On Tue, 5 Oct 2021 at 17:06, Tom Stellard via llvm-dev < llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org> wrote:> - Any other information that you think will help the Board of Directors > make the best decision.- Foundation Board will have 30 days to make a final decision about using> GitHub Pull Requests and then communicate a migration plan to the community.Hi Tom, Please help me here, I think I'm severely misunderstanding what this means... I'm reading it that the "Board of Directors" will make a decision and communicate to the community, apparently through some undisclosed internal process. For example: * What about people that are on holidays during the 30 days comment period? * What if the points are not made clear after 30 days? * How do we know the IWG will correctly summarise the comments to the board? * How does the board guarantee it will take all facts in consideration without bias? * What kind of recourse would the community have if the decision alienates a large part of the developers? Please understand that I'm not assuming malice *at all*. We're all humans, and in the effort to make some change happen we quite often let unconscious bias be the merits of our decisions. For context... Since its inception[1], the foundation has always steered away from technical decisions, always referring to the llvm-dev list for those. Previous long running contentious issues (Github, monorepo, CoC) were all decided by the community, in the llvm-dev list, and executed by the foundation. Recent discussions about the mailing list, irc, discord, discourse have emphasised that, even with an infrastructure working group, the views of the community are still too hard to predict and make it work for the majority. Neither the board of directors, nor the IWG are wide and diverse enough to make decisions that take most people's views into consideration. That is why we still rely on the dev list for large technical discussions and decisions. Code review and bug tracking are very much technical decisions. Not code directly, but how we all work. And there are a lot of us. Giving feedback and having no insight into the decision making process will certainly divide the community even more, if we're forced to accept whatever outcome. I can't see how this "solves" the problem of never-ending discussions, other than further fragmenting the community. cheers, --renato [1] http://blog.llvm.org/2014/04/the-llvm-foundation.html -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/attachments/20211005/2e925010/attachment.html>
On 10/5/21 9:47 AM, Renato Golin wrote:> On Tue, 5 Oct 2021 at 17:06, Tom Stellard via llvm-dev <llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org <mailto:llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org>> wrote: > > - Any other information that you think will help the Board of Directors make the best decision. > > - Foundation Board will have 30 days to make a final decision about using GitHub Pull Requests and then communicate a migration plan to the community. > > > Hi Tom, > > Please help me here, I think I'm severely misunderstanding what this means... > > I'm reading it that the "Board of Directors" will make a decision and communicate to the community, apparently through some undisclosed internal process. > > For example: > * What about people that are on holidays during the 30 days comment period? > * What if the points are not made clear after 30 days? > * How do we know the IWG will correctly summarise the comments to the board? > * How does the board guarantee it will take all facts in consideration without bias? > * What kind of recourse would the community have if the decision alienates a large part of the developers? > > Please understand that I'm not assuming malice *at all*. We're all humans, and in the effort to make some change happen we quite often let unconscious bias be the merits of our decisions. > > For context... > > Since its inception[1], the foundation has always steered away from technical decisions, always referring to the llvm-dev list for those. Previous long running contentious issues (Github, monorepo, CoC) were all decided by the community, in the llvm-dev list, and executed by the foundation. >In my opinion, this is not a technical issue. The Board owns the infrastructure for the project and is responsible for ensuring that it is well maintained and functional. From the blog post: "The LLVM Foundation" will allow us to: - Solve infrastructure problems. This is what we are doing here. The project is very much at risk by using a self-hosted, unmaintained code review tool. We really need to move forward with a more robust solution otherwise we risk a major disruption to the community.> Recent discussions about the mailing list, irc, discord, discourse have emphasised that, even with an infrastructure working group, the views of the community are still too hard to predict and make it work for the majority. Neither the board of directors, nor the IWG are wide and diverse enough to make decisions that take most people's views into consideration. That is why we still rely on the dev list for large technical discussions and decisions. > > Code review and bug tracking are very much technical decisions. Not code directly, but how we all work. And there are a lot of us. Giving feedback and having no insight into the decision making process will certainly divide the community even more, if we're forced to accept whatever outcome. >What additional information about the decision making process would you like to see? -Tom> I can't see how this "solves" the problem of never-ending discussions, other than further fragmenting the community. > > cheers, > --renato > > [1] http://blog.llvm.org/2014/04/the-llvm-foundation.html <http://blog.llvm.org/2014/04/the-llvm-foundation.html>
+1 to Renato's response here. I had the same thought, and Renato phrased it much better than I'd have managed. Philip On 10/5/21 9:47 AM, Renato Golin via llvm-dev wrote:> On Tue, 5 Oct 2021 at 17:06, Tom Stellard via llvm-dev > <llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org <mailto:llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org>> wrote: > > - Any other information that you think will help the Board of > Directors make the best decision. > > - Foundation Board will have 30 days to make a final decision > about using GitHub Pull Requests and then communicate a migration > plan to the community. > > > Hi Tom, > > Please help me here, I think I'm severely misunderstanding what this > means... > > I'm reading it that the "Board of Directors" will make a decision and > communicate to the community, apparently through some undisclosed > internal process. > > For example: > * What about people that are on holidays during the 30 days comment > period? > * What if the points are not made clear after 30 days? > * How do we know the IWG will correctly summarise the comments to the > board? > * How does the board guarantee it will take all facts in > consideration without bias? > * What kind of recourse would the community have if the decision > alienates a large part of the developers? > > Please understand that I'm not assuming malice *at all*. We're all > humans, and in the effort to make some change happen we quite often > let unconscious bias be the merits of our decisions. > > For context... > > Since its inception[1], the foundation has always steered away from > technical decisions, always referring to the llvm-dev list for those. > Previous long running contentious issues (Github, monorepo, CoC) were > all decided by the community, in the llvm-dev list, and executed by > the foundation. > > Recent discussions about the mailing list, irc, discord, discourse > have emphasised that, even with an infrastructure working group, the > views of the community are still too hard to predict and make it work > for the majority. Neither the board of directors, nor the IWG are wide > and diverse enough to make decisions that take most people's views > into consideration. That is why we still rely on the dev list for > large technical discussions and decisions. > > Code review and bug tracking are very much technical decisions. Not > code directly, but how we all work. And there are a lot of us. Giving > feedback and having no insight into the decision making process will > certainly divide the community even more, if we're forced to accept > whatever outcome. > > I can't see how this "solves" the problem of never-ending discussions, > other than further fragmenting the community. > > cheers, > --renato > > [1] http://blog.llvm.org/2014/04/the-llvm-foundation.html > <http://blog.llvm.org/2014/04/the-llvm-foundation.html> > > _______________________________________________ > LLVM Developers mailing list > llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org > https://lists.llvm.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/llvm-dev-------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/attachments/20211005/e15de523/attachment.html>
Reid Kleckner via llvm-dev
2021-Oct-07 20:48 UTC
[llvm-dev] [cfe-dev] RFC: Code Review Process
On Tue, Oct 5, 2021 at 9:48 AM Renato Golin via cfe-dev < cfe-dev at lists.llvm.org> wrote:> On Tue, 5 Oct 2021 at 17:06, Tom Stellard via llvm-dev < > llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org> wrote: > >> - Any other information that you think will help the Board of Directors >> make the best decision. > > - Foundation Board will have 30 days to make a final decision about using >> GitHub Pull Requests and then communicate a migration plan to the community. > > > Hi Tom, > > Please help me here, I think I'm severely misunderstanding what this > means... > > I'm reading it that the "Board of Directors" will make a decision and > communicate to the community, apparently through some undisclosed internal > process. > ... >I want to take the other side here, and say that I appreciate that the board is trying to provide more structure for this decision making process. I don't think the board is trying to step in and take ownership of the decision, they are trying to solicit input and reflect it back to LLVM developers in an efficient way. It has long been clear that LLVM needs a more effective process for building consensus and making decisions, and in the absence of that, the board came up with this ad hoc process. That seems very reasonable to me. For everyone else who has suggestions on how we could run our infra better, my understanding is that you can get involved in the infrastructure working group by emailing iwg at llvm.org. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/attachments/20211007/f655efe1/attachment.html>