Re: [HACKERS] Decision Process WAS: Increased company involvement

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Josh Berkus [mailto:josh(at)agliodbs(dot)com]
> Sent: Monday, May 02, 2005 1:21 PM
> To: Bruce Momjian
> Cc: Marc G. Fournier; PostgreSQL advocacy; Dave Held;
> PostgreSQL-development
> Subject: Re: [pgsql-advocacy] [HACKERS] Decision Process WAS:
> Increased
> company involvement
>
> [...]
> Hmmm ... why does everyone assume that Core does more than
> what we do? I think that most people would be surprised by
> how *little* traffic there is on the pgsql-core mailing list.

Well, I never said that core runs around saving the world. I
mostly made the point that core developers have special
influence, and that should be considered when contributing to
Postgres, which is directly relevant to the point of the
thread, which was originally called "Increased company
involvement."

> Core decides on releases, and approves committers.
> Occasionally we'll handle something which requires
> confidentiality, like a security issue or a new
> corporate participant.

Which is also something that new would-be corporate
contributors should know about.

> [...]
> Materially, what's accepted is decided through open
> discussion on the pgsql-hackers list; even Tom brings
> up his patches for discussion before commit, and I'd
> defy you to point to even one patch which was accepted
> by consensus on pgsql-hackers and not committed.

But this misses the point. The point is that consensus is
often an iterative process, and even if a few people support
an idea at first, in the end, the weight of a few "inner
circle" people (whether they be core or patch approvers
or whatnot) tends to sway the consensus in a certain
direction. This isn't always bad, especially if those
core people simply know more about the internals of
Postgres to have better judgement. It is bad if the person
making the proposal doesn't feel he/she has good odds in
defending the proposal and gives up without a fight.

> As you've already observed, if Tom doesn't like something
> it's very unlikely to get through. But that's true for
> a lot of major contributors; the consensus process we use
> provides ample opportunities to veto and slender
> opportunities to pass.

This also misses another point. I'm not saying that the
current process is inherently flawed. It's probably about as
good as any OSS project. My point is that it's not *democratic*,
and that outsiders wishing to contribute should understand
the dynamic of the process that is not explicitly and officially
spelled out anywhere.

> [...]
> From my perspective, this is a good thing for a database
> system which can get easily broken by an ill-considered
> patch. It's *good* for us to be development-conservative.

Right. I agree. I'm not criticising the process as a whole,
and I've more or less made this exact point myself.

> So there is an "insider group", but it's the group of major
> contributors.

That is exactly my point, but you said it better.

> Tom has the loudest voice because he writes the most code.
> The fact that Tom, Bruce or Peter's veto is often as far as
> a proposal goes is simply because most of the pgsql-hackers
> subscribers simply don't involve themselves in the process
> unless it's one of their own pet features.

Which is perfectly understandable. You can probaby guess that
most people who use Postgres haven't tried to implement an
RDBMS themselves, and have only a shallow understanding of the
details.

> And the important thing about the group of major contributors
> is that membership is open.

Which may be true philosophically, but in practice, most people
who contribute will not have the resources or motivation to
become a major contributor. I do not mean to imply that this
is necessarily a bad thing; but I think it is the true state of
affairs, and part of the dynamic which must be understood by
someone considering investing in Postgres as a contributor.

> [...]
> If people want the acceptance process to be more "democratic",
> then those people have to be willing to do the work of full
> participation.

That actually doesn't make it more democratic. In a democracy,
everyone has an equal vote regardless of their status. The point
is that a democracy is not always a priori the best form of
organization. What you describe is actually a meritocracy,
and for a project like Postgres, it makes a lot of sense. But
that merely reinforces my point that contributors need to
understand that if their pet feature they create is not in line
with core thinking, they will have to earn the credibility to
get community buy-in.

> [...]
> (P.S. on a complete tangent, "call a spade a spade" is
> actually a racist expression originating in the
> reconstruction-era South. "spade" does not mean garden tool
> but is a derogatory slang term for black people.
> [...]

Interesting. Duly noted.

__
David B. Held
Software Engineer/Array Services Group
200 14th Ave. East, Sartell, MN 56377
320.534.3637 320.253.7800 800.752.8129