of themselves but can be provoked, for better  
or worse

In addition to these human requirements are the principles of  
OpenSolaris:
http://www.opensolaris.org/os/about/

In writing, discussing, and voting on proposals, please remember to  
consider all of these individuals and the requirements necessary to  
satisfy their needs. I can't speak for them, and they won't always be  
here to speak for themselves, but their faith, which is in your hands,  
is crucial to the success and growth of OpenSolaris.



About APP DEVELOPER role:
At this time I do not believe there exists an "APP DEVELOPER" role in  
the OpenSolaris community. Windows and OS X have application  
developers but the trick with open source is that applications are  
cross platform and typically open source themselves; osx and windows  
applications are proprietary! The closest thing opensolaris has to an  
application developer is a package maintainer or a core contributor;  
it is my belief that the developer is outside the context of the  
opensolaris community and is more a part of the Sun community at  
large. A majority of developers who would create a system catered to  
OpenSolaris will likely be developing their application based on Sun's  
technology and not OpenSolaris. Just ask yourself: Why would I want to  
create an application that only runs on Solaris? If the answer doesn't  
have to do with the OS or a utility then it's likely you are  
developing something because it uses a Sun technology such as Java,  
Coolthreads, ZFS, etc.



Regards,
Alex Leverington