RE: [eclipse.org-architecture-council] Minutes from today's call

["Schaefer, Doug" <Doug.Schaefer@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I'm certainly not blaming anyone but myself for missing the meeting. The culture we have in the CDT is "I want feature X" and we say "great, where's the patch". I want to be reminded about the meetings and I'm sure I can patch outlook myself to do that.

 

At either rate, I'm just sad I missed the meeting. I didn't realize e4 was on the agenda. Rather than polling the arch council site for agenda updates, it would be nice to know before hand. For example, if you have a big topic to talk about, let us know on the list so we can prepare before the meeting. Which also sounds like a good process for architecture changes at Eclipse ;).

 

DougS.

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From: eclipse.org-architecture-council-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:eclipse.org-architecture-council-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Bjorn Freeman-Benson
Sent: Thursday, March 13, 2008 2:00 PM
To: eclipse.org-architecture-council
Subject: Re: [eclipse.org-architecture-council] Minutes from today's call

More about my comment in the minutes about "meeting reminders"... I actually think this is in an important point. Specifically, the Architecture Council (and other bodies) have been ineffective in the past because we (collectively) have taken a passive approach: "I'll wait for someone to invite me, I'll comment on a proposal, but I won't be actively involved". We, the leaders of Eclipse, need to encourage an active approach and that means we also need to take an active approach. We want the larger Eclipse community to think "I want feature X in the Platform, that means that *I* need to provide feature X". We suffer too much from "I want feature X, so I'll tell McQ that I want feature X and then I'll whine when it doesn't show up"... That's just not going to work anymore (not that it really did in the past).  We, Eclipse, need a greater, active, code writing, involvement in e4. Thus, we, the AC need to promote a greater, active, involvement. Thus, we, the AC, cannot sit around and say "nobody reminded me of this meeting" - the dates have all been published in advance. If you/we need more than that, someone needs to step up and take responsibility for that - waiting around for "someone else to do it" is symptomatic of a the larger problem.

Now, what we, the AC, can do is to help projects understand the roadblocks they are putting up against such greater involvement. Is there an architectural issue that is making more activity difficult? Is there a process issue? Is there a perception issue? ... That's where I think the AC can take an active role in encouraging more active participation by the larger community. Not just "lists of requested features", but actual code.

Anyway, that's my rant for the day...
- Bjorn

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