14:00:02 #startmeeting 14:00:03 Meeting started Tue Oct 29 14:00:02 2013 UTC. The chair is jwb. Information about MeetBot at http://wiki.debian.org/MeetBot. 14:00:03 Useful Commands: #action #agreed #halp #info #idea #link #topic. 14:00:03 #meetingname fedora-workstation 14:00:03 #meetingtopic Fedora Workstation WG 14:00:03 #topic init 14:00:03 The meeting name has been set to 'fedora-workstation' 14:00:14 hello! who all is around for the meeting today 14:00:40 i know ryanlerch couldn't make it because of a conflict, but i believe everyone else should be able to 14:00:54 evening 14:00:57 * mclasen is here 14:00:57 hi jwb 14:00:59 hi there 14:01:05 * sgallagh hangs around to steal ideas for the Server meeting tomorrow. 14:01:32 sgallagh, based on what i've seen on server list, you're kinda ahead of us and i'm going to steal from you 14:01:42 #chair juhp cschalle_ mclasen 14:01:42 Current chairs: cschalle_ juhp jwb mclasen 14:01:46 The Open Source Way ;-) 14:01:58 * mclasen pings kalev 14:02:52 so i think we're waiting for cwickert kalev ltinkl and otaylor 14:02:52 hi 14:02:58 #chair kalev 14:02:58 Current chairs: cschalle_ juhp jwb kalev mclasen 14:03:01 otaylor is here too 14:03:05 jwb: I'm here 14:03:10 oh, great 14:03:14 #chair otaylor 14:03:14 Current chairs: cschalle_ juhp jwb kalev mclasen otaylor 14:03:20 oh 14:03:26 damn time shoft 14:03:28 shift 14:03:46 Right, Europe switched this past weekend, US switches this coming weekend. 14:03:50 cwickert, available still? 14:03:51 we changed our clocks this weekend, I thought we are supposed to meet in an hour 14:03:53 sure 14:04:11 great. thanks for being flexible on this one. i realize it isn't an ideal time for everyone 14:04:17 #chair cwickert 14:04:17 Current chairs: cschalle_ cwickert juhp jwb kalev mclasen otaylor 14:05:03 ok, i pinged ltinkl. let's get started 14:05:13 #topic logistics 14:05:36 so the first order of business is to work out where we're actually going to do most of our work 14:05:56 i believe we already agreed that desktop@lists.fedoraproject.org was the best mailing list, correct? 14:06:10 yeah, sounds fine 14:06:17 anything is better than a new list, thats for sure 14:06:21 sounds good to me too 14:06:34 what is the current scope of desktop list btw? 14:06:51 right now, it's basically the list for the desktop spin in Fedora as i understand things 14:06:53 just to clarify that 14:07:00 I see 14:07:08 the workstation product is kind of a evolution of that, so it seems to fit 14:07:19 that was my suspicion too 14:07:49 ok, lets go with that then. 14:07:53 if it turns out confusing, it might be possible to rename an existing mailing list, I would guess 14:07:57 jwp: yes, historically, it was the list to discuss desktop spin issues on 14:08:29 #info desktop@lists.fedoraproject.org is the main mailing list for the WG 14:08:37 ok. IRC channel 14:08:45 i've created and proposed #fedora-workstation 14:08:49 on freenode 14:09:06 might be nice to keep the existing #fedora-desktop channel too, but it's unfortunately on a different IRC server 14:09:12 I like the name but it is a little long (for my client) :) 14:09:32 kalev, yeah. gimpnet i believe? 14:09:35 yeah 14:10:16 since most people are used to the Gimpnet channel why not just keep it? I mean channels being on different servers isn't really a problem with an IRC client 14:10:51 just would like to avoid the risk of fragmenting discussion 14:11:14 about the mailing-list, will there be non-gnome discussions? because the old desktop ML is seen as a gnome ML... 14:11:28 are we going to discuss the scope of this WG later - I am still a bit unclear about that to be honest? 14:11:45 hadess, right that is what I am wondering too - ditto for the channel 14:11:48 * mclasen has no problem at all with dropping #fedora-desktop on gimpnet and moving over to #fedora-workstation here 14:12:08 cschalle_, two concerns. 1) is #fedora-desktop used heavily today? i'd hate to steal a channel that's used for a primary purpose and clutter it up. 2) fragmenting discussion because every other fedora channel is on freenode ;) 14:12:38 * ltinkl is for having #fedora-workstation here on freenode 14:12:40 jwb, it is used heavily, but if mclasen is fine with shutting down the old channel in favour of this new one then that is fine for me too 14:12:41 jwb, we have 83 people lurking in the channel right now, and it's usually upstream developers 14:12:44 hadess, i would think there are discussions to be had that go beyond just GNOME, yes 14:13:04 we do have too many general-purpose channels on gimpnet already, anyway 14:13:15 jwb, we already discuss beyond gnome, i meant _besides_ gnome 14:13:35 jwb, eg. kde or xfce or what have you 14:13:38 hadess, yes. i'm sure we'll discuss other DEs and requirements 14:14:32 and i doubt those 83 people in #fedora-desktop from upstream GNOME want to listen to us talk about that :) 14:14:45 i'm sure the #fedora-desktop will carry on existing then 14:14:50 right 14:14:51 oh, i don't down it 14:14:51 Scope of the working group is IMO separate from mailing lists and IRC channel 14:14:54 er, doubt it 14:15:04 otaylor, yes 14:15:25 otaylor, if we coopt old mailing lists and IRC channels, it isn't 14:15:30 I don't think we need to shut down #fedora-desktop immediately, but I think we should evaluate things in a bit and see how things are working 14:15:38 otaylor, agreed 14:16:07 ok, let's go with #fedora-workstation on Freenode for now. if it's utterly failing, we can fix it 14:16:18 ok 14:16:21 we can put something in topic in #fedora-desktop that points people to freenode for workstation wg disscussion 14:16:29 * kalev joins #fedora-workstation. 14:16:32 #info Primary IRC channel will be #fedora-workstation 14:16:35 mclasen, good idea 14:16:36 where are the kde/xfce/etc. developers btw? 14:16:38 hadess: a) The desktop mailing list isn't exactly a hotbed of discussion b) let's see how scoping works out before we start worrying that it will be drowned 14:16:41 #undo 14:16:41 Removing item from minutes: 14:16:45 #info Primary IRC channel will be #fedora-workstation on Freenode 14:16:59 * cwickert cheers 14:17:20 cwickert, hey 14:17:22 hadess, we have cwickert ltinkl and juhp that aren't from GNOME 14:17:36 KDE SIG has also a separate IRC channel at #fedora-kde 14:17:50 ltinkl, yeah, and i think those should still exist 14:17:54 definitely 14:17:56 just wish my client could handle the long name but I guess I can manage :) 14:18:07 juhp, get a better client :) 14:18:10 ok, so meeting times and frequency 14:18:30 i dislike meetings for the sake of having meetings, but if we want to have a standing meeting, how often should we do it? 14:19:02 depends on what we're going to do and discuss here, it's still a bit unclear 14:19:07 well I guess the question that needs to come first is how do we plan on working 14:19:13 right 14:19:26 actually, let's come back to meetings at the end 14:19:33 that might make it a bit easier 14:19:40 sure 14:19:56 ack 14:20:03 ok, so let's get to the main purpose 14:20:11 #topic Next Steps 14:20:23 so we have two major tasks to accomplish before January 14:20:33 the first is to create a governance charter for the WG 14:20:42 that is due by November 15th 14:21:04 this is basically going to setup the WG going forward. what we have right now is just to get things started 14:21:12 have anyone written a draft for that? I assume the charter will be mostly the same accross the WGs? 14:21:36 so we need to discuss how many voting seats we want, what roles we need/want, if we need specific representation in the voting seats, etc 14:21:39 don't we need to know what it is before we can say how it's going to be governed? 14:22:39 hadess, yes and no ;) 14:22:57 i mean, we're here to define a Workstation product for Fedora. this goes along side the Server and Cloud products 14:23:15 jwb: how many people do we currently have ? its a little hard to tell from this channel's population... 14:23:27 * ryanlerch is here now. 14:23:29 mclasen, in the WG, we have 9 total 14:23:50 jwb, we need to scope it before anything else 14:24:09 jwb: If we can keep formal structure to a minimum that would be good - membership, chair to plan meetings and set agendas, vote only as a last resort 14:24:27 hadess, i think they can be done in parallel. FESCo set the governance charter as the first thing 14:24:39 jwb, that's backwards 14:24:51 hadess, so the other major item is the Product Requirements Document, which is where scope comes in 14:24:58 hadess, i didn't make this descision. they did :) 14:25:01 its the task we are given, go complain to fesco... 14:25:08 hadess: The governance charter should include a mechanism for changing the charter if needed. 14:25:18 anyway, we can work on both of those things in parallel for now 14:25:25 jwb: I'm really hoping this can be a working group and not a dispute resolution forum, so a lot of complex machinery doesn't make sense to me 14:25:28 This should allow the flexibility to revise it if the final scoping proves to need changes. 14:25:35 Product Requirements Document? 14:25:38 is there a deadline for the PRD? 14:25:40 otaylor, i agree. 14:25:48 juhp, January 14:25:51 The whole point is that we want the groups to be self-governed in the long term, rather than appointed by FESCo as this initial "constitutional convention" is 14:25:51 I see 14:25:59 I don't see any reason to make the voting membership any smaller than the initial 9 - I guess the question is to we need to ensure that certain key groups are represented, say qa ? 14:26:09 if we end up scoping "gnome", how are we going to pass that through a board that has kde and xfce developers on it? 14:26:15 juhp: We haven't set a firm date in January, which we need to do tomorrow. 14:26:17 cwickert, basically a document outlining what the product is and isn't, what its goals are and so on 14:26:31 cwickert, basically think of it as "what are the end use cases for this product, what are we trying to solve with it, and what are the requirements to get there" 14:26:36 cschalle_: I guess that much, but where does this come from? 14:26:40 did I miss something? 14:26:41 cwickert, we create it 14:26:42 cwickert, the wikipedia page was what i used to help myself define it in my head -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Product_requirements_document 14:26:49 cwickert, it's the second thing we have to create 14:26:58 or one of the things we create in parallel 14:27:18 does FESCo have a governance charter we could copy, or does some other existing working group have something? 14:27:34 kalev, FESCo has one for FESCo. we could look at that 14:27:55 sorry, I am quite busy with $dayjob. so FESCo wants us to do something but did they actually tell us? 14:28:00 where is this coming from? 14:28:09 cwickert, https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Fedora.next/boardproposal 14:28:33 are there any relevant mails I need to read to catch up? 14:28:34 kalev: FESCo's charter can only be modified by the Board. Basically it's nine sitting members that serve for two Fedora releases, half being elected between each release 14:28:59 sgallagh: That sounds like a good starting place for our charter. 14:29:17 kalev: or maybe it is a bit 'heavy' for a working group 14:29:21 cwickert, nothing specific that i can recall for the PRD. sgallagh can you recall any "here is what FESCo is looking for with the WG PRD" emails or pages? 14:29:26 Do we think general elections by the fedora membership to the board is necessary - it seems like overkill to me 14:29:33 s/board/working group/ 14:29:56 I would guess we can set it up so that FESCo is elected and FESCo appoints members 14:29:56 I see nothing on announce or devel-announce. I think this is a bad start for this WG 14:30:13 cwickert: https://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/devel-announce/2013-October/001258.html ? 14:30:17 or at least for me to work here. seems some people know way more than I dp 14:30:19 when someone needs to leave the Workstation WG, we could find a new candidate and have FESCo rubberstamp it 14:30:20 jwb: The discussion continuously devolved until we finally agreed to let the WG determine what is a useful document for that WG 14:30:48 otaylor: I know that one, but it doesn't mention the Requirements thing 14:30:55 cwickert, well, that's the purpose of _this_ meeting. to get people caught up that haven't been in all the FESCo meetings, etc. we aren't going to solve the PRD here today. 14:31:12 ok 14:31:14 hence the "next steps" in topic 14:31:40 * cwickert will shut up and listen 14:31:48 cwickert, https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Fedora.next/boardproposal#Product_Working_Groups <- the PRD is mentioned here in the Product Working Group section 14:32:23 how long are we going to operate under this 'initial setup' ? - until we deliver the governance and the prd, and then we ask fesco to appoint our replacements ? 14:32:34 mclasen, no 14:33:04 mclasen, we operate under the initial setup until we deliver those two items, and then we continue based on whatever we came up with for governance 14:33:19 was there any guidance from FESCo on the suggested structure of the PRD? i tried to research if there were any IEEE-type standards or templates for a PRD, but only came up with things like IEEE830 (software requirements specification) 14:33:19 so for an initial term? 14:33:29 jwb: for membership, I'd suggest that we simply say that the membership count is 9 (unless changed) and if people resign, the remaining members find replacements, subject to approval by fesco 14:33:45 FESCo is not going to appoint WG members after this set. well, unless that's what we come up with for governance, but that doesn't seem likely 14:33:52 ryanlerch, no guidance, I asked that question myself once the Fedora.next proposal was online 14:34:05 otaylor: that sounds fine to me 14:34:06 otaylor, that seems fairly straghtforward 14:34:10 otaylor: That sounds good to me too 14:34:44 ryanlerch: No, the PRD format is not prescribed. 14:34:47 so I am not sure we will be able to get anywhere hugely useful with an open ended IRC discussion, maybe we should task people with doing two draft documents and then we can instead discuss changes to those documents? Always easier to discuss something concrete IMO 14:34:49 to be clear, there is an open FESCo ticket on whether the FESCo liaison role is required to be a voting member. so once they decide that, we can come up with something official 14:35:27 cschalle_, yeah. i agree. i'll be happy to send a draft governance to the list to get things going 14:35:41 and I would be happy to draft a PRD document and send to the list 14:36:31 May I make one suggestion: Can we agree to use the Fedora Wiki as the place to host these documents? 14:36:38 sgallagh, hell no 14:36:44 wiki's are horrible for commenting 14:37:03 sgallagh, so basically, the definition of the PRD in this context is for us (the Working Group) to define the scope of the Workstation product. 14:37:09 jwb: whats the alternative - google docs ? 14:37:15 ryanlerch: Yes 14:37:18 ryanlerch, yes 14:37:19 final doc doc wiki? 14:37:20 * mclasen can already hear the 'think of the children' screams 14:37:24 ryanlerch, the scope and the requirements 14:37:37 s/doc doc/doc on/ 14:38:09 jwb, to what level of detail? High-level lofty scope, or specific, discrete requirements? 14:38:18 mclasen, sgallagh: ok, so middle ground. send it to the list in wiki syntax format so that once we get the initial discussion settled and something mostly agreed on, we can stick it up on the wiki 14:38:23 * mclasen would be fine with going old-school and sending actual text (gasp) via email 14:38:43 mclasen, right. text via email to start the discussion, the move it to the wiki when it gets more finalized 14:38:45 sticking on the wiki afterwards sounds right 14:39:09 ryanlerch, my idea is that we need to do a bit of both. Both set the overall direction, but of course this being a working group things also needs to be concrete enough for us to take action 14:39:33 yes 14:39:55 right. and that should also enable us to eventually highlight dependencies we have on other groups, like rel-eng, QA, etc 14:40:02 what mailing list are we talking about here now? desktop@lists.fedoraproject.org, right? 14:40:07 cwickert, yes 14:40:09 k 14:40:56 #action jwb to send initial draft of governance document to the mailing list for discussion 14:41:14 #action cschalle_ to send intial draft of PRD to the mailing list for discussion 14:42:05 i think, perhaps, that once we get _something_ to look over things might become a bit clearer 14:42:13 and we can work from there 14:42:33 yeah, I think without something concrete we would just end up tilting at windmills here :) 14:42:38 also, it's my job (because i'm crazy) to take what we produce and talk to FESCo about it to make sure we're meeting what they want to see from us, etc 14:42:56 so as i do that, i'll be able to provide feedback from them and vice versa 14:43:33 great 14:43:42 does that clear up, to a degree anyway, what we need to start discussing? 14:44:01 * cwickert thinks so 14:44:31 good 14:45:13 let's save the meeting thing for another day. i think our meeting needs will work themselves out based on how we're working on the lists and in the channel 14:45:24 so we'll move to open floor for just a few min 14:45:31 #topic Open Floor 14:45:38 agreed, I mean we could just agree that you can set up meetings based on need for the time being 14:45:48 cschalle_, right. 14:46:05 so anyone have any questions/comments for open floor? 14:46:36 "What have we gotten ourselves into?" :) 14:46:52 I still feel as hadess also suggested earlier that maybe we need a separate mailing-list for the WG sooner or later 14:46:54 sgallagh, :) 14:47:05 are we scoping for multiple desktops or not then? 14:47:08 sgallagh: :) 14:47:09 and how would that work? 14:47:14 will we take a xmas break ? :-) 14:47:18 Joking aside, it's probably fair to ask at this point if, now that people understand the scope of what's being asked of them, are they still okay with being a part of it? 14:47:23 hadess: I think the prd draft will speak to that 14:47:40 my only comment would be we should try to limit the amount of procedure and rules in governance to a minimum 14:47:44 hadess, I would assume so 14:47:46 mclasen, it's really a yes or no question, we don't already have an inkling? 14:48:08 I think we're defining a single product, with a single user experience 14:48:24 a single product? 14:48:28 juhp, and how would that work then? i don't see an integrated experience happening if we have multiple desktops 14:48:29 I would like to have a focus on a single product as well 14:48:34 with rules for how alternative user experiences can be installed 14:48:36 Like, "there can only be one desktop"? 14:48:39 mclasen: that doesn't contradict having choice 14:48:40 mclasen: (for clarity) Does that mean a single desktop, or multiple desktops with a mandate to share a default theme that looks the same? 14:48:56 hadess: I would assume the opposite of juhp that we are *not* scoping multiple desktops, but there may be coordination to do with people working on other desktops 14:48:58 sgallagh, bluecurve? 14:49:09 I don't want to start a desktop fight, but I wonder if ltinkl and me the only none-gnome folks here. correct? 14:49:09 cwickert: no, not "there can only be one desktop" -- Workstation would be one single product, and other groups are free to produce secondary products 14:49:11 hadess: I was thinking CDE, myself ;-) 14:49:14 sgallagh, user experience != theme 14:49:34 ryanlerch: Sure, I understand that 14:49:50 ok, so the question everyone is asking here is "Are we going to use GNOME for the product", right? 14:49:59 so only one WS spin with gnome? 14:50:13 lets have this discuss on the basis of the PRD, I think there can be a lot of nuances and short IRC sentences are not a great way to deal with them 14:50:40 cschalle_, agreed 14:50:46 * ltinkl personally hates the "spins" concept 14:50:58 true 14:51:14 ltinkl, spins, as they exist today, are kind of bad, yes. they need to change with fedora having 3 products anyway 14:51:16 I really think there should be one (tm) workstation product but otoh, that doesn't rule out (imho) having choice as for the actual desktop 14:51:40 i don't see what nuances you can introduce in a yes/no question, but i'll wait for the prd 14:51:58 so sgallagh, FESCo needs to start thinking about what 3 products means for spins. or the board i guess ;) 14:52:12 but, thankfully, that isn't the WG's problem to solve. 14:52:36 jwb: Part of the original discussion we had at Flock around this was on that topic. I can speak to it a bit if you like. 14:52:47 see, majority of other distros doesn't force you pick the desktop at the moment you press the Download button 14:53:08 sgallagh: actually I would like to discuss this a bit 14:53:30 sgallagh, please 14:53:37 sgallagh: go ahead :) 14:53:58 What we discussed was that we might want to take a page out of Ubuntu's book here and encourage downstream distributions (e.g. Kubuntu) rather than treating spins as a formal part of the Fedora Project. So these would be their own communities that could elect to use the Fedora Project's packages (and possibly build-system to seed themselves) 14:54:01 ltinkl, if we're trying to replicate what other distributions are doing, we've failed already 14:54:23 Note: this is not an approved proposal, it's just the summary of the discussions we had. I haven't formalized it enough to take it to the Board. 14:54:28 hadess: no but we're trying to (at least I hope) give the users the freedom of choice 14:54:31 ltinkl, we're competing against highly integrated OSes, that's OSX, Windows 8... 14:54:48 hadess: do you really think so? :o) 14:55:02 ltinkl, they can choose not to use the more targeted workstation product too 14:55:03 * juhp was also wondering if other spins might be left for SIGs and secondary WGs etc 14:55:13 declaring we've failed before we've even started anything is not helpful. please avoid absolutes and try and assume we're going to work this out 14:55:25 jwb, "if" 14:55:35 ltinkl: choice will always be available - we're just trying to get beyond choice being the defining characteristic 14:56:01 mclasen, that's actually a really good way to look at it, imo 14:56:03 ltinkl: Users given too *many* choices become confused too. It's a balancing act. 14:56:22 that's the status quo of the Fedora website imo :) 14:56:26 I'm inclined to suggest that we want to offer a simple, integrated solution and allow (and assist) downstream distros in creating those choices instead. 14:57:28 i think that we really need to define the broad goal of the WG before we start these kinds of discussions. If the goal is something akin to "a consistent user experience for a desktop product" then that is obviously going to impact the if this working group is focusing on a single desktop or multiples, right? 14:57:29 I don't like the concept of downstream at all 14:57:40 ryanlerch, yes 14:58:13 another major constraint is QA 14:58:38 3 products is going to stretch QA a lot 14:58:43 they're aware 14:58:46 Back at Flock, the general thought we had on this product was this: the Fedora Workstation should be the best platform out there for developing software IN Fedora and ON Fedora. 14:58:50 so should we work on something (perhaps on the mailing list) like a goal of defining our purpose in a 100-200 word blurb? 14:59:12 Mission Statement? 14:59:22 juhp: That's part of why we voted to extend the Fedora 21 cycle to allow QA at least two months of time to spend exclusively on automation 14:59:32 aha 14:59:34 I mean, lets face it, the fragmentation is a problem of Ubuntu. Fortunately, we never went down that road but had one repository, one bug tracker, one community and so on. but in this community everything but GNOME was kind of a second class citizen and I'm afraid something that is considered 'downstream' will become a 3rd class citzien 14:59:37 A mission statement would be a really good idea 15:00:04 i would think a mission statement is the first part of the PRD 15:00:09 cwickert, why is is a problem? it has made Ubuntu the most popular distro by a mile 15:00:11 cwickert: From the description you just gave, I think it sounds more like being honest about the current state 15:00:52 Choice SHOULD be the defining characteristic, users who don't want to have any choices are better off with OS X or even iOS. Proprietary stuff makes choices for users, we should empower them to make their OWN choices. And as an example, AFAIK, openSUSE does fine with their desktop selection at download time. Just my 2 cents, now back to waiting for our (KDE SIG) turn for the room. ;-) 15:01:24 yeah, we're at an hour 15:01:38 ok, let's do this 15:02:05 the "mission statement" should likely be _in_ the PRD as the first thing anyway. so let's start there and we can address that first based on cschalle_'s draft 15:02:10 so, next step is: we're taking over the desktop mailing list with prd and governance discussions 15:02:16 cschalle_: are you serious? Ubuntu's popularity has a lot of reasons but I doubt that the different distributions is one of them. Do you consider say incompatible packages with the same name feasible? 15:02:20 mclasen, basically, yes 15:03:09 ok. we clearly have a lot to work through, so stretch your fingers and prepare to type :) 15:03:28 thank you all for coming today. i really look forward to working on this with everyone 15:03:32 cschalle_, sgallagh: I'd consider having no choice in Fedora a serious problem, as Kevin pointed out, we should empower our users by giving them that choice 15:03:41 jwb, thanks for chairing! 15:03:48 sgallagh: maybe, but will this become any better with the downstream approach? I mean, we have a lack of QA for alternative desktops atm, I'm afraid that downstream means we get no coverage from QA at all 15:03:58 ltinkl, me too 15:03:59 KDE is waiting. move to #fedora-workstation ;) 15:04:05 thanks all 15:04:07 #endmeeting