| Time |
Nick |
Message |
| 15:24 |
meeting |
Meeting started Tue Oct 26 15:24:49 2010 UTC. The chair is walterbender. Information about MeetBot at http://wiki.debian.org/MeetBot. |
| 15:24 |
|
Useful Commands: #action #agreed #help #info #idea #link #topic #endmeeting |
| 15:24 |
walterbender |
Welcome everyone. |
| 15:25 |
CanoeBerry |
I'm away for the 1st half of Haiti fyi! |
| 15:25 |
|
I'm away for the 1st half of (November, in) Haiti fyi! |
| 15:25 |
|
Offline.. |
| 15:26 |
walterbender |
#topic state of Sugar Labs |
| 15:27 |
|
As you all know, Tomeu's departure has let to lots of introspection and 'blunt' emails :) |
| 15:28 |
|
I am in the middle of writing a Sugar Digest blog about all of this... I was hoping to finish before this meeting and use it as a strawman for the discussion |
| 15:29 |
|
I was responding to Yioryos's post, where he outlined the need for clarity around 4 topics |
| 15:29 |
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* Clearly defined aims |
| 15:29 |
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* Clearly defined road map |
| 15:29 |
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* Clearly defined tools/methods of implementation |
| 15:29 |
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* Clearly defined, tangible, milestones and annual _external_ evaluation |
| 15:30 |
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What do others think of this as a way to frame the discussion? |
| 15:32 |
cjb |
I think they bring up the debate about whether we're a company with goals and milestones and schedules, or a group of volunteers that can only be gently directed towards doing anything in particular |
| 15:34 |
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lucian <lucian!~lucian 78-86-217-168.zone2.bethere.co.uk> has joined #sugar-meeting |
| 15:35 |
walterbender |
cjb: I think there is a middle ground... |
| 15:35 |
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cjb: every project needs goals |
| 15:35 |
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and every individual will have their personal goals |
| 15:36 |
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cjb: but without a clear set of overall objectives, it makes it harder to contribute IMHO |
| 15:36 |
cjb |
yep |
| 15:37 |
bernie |
reads backlog |
| 15:37 |
walterbender |
I may be mistaken, but I don't think there is so much controversy over our overall goals |
| 15:38 |
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but in terms of tools/methods of implementation, we touch on hot buttons |
| 15:40 |
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re road maps, personally, I think we have a good release process |
| 15:40 |
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but we lack an architectural document |
| 15:42 |
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I am less certain about the evaluation situation |
| 15:43 |
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Well, this approach is obviously not getting much reaction... |
| 15:43 |
[scs] |
walterbender: hi Walter, and all |
| 15:43 |
walterbender |
hi [scs] |
| 15:43 |
bernie |
[scs]: hello! |
| 15:44 |
cjb |
walterbender: we seem to generally be in bad shape with SLOBs; we're not (other than you) doing or writing much |
| 15:44 |
[scs] |
walterbender: I would like to ask what would be evaluated? the development process, or the impact of Sugar on learning? |
| 15:44 |
cjb |
(I'm not sure why.) |
| 15:45 |
[scs] |
walterbender: here in PY we are beginning efforts to conduct a pedagogical evaluation for a 3 year cohort |
| 15:46 |
bernie |
[scs]: VERY interesting! do you think the results could be published (in our wiki or elsewhere?) |
| 15:46 |
christophd |
[scs]: excellent news! |
| 15:47 |
bernie |
christophd: hey dude! |
| 15:47 |
christophd |
bernie: hola |
| 15:47 |
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satellit_ has quit IRC |
| 15:47 |
walterbender |
[scs]: I had a long conversation with Pacita about the baseline interviews |
| 15:47 |
[scs] |
bernie: I am not sure, we would have a baseline by March 2011, and results 3 years after that |
| 15:48 |
|
walterbender: I think my question has to do more with what goals do teachers have in common with the development gurus at SugarLabs, and hence what would be evaluated in terms of overall impact |
| 15:48 |
bernie |
walterbender: marcopg also made the same observation that last week, we totally lack a technical roadmap. |
| 15:48 |
CanoeBerry |
MUCH discussion of evaluation in SF over the past 4 days, with various folks bringing actual data soon. |
| 15:48 |
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Mailing lists are insufficient to bring this discussion forward. |
| 15:49 |
|
In person clearly far more effective ;) |
| 15:49 |
christophd |
CanoeBerry: who in particular will be bringing forth that information? I mean, who really has the data? |
| 15:49 |
walterbender |
we need to mesh the pedagogical observations with our technical roadmap |
| 15:49 |
bernie |
[scs]: as you know, we have some sort of disconnection between educators and engineers in the Sugar (and OLPC) ecosystem |
| 15:50 |
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| 15:52 |
[scs] |
bernie: yes, we are trying to address that at the deployment level, many discussions with christophd too about this... :) |
| 15:52 |
CanoeBerry |
christophd: i was not part of these talks sadly, as the mother hen is quite exhausted here inducing others to have these many successful conversations, but i personally overheard at least 2 countries in Asia, and 2 deployments in Latin/Carib preparing various research. |
| 15:53 |
tch |
hello amigos |
| 15:53 |
bernie |
tch: hola! |
| 15:53 |
[scs] |
tch: bounjour |
| 15:54 |
christophd |
tch: hola |
| 15:54 |
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CanoeBerry: thx for the info |
| 15:54 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: I don't know of any major or minor deployment that isn't conducting some sort of research... |
| 15:54 |
christophd |
CanoeBerry: (and get some rest;) |
| 15:55 |
walterbender |
but we should better leverage these efforts to get more data re Sugar itself if possible |
| 15:55 |
|
in .py rgs and morgan have been doing some work along those lines |
| 15:55 |
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satellit__ <satellit__!~satellit2002:d064:95e7:0:924c:e5ff:fe84:8dec> has joined #sugar-meeting |
| 15:55 |
CanoeBerry |
Exactly. The good news is these folks are getting organized, and much closer to communicate different observations after 3 yrs. |
| 15:55 |
walterbender |
looks forward to reading up on what was discussed in SF |
| 15:56 |
christophd |
also does |
| 15:56 |
CanoeBerry |
Summary notes are all public here: |
| 15:56 |
|
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC[…]edule_of_sessions |
| 15:56 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: the bad news is that the 'instruments' we have provided in the past are too crude... morgan will have many holes in her data, alas |
| 15:57 |
CanoeBerry |
The more folks clean these up in coming days, the merrier. |
| 15:57 |
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satellit_ <satellit_!~satellit2002:d064:95e7:0:219:d1ff:fe73:14e6> has joined #sugar-meeting |
| 15:57 |
walterbender |
but we are perhaps being too focused on details... |
| 15:57 |
|
git vs trac vs email review of patches :) |
| 15:58 |
garycmartin |
christophd: Did you see Pierre Varly's latest report at: http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC[…]_OLPC_Evaluations ? |
| 15:58 |
walterbender |
overall, how are we doing? is Sugar a house of cards or are we built on a more substantial foundation? |
| 15:58 |
garycmartin |
christophd: "What for? What has been done, what could be done? (PDF), October 22nd 2010" |
| 15:58 |
bernie |
walterbender: I think Sugar (the project) has done quite well this year. |
| 15:59 |
cjb |
walterbender: you're setting a pretty low bar there :) |
| 15:59 |
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silbe <silbe!~silbe2001:6f8:120a::2> has joined #sugar-meeting |
| 15:59 |
christophd |
garycmartin: yeah, I did, couldn't make much sense of it though |
| 15:59 |
bernie |
walterbender: I would dare saying that this year Sugar matured more than ever before. |
| 15:59 |
|
silbe: hello |
| 16:00 |
cjb |
I think that Sugar isn't a house of cards, but SLOBs isn't providing very effective leadership/facilitation, and we seem to have trouble attracting/retaining new contributors, which is why it's hurting so much when a developer who's been around for years decides to move on |
| 16:00 |
silbe |
bernie: hi! :) |
| 16:01 |
bernie |
walterbender: as for Sugar Labs, we seem to have some organizational problems and discontent. |
| 16:01 |
CanoeBerry |
Yes: Release 10.1.2 and Dextrose give people HOPE this year like never before.. partic when Bernie is hopped up selling it ;) |
| 16:02 |
bernie |
cjb: agreed, but I would separate the first part of your sentence from the second. I don't think that strong leadership and welcoming contributors need to go together. |
| 16:03 |
cjb |
that sounds right |
| 16:03 |
bernie |
cjb: sunday I spoke with 3 people of the Wikimedia foundation: they basically told me that they have 50 people and they do *nothing* to interfere with what the community does. |
| 16:03 |
cjb |
I wasn't implying a direct causality |
| 16:03 |
bernie |
cjb: their job is to make the infrastructure work and get out of the way. |
| 16:03 |
|
cjb: they don't even participate (much) in the development of Mediawiki. they told me that it happens almost entirely outside the foundation. |
| 16:04 |
cjb |
mediawiki is an extremely dysfunctional project |
| 16:04 |
bernie |
cjb: so I think we could solve our organizational issues in the *opposite* way of what everybody suggests: by doing less., |
| 16:04 |
cjb |
almost no-one is working on it, in part because they don't have anyone at the foundation reviewing patches or providing technical leadership |
| 16:04 |
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bernie: talk to mako |
| 16:04 |
walterbender |
bernie: I am not sure that Sugar Labs can be so remote from our codebase... |
| 16:05 |
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or our deployments |
| 16:05 |
cjb |
even the wikimedia foundation would tell us not to copy anything from the mediawiki project, I'd bet |
| 16:05 |
bernie |
cjb: I just did... he basically confirmed this and told me that if I wanted to know how Wikipedia works I should have asked the community |
| 16:06 |
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As for us, I feel that we could just state the obvious truth: that the Oversight Board isn't an executive organ and Sugar Labs isn't a company. |
| 16:06 |
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As Tomeu described it in the past, we simply provide a *place* where the community can get together to work on Sugar and related projects. |
| 16:06 |
walterbender |
bernie: I think we provide more than just the place |
| 16:06 |
CanoeBerry |
bernie+walterbender+cjv: if you really care about community-foundation relations (Wikipedia has NOT solved this!) you need to join our Wedn night reading group at Harvard/Berkman.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U[…]man_Reading_Group |
| 16:07 |
bernie |
Now, if we need vision, perhaps Paraguay Educa, Activity Central, OLPC can provide theirs. |
| 16:07 |
CanoeBerry |
bernie+walterbender+cjb: if you really care about community-foundation relations (Wikipedia has NOT solved this!) you need to join our Wedn night reading group at Harvard/Berkman.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U[…]man_Reading_Group |
| 16:07 |
walterbender |
bernie: It is not clear to me that those visions can be so simply decoupled from Sugar Labs... |
| 16:08 |
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bernie: they can fork of course |
| 16:09 |
bernie |
walterbender: would we be welcoming to entities with diverging visions? |
| 16:09 |
walterbender |
but given my recent conversations with Paraguay Educa and OLPC, I don't think that is what they are considering... they want more rather than less synergy with Sugar Labs and the community. |
| 16:09 |
|
bernie: diverging visions are a reality in every project... |
| 16:09 |
bernie |
walterbender: I think we should... as long as the goals are not diametrically opposed to ours |
| 16:10 |
walterbender |
bernie: but we provide a well from which these projects can drink |
| 16:10 |
bernie |
walterbender: (we should be welcoming, that is) |
| 16:10 |
christophd |
walterbender: out of curiosity - as you mention talks with OLPC - what is your role at OLPC these days? |
| 16:10 |
[scs] |
chiming in again... what about maintaining the releases of Sugar? here in PY we have a majority of schools were we need a stable release with little or no bugs |
| 16:10 |
walterbender |
bernie: I don't see us as unwelcoming to our deployments... but I am probably wrong in some cases, given the flaming we've been seeing... |
| 16:11 |
|
[scs]: every deployment needs stability |
| 16:11 |
[scs] |
only one or two schools are good grounds for new (buggy) releases, where students and teachers like those types of challenges |
| 16:11 |
walterbender |
[scs]: and no one wants bugs |
| 16:11 |
bernie |
[scs]: I think this is better done with projects such as Dextrose rather than the upstream releases. |
| 16:11 |
walterbender |
[scs]: the question is how best to achieve those goals |
| 16:12 |
bernie |
[scs]: analogously, users install Ubuntu and not the tarballs released by the Gnome Foundation. |
| 16:12 |
walterbender |
bernie: I don't disagree... but Dextrose would not exist were it not also for the existence of the upstream project |
| 16:12 |
bernie |
[scs]: Sugar is very much like Gnome imho... not useful by itself until a downstream project (company or deployment) does the necessary QA and integration steps. |
| 16:13 |
walterbender |
so the question remains, how do we work together? |
| 16:13 |
bernie |
walterbender: of course... and Dextrose found shelter within Sugar Labs too... alongside SoaS and USR |
| 16:13 |
|
walterbender: well, USR is probably mostly in Launchpad, but I guess it would be welcome here too. |
| 16:13 |
walterbender |
bernie: [scs] can correct me, but I didn't sense great angst about Sugar Labs when I was in .py last week. |
| 16:14 |
cjb |
[scs]: you're aware that OLPC (via erikos) is maintaining a stable version of Sugar? |
| 16:14 |
walterbender |
bernie: the conversations were all about how do we further our mutual goals of providing great tools for kids |
| 16:14 |
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and how can we learn from each other... |
| 16:15 |
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bernie: and how can SL help promote these goals in the region... |
| 16:15 |
satellit_ |
don't forget opensuse-edu and trisquel and others.... |
| 16:15 |
walterbender |
bernie: I spent more time with politicians than engineers on my trip |
| 16:15 |
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satellit_ +1 |
| 16:16 |
CanoeBerry |
Family squabbles in indicate we have a family. |
| 16:16 |
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Then there is money.. |
| 16:16 |
|
What's our financial situation today? |
| 16:17 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: I gave up last time I tried to decipher it :/ |
| 16:17 |
CanoeBerry |
Hmm |
| 16:18 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: with the exception of the Gould grant which is specifically targeted to SoaS trials, we have essentially $0. |
| 16:18 |
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(a little GSoC mentor travel money) |
| 16:18 |
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CanoeBerry: then again, we have never had any money |
| 16:18 |
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I just got yet another grant rejected... this one by USAID. |
| 16:18 |
bernie |
walterbender: what would the people you spoke with expect from us? |
| 16:19 |
walterbender |
the reviewers all loved it, or so they said, but they rejected it none the less. |
| 16:19 |
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bernie: expect or hope to get? |
| 16:19 |
bernie |
walterbender: I mean, how can we help them promote our common goals in their area? |
| 16:20 |
walterbender |
bernie: for example, Seba, Roberto, and I met with an important foundation in .py. We are preparing a proposal together. |
| 16:20 |
bernie |
walterbender: we have the Local Labs thing, but some deployments have been shy about it because they ask what it implies to be a local lab and our answer is more or less: "you get few web services under COUNTRYCODE.sugarlabs.org" |
| 16:20 |
dfarning |
I would ask that everyone talk a minute and reread this entire. occasional someone raises a concern to which Walter responds, 'It ok because i had a conversation with...." |
| 16:21 |
[scs] |
walterbender: the goal of maintenance seems to be of importance to Roberto, this I suppose is something we should address through OLPC then, as indicated by cjb? |
| 16:22 |
walterbender |
[scs]: OLPC certainly has an important role to play regarding maintenance and they have been hiring of late, e.g., Erikos |
| 16:22 |
|
[scs]: but .py has a role to play as well... and has been playing that role by having established a strong local team. |
| 16:23 |
|
[scs]: IMHO, one role SL plays is to help ensure these various efforts are somewhat in synch, so that everyone benefits |
| 16:24 |
CanoeBerry |
Agenda request before we end this meeting: when / how will Sugar Labs election take place? |
| 16:24 |
walterbender |
[scs]: this may be something we are not doing well... but it seems to me what a community as opposed to an individual effort can do |
| 16:24 |
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CanoeBerry: Luke tells me, 1 Nov. (whereas I had thought 1 Oct.) |
| 16:25 |
|
Perhaps we should end the 'official' meeting as we are well past the hour. |
| 16:25 |
|
I am traveling again next week... shall we plan to meet again in two weeks? |
| 16:25 |
CanoeBerry |
Last year the election took place aover about 2 weeks -- what will the time period be this year? |
| 16:26 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: I believe so |
| 16:26 |
CanoeBerry |
What timeframe? |
| 16:26 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: what timeframe for what? |
| 16:26 |
CanoeBerry |
During what timeframe will the election run? |
| 16:26 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: the first 2 weeks of Nov |
| 16:27 |
CanoeBerry |
OK, I may not be able to vote, being offline then, but that is OK. |
| 16:27 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: I will reconfirm with Luke |
| 16:27 |
|
CanoeBerry: maybe Mako can add a provision for absentee ballots to his system |
| 16:27 |
[scs] |
walterbender: a local lab in Paraguay would be great, especially if it gets funding from Itaipú |
| 16:27 |
walterbender |
[scs]: yes... |
| 16:28 |
|
[scs]: maybe it is wrong, but the decision we made at SL was to try to develop local, self-sustaining groups to be the real presence of Sugar regionally |
| 16:29 |
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I find that the efforts of Paraguay Educ, Ceibal Jam, et al. as a harbinger for our future growth and stability |
| 16:29 |
CanoeBerry |
Yes Paraguay Educa's doing that.. one of the only groups worldwide to take this seriously, hiring a volunteer coordinator (Carla / CCR) |
| 16:30 |
|
Tomeu would be proud. |
| 16:30 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: I think OZ is beginning to step up |
| 16:30 |
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CanoeBerry: and Ceibal as well |
| 16:30 |
bernie |
walterbender: there's no way we can accept new candidates for the board elections? |
| 16:30 |
walterbender |
and in .pe they are beginning to understand the value of the community |
| 16:30 |
CanoeBerry |
walterbender: Interesting, put me in touch if you can. |
| 16:30 |
bernie |
walterbender: Claudia Urrea and Pacita Peña both missed the deadline. |
| 16:31 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: it takes time... and your great example |
| 16:31 |
|
bernie: I wasn't aware they were interested in applying... |
| 16:31 |
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bernie: but I think it would be unfair to reopen the ballot. |
| 16:31 |
CanoeBerry |
bernie's got a great point -- elections without promotion are meaningless |
| 16:32 |
|
participation requires promotion as a prerquisite |
| 16:32 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: I don't follow how that follows from what bernie said |
| 16:32 |
|
CanoeBerry: not that I disagree about the value of promotion |
| 16:32 |
bernie |
[scs]: regarding Sugar support, I think the best compromise for paraguay is taking the stable builds released by OLPC and adding the features required by paraguay on top of them. |
| 16:32 |
|
[scs]: which is exactly what we did with Dextrose... |
| 16:32 |
cjb |
yes, that's bit of a weird thing to say. Adam, you're on SLOBs too, right? :) |
| 16:33 |
CanoeBerry |
Claudia & Pacita did not know to register as candidates.. we lose great candidates and weaken our effort. |
| 16:33 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: what do you propose we do about it? and, why didn't you propose it earlier? |
| 16:33 |
bernie |
[scs]: olpc just released a new stable build and SMParrish is checking if there are any bug fixes that we missed. |
| 16:34 |
CanoeBerry |
i did a small bit promoting http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/O[…]0-2011-candidates |
| 16:34 |
|
but if such pages are not promoted by others, our election becomes a joke |
| 16:34 |
walterbender |
we have two strong educators as candidates: Gerald and Rosamel... which is a real plus for SL |
| 16:35 |
CanoeBerry |
our election was not promoted uring the candidacy period, which concerns me gravely |
| 16:35 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: we put the world out on Sur and other forums as well and also reached out personally |
| 16:35 |
|
^world^word |
| 16:35 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: hm, wasn't it in the Sugar Digest? |
| 16:35 |
CanoeBerry |
anyway Bernie can speak to Claudia and Pacita's qualifications, I cannot. |
| 16:35 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: I suppose dfarning will jump on me, but I humbly disagree |
| 16:36 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: I'm still not following what precisely youthink we did wrong, and why youdon't seem to feel complicit in it |
| 16:36 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: no one is questioning their qualifications... it is a matter of having a fair and transparent process |
| 16:36 |
cjb |
sorry, wonky space bar :) |
| 16:36 |
CanoeBerry |
cjb: we are all complicit, i don't find a blame game constructive |
| 16:36 |
walterbender |
Are you suggesting we reopen the list at this late date? |
| 16:37 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: okay. when yousay "promoted by others", that sounded like a blame game that wans't including you. |
| 16:38 |
CanoeBerry |
if the election is a joke i will not participate |
| 16:38 |
|
elections need serious promotion |
| 16:38 |
bernie |
well, regardless of who did wrong, neither Pacita nor Claudia were aware of the deadline. |
| 16:38 |
|
I told them that the list was closed after the fact. |
| 16:39 |
walterbender |
bernie: I was with Claudia in CR two weeks ago. She knew then than she had missed the deadline. |
| 16:39 |
CanoeBerry |
anyway, nobody said elections were easy :) |
| 16:39 |
cjb |
bernie: I guess it's not obvious to me how committed members of SL could have not realized that we were having an election |
| 16:39 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: I find your characterization harsh. Nonetheless, how do we do better? |
| 16:40 |
bernie |
walterbender, CanoeBerry, cjb, mchua_afk: perhaps the 5 of us could meet in person later this week? I feel like we should have a much deeper face-to-face discussion. |
| 16:40 |
cjb |
it happens every year at this time, and it was announced on iaep, in Sugar Digest, probably other places too. how can we characterize that as a sham election? |
| 16:40 |
bernie |
(anyone else welcome to come to boston, of course) |
| 16:40 |
CanoeBerry |
electing what? |
| 16:41 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: SLOBs? |
| 16:41 |
bernie |
cjb: well, claudia and pacita are admittedly not yet core members of SL... |
| 16:42 |
CanoeBerry |
Right, but they should be considered if they are serious. |
| 16:42 |
bernie |
cjb: let's say that this gaffe will not help get them more involved... |
| 16:42 |
cjb |
what is the gaffe? |
| 16:42 |
CanoeBerry |
Non-promotion |
| 16:42 |
cjb |
people who are apparently uninterested in SL's governance structure didn't know enough about SL's governance structure to take part |
| 16:42 |
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CanoeBerry: you keep saying that, and it keeps being untrue |
| 16:43 |
|
we don't have an advertising budget |
| 16:43 |
|
we have mailing lists and newsletters |
| 16:43 |
|
and we used them |
| 16:43 |
|
If you know of a channel that would have been vastly superior, you could have mentioned it or promoted the electiont here yourself |
| 16:43 |
CanoeBerry |
Who is Promoting SLOB's roles, inspiring people to run? We have failed. |
| 16:44 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: I come back to my question. How do we concretely do better? |
| 16:44 |
CanoeBerry |
Tomeu tried; to his great credit. |
| 16:46 |
walterbender |
and my other question: do you think there is a fair and transparent way to add new candidates at this late date? |
| 16:46 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: where did he do that? maybe knowing that will help knowing where the rest of us failed so desperately. |
| 16:46 |
CanoeBerry |
Farning+Bender did the best work of all defining http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Oversight_Board -- but these docs are now rusty :-) |
| 16:47 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry, bernie: can you take as an action item answering my two questions? |
| 16:48 |
cjb |
walterbender: I don't think there's anything desperately unfair in principle with deciding that we'd like more candidates and we're going to keep the nominations open for another week to get them |
| 16:48 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry, bernie: there is some urgency as the election is days away |
| 16:48 |
cjb |
so I suppose I'd support doing that, although I'm as baffled as you are with the way the conversaiton's gone |
| 16:48 |
CanoeBerry |
can the election be delayed? (not saying it should, but can it?) |
| 16:48 |
bernie |
walterbender: I think the problem is that the communication media we use is unfamiliar to non-geeks. the educators of paraguay educa and olpc communicate differently. |
| 16:48 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: certainly it can be delayed... |
| 16:49 |
|
bernie: I suppose. I am in IRC with Pacita and Claudia every week and the election was brought up in that channel |
| 16:49 |
|
as was the call for candidates |
| 16:49 |
bernie |
walterbender: we can't reach out for them, because they don't read mailing lists and wikis... as disgusting as it sounds, they prefer skype, google docs and email attachments. |
| 16:49 |
CanoeBerry |
bernie has great ideas, if FSF doesn't pull him away. this election needs energy otherwise it becomes an echo chamber |
| 16:50 |
bernie |
walterbender: yes, claudia uses irc as well. she's great. I did not know about pacita. |
| 16:50 |
walterbender |
bernie: every week... |
| 16:51 |
|
but obviously the details didn't get communicated properly |
| 16:51 |
cjb |
bernie: perhaps a dumb question, but if a candidate doesn't use the wiki or mailing lists, how is anyone going to know enough about them to want to vote for them? |
| 16:51 |
CanoeBerry |
i'm as much to blame as the rest of us: but where are the DSD's, and Caroline Meeks's and Bastien Guerry's who ran last year? |
| 16:51 |
|
we need an answer |
| 16:51 |
cjb |
is slightly ashamed to admit that he only the vaguest of idea who Pacita is |
| 16:52 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry, bernie: regarding my proposed action item? |
| 16:52 |
bernie |
walterbender: to answer your second question... admitting new candidates at this point may look unfair. I don't know what to propose. |
| 16:52 |
CanoeBerry |
why isn't Sebastian Dziallas running? |
| 16:52 |
christophd |
cjb: pacita is paraguayeduca's educational lead |
| 16:52 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: have you asked him? |
| 16:52 |
CanoeBerry |
Nope |
| 16:53 |
walterbender |
is tired of people speculating as to what other people are thinking rather than just asking them |
| 16:53 |
cjb |
christophd: ok. I don't know if there was a reason I should have known that. |
| 16:53 |
[scs] |
walterbender: I helped Pacita with her page in the SL wiki, it's true we are new to SL governance, but for a while the elections page was even wrong, listingSunday Oct. 1 as the deadline for membership |
| 16:54 |
|
here it is http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Sugar_Labs/Members |
| 16:54 |
CanoeBerry |
who talks to Sebastian Dziallas these days? |
| 16:54 |
[scs] |
anyway, the information was not good |
| 16:54 |
bernie |
cjb: I have a recursive answer for your question: if there were more community members from the education world, the'd know about candidates such as pacita and claudia. |
| 16:54 |
walterbender |
[scs]: yes. that was a mistake in communication with the election committee |
| 16:55 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: I guess a somewhat fundamental disagreement is in the burden of communicating interest in standing in an election apparently being on us to the candidates, rather than the candidates to us |
| 16:55 |
bernie |
cjb: I guess christophd and CanoeBerry know how to reach out for them. |
| 16:55 |
CanoeBerry |
cjb: i'm not interested in legalistics, i'm interested in participation |
| 16:55 |
bernie |
cjb: the OLPCSF meeting was also full of that "other" type of volunteers I'd like to reach out for. |
| 16:55 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: I was on irc with him last night... |
| 16:55 |
|
CanoeBerry: he is swallowed up in school |
| 16:56 |
CanoeBerry |
ok |
| 16:56 |
bernie |
CanoeBerry: sdz is disappeared? |
| 16:56 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: and I am interested in concrete action items... |
| 16:56 |
|
bernie: he is adjusting to freshman year in a very intense engineering program |
| 16:56 |
[scs] |
if I may speak for Pacita, what motivates PY is to have closer ties to SL, maybe there are other mechanisms than sitting on a board to achieve this, Pacita is not desperate to run for SLOB if we can achieve the goal in a different fashion |
| 16:57 |
walterbender |
bernie: but he is, for example, going to a technology in education conference this weekend. |
| 16:57 |
CanoeBerry |
is a 1 month delay on recruiting candidates wise? Until Nov 1 instead of Oct 1? |
| 16:57 |
walterbender |
[scs]: my impression from speaking with her as well... |
| 16:58 |
cjb |
okay. well, like I said, I'm willing to support providing a few more days for more candidates; I'm just finding this idea that we've failed if we didn't somehow spread the word about the election to people who weren't paying attention to any of our communication channels to be totally bizarre. |
| 16:58 |
CanoeBerry |
candidates needs to be recruited not spammed |
| 16:58 |
cjb |
allowing more candidates until 1 Nov, and also opening the election on 1 Nov |
| 16:58 |
|
would work for me |
| 16:58 |
CanoeBerry |
spamming accomplishes nothing |
| 16:58 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: I am not opposed to opening the door to additional candidates as long as it is clearly spelled out as to why and the community has time to react. |
| 16:58 |
|
e.g., not by fiat |
| 16:59 |
CanoeBerry |
sorry for my harsh words today |
| 16:59 |
|
plz nobody take this personally |
| 16:59 |
|
i saw 130++ fired up this wkd in person |
| 16:59 |
|
doing things right |
| 16:59 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: can you please write up a draft not to send to the community as to the rationale? |
| 16:59 |
CanoeBerry |
we need to bring that energ home |
| 16:59 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: run it past SLOBS and then we can send it out? |
| 17:00 |
|
CanoeBerry: |
| 17:00 |
|
I am not sure we don't want to keep that energy in the field where it is accomplishing things :) |
| 17:01 |
|
CanoeBerry: you saw 130++ fired up and why is that not an indication that there is positive energy in the community? |
| 17:01 |
|
kfx <kfx!~kfx_unaffiliated/kfx> has joined #sugar-meeting |
| 17:01 |
CanoeBerry |
when will the election run if we accept candidates until Nov 1? |
| 17:01 |
|
can we be specific? |
| 17:01 |
cjb |
Nov 1 - Nov 14 |
| 17:01 |
|
say? |
| 17:01 |
CanoeBerry |
all agree? |
| 17:02 |
walterbender |
sure... but let's make a formal motion |
| 17:02 |
cjb |
that's when it was going to run anyway |
| 17:02 |
bernie |
[scs]: I think having pacita on the SL board would be mostly a symbolic act. the board is not where education or technical issues are being discusses |
| 17:02 |
|
discussed |
| 17:02 |
CanoeBerry |
sounds fine to me, i don't care if i vote or not. |
| 17:02 |
|
shouldn't admit that of course :) |
| 17:02 |
cjb |
MOTION: we should continue allowing new candidates to run up until the start of the election on Nov 1 |
| 17:02 |
CanoeBerry |
just that i'm away+offline nov 1-14 |
| 17:02 |
|
+1 |
| 17:02 |
|
MOTION: election nov 1-14 |
| 17:02 |
bernie |
cjb: +1 |
| 17:03 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: the election was already nov 1-14. you don't need a motion for that. |
| 17:03 |
CanoeBerry |
great |
| 17:03 |
bernie |
CanoeBerry: +1 |
| 17:03 |
walterbender |
cjb: I'd like to amend the motion to include a notification to the community |
| 17:03 |
cjb |
walterbender: ok |
| 17:03 |
CanoeBerry |
perfect |
| 17:03 |
bernie |
walterbender: +1 to your amendment |
| 17:03 |
cjb |
we're pretty short on time |
| 17:03 |
|
so I'm not sure how that'll work |
| 17:03 |
bernie |
are people still interested in a face2face meeting later this week? |
| 17:03 |
walterbender |
cjb: yes we are... but I don't think we have a choice |
| 17:03 |
|
cjb: when are you back from Taipei? |
| 17:04 |
CanoeBerry |
bernie: YES! |
| 17:04 |
walterbender |
(and how is 1.75?) |
| 17:04 |
CanoeBerry |
Fri night please? |
| 17:04 |
cjb |
arrive back Nov 2, then Linux Plumbers Conf Nov 3-5 |
| 17:04 |
bernie |
yeah how is it? |
| 17:04 |
CanoeBerry |
I'm gone Sat Oct 30 for 2+ wks |
| 17:04 |
cjb |
pretty good |
| 17:04 |
[scs] |
bernie: yes, I think the symbolic act would bring more power to the local stakeholders, but I assume campaign strategies should go on a different channel :) |
| 17:04 |
walterbender |
cjb: great ! |
| 17:04 |
cjb |
http://dev.laptop.org/~cjb/1.75-a1-dmesg |
| 17:04 |
|
http://dev.laptop.org/~pgf/xo-1.75-broughtup.jpg |
| 17:04 |
|
etc |
| 17:05 |
CanoeBerry |
Can we clarify the motion now? |
| 17:05 |
|
Can we also clarify Lame Duck procedures during our next meeting? |
| 17:05 |
|
I'm very concerned about Lame Duck SLOBS, who disempower us all. |
| 17:05 |
bernie |
cjb: regarding OLPC and Dextrose releases, would you have some time later this week to discuss a common roadmap? I'd be interested in synchronizing releases and increasing the interchange of bugfixes. |
| 17:06 |
tch |
is there any ideas of how we could avoid this situation happening for the next elections? |
| 17:06 |
cjb |
MOTION: we should announce our intention to continue (allowing new candidates to run in the election up until Nov 1) to iaep@, gather feedback, and proceed with that if there are no strong objectoins |
| 17:06 |
bernie |
tch: good point |
| 17:06 |
cjb |
bernie: I'm not sure there's any OLPC<->Dextrose linkage needed here |
| 17:06 |
|
bernie: get your patches in Sugar and OLPC RPMs |
| 17:06 |
|
and then we will ship them later |
| 17:06 |
bernie |
cjb: please rephrase the motion with a person responsible for doing it. |
| 17:06 |
walterbender |
cjb: I second the motion |
| 17:07 |
cjb |
bernie: that doesn't need to go in the motion |
| 17:07 |
bernie |
cjb: maybe walter? or yourself? |
| 17:07 |
walterbender |
cjb: we can follow up with some #actions |
| 17:07 |
cjb |
I'm about to sleep, 1am here |
| 17:07 |
|
so walter would be better, please |
| 17:07 |
bernie |
cjb: anyway, I'm +1 on your motion |
| 17:07 |
cjb |
okay, let's vote on that one |
| 17:07 |
|
+1 |
| 17:07 |
walterbender |
+1 |
| 17:08 |
CanoeBerry |
+1 with get-out-the-vote chutzpah required from all of here, if we believe in Sugar. If not we should resign. |
| 17:08 |
bernie |
cjb: yes, the OLPC <-> Dextrose thing was OT here... let's meet up _another_ day to talk about it. |
| 17:08 |
|
cjb: I feel like we could work a little less and serve deployments a little better. |
| 17:09 |
walterbender |
bernie: vote? |
| 17:09 |
CanoeBerry |
bernie: can you pass the above vote? |
| 17:09 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: speaking of which, we might want to suggest procedures for replacing absentee SLOBs |
| 17:09 |
CanoeBerry |
cjb: +10 |
| 17:09 |
bernie |
walterbender: cjb's motion? I already voted it +1 |
| 17:09 |
cjb |
we've been struggling to hit quorum every week, which shouldn't happen |
| 17:10 |
CanoeBerry |
bernie: plz confirm you agree with the revised motion |
| 17:10 |
cjb |
oh yeah, motion passes, it did get four |
| 17:10 |
walterbender |
ok. motion passes. 4 yeah. 3 absent |
| 17:10 |
|
I'll circulate it to SLOBS by email to get any additional votes |
| 17:11 |
|
#action: CanoeBerry will write up an explanatory note and walter will circulate the change in rules to the community |
| 17:11 |
bernie |
CanoeBerry: which revised motion? |
| 17:11 |
CanoeBerry |
cjb's revision above. |
| 17:11 |
bernie |
CanoeBerry: I voted +1 on this one: |
| 17:11 |
|
<cjb> MOTION: we should announce our intention to continue (allowing new candidates to run in the election up until Nov 1) to iaep@, gather feedback, and proceed with that if there are no strong objectoins |
| 17:11 |
CanoeBerry |
great. |
| 17:11 |
walterbender |
#action: all of us will do our best to solicit new candidates and promote the vote |
| 17:11 |
bernie |
tch: GURAIT-TO |
| 17:12 |
cjb |
s/objectoins/objections/, oops :) |
| 17:12 |
CanoeBerry |
Clarif: are new Sugar Labs members also welcome until Nov 1? |
| 17:12 |
|
What time Nov 1 in both cases? |
| 17:12 |
bernie |
CanoeBerry: no, screw them. |
| 17:12 |
|
:-)) |
| 17:12 |
tch |
bernie: ;) |
| 17:12 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: that should be a sep. motion |
| 17:12 |
bernie |
just joking. I'd say yes |
| 17:12 |
|
jocking |
| 17:12 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: that's not what the motion said, so no |
| 17:12 |
|
akeybl <akeybl!~akeybl166.205.137.84> has joined #sugar-meeting |
| 17:12 |
CanoeBerry |
Do we want that? I'd say yes. |
| 17:12 |
cjb |
throwing out our membership requirement completely seems a bit over the top |
| 17:13 |
|
it's in the bylaws for a reason |
| 17:13 |
CanoeBerry |
Do the bylaws say Oct 1 5pm? |
| 17:13 |
bernie |
cjb: I'd not throw out the requirement to be a sugar contributor |
| 17:13 |
cjb |
bernie: how do you measure that? |
| 17:13 |
bernie |
in fact, we don't have a deadline for becoming members |
| 17:14 |
|
we only have a deadline to let new members vote at the elections |
| 17:14 |
CanoeBerry |
Shouldn't those 2 dates be aligned? |
| 17:14 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: I don't think they list a time. GMT 6pm == midnight EDT works for me |
| 17:14 |
bernie |
cjb: the membership "committee" (only one person) decides |
| 17:14 |
CanoeBerry |
cjb: agreed |
| 17:15 |
bernie |
cjb: we had 2 people on the membcom last year, but it's a boring job and I'm glad lfaraone was available to do it this year. |
| 17:15 |
walterbender |
I am comfortable with opening up the dates for getting a ballot, but we should vote on it... motion please |
| 17:15 |
cjb |
walterbender: getting a ballot == voting? |
| 17:15 |
CanoeBerry |
? |
| 17:15 |
cjb |
not sure I see the motivation for doing that |
| 17:16 |
CanoeBerry |
is there a reason both deadlines should not be aligned? |
| 17:16 |
walterbender |
cjb: yes... |
| 17:16 |
bernie |
walterbender: what ballot? did we have ballots in our election procedures last year? |
| 17:17 |
walterbender |
alignment or not, is there a reason other than logistics, not to keep registering voters until the last possible moment. |
| 17:17 |
CanoeBerry |
(1) deadline to put your name in as a candidate (2) deadline to become a voting member |
| 17:17 |
bernie |
is confused |
| 17:17 |
walterbender |
bernie: we send a ballot to each member. |
| 17:17 |
CanoeBerry |
Both dates should be aligned, unless I'm missing something. |
| 17:17 |
cjb |
bernie: ballot == you get the e-mail with a token to vote |
| 17:17 |
|
this depends on you being a member |
| 17:18 |
bernie |
ah, I misinterpreted the meaning of ballot. in italian it's when you have to vote a second time to choose among the top candidates. |
| 17:18 |
cjb |
ah, that's called a runoff in US |
| 17:18 |
walterbender |
bernie: ah... |
| 17:18 |
|
yama has quit IRC |
| 17:18 |
cjb |
anyway, I don't see anything else that obviously needs changing here |
| 17:18 |
walterbender |
anything else before we adjourn? |
| 17:19 |
CanoeBerry |
so what's the deadling for applying to vote? |
| 17:19 |
|
so what's the deadline for applying to vote? |
| 17:19 |
walterbender |
shall we leave it to Luke's discretion? he is the one who has to manage the logistics |
| 17:19 |
CanoeBerry |
we need to promote both dates |
| 17:19 |
cjb |
I think that deadline has passed |
| 17:19 |
CanoeBerry |
seems dumb |
| 17:20 |
cjb |
restricting voting privileges to members of an organization seems dumb? |
| 17:20 |
CanoeBerry |
motion: extend deadline to register to vote, to align it with midnight EDT Nov 1 |
| 17:20 |
|
same as deadline of putting in your name to become a candidate |
| 17:20 |
|
11:59pm EDT Nov |
| 17:21 |
cjb |
you're essentially rewriting the bylaws to forget about the idea of membership if we do this |
| 17:21 |
CanoeBerry |
show me the bylaw |
| 17:21 |
cjb |
which seems like it should require a stronger raitonale than "seems dumb" |
| 17:21 |
|
*rationale |
| 17:21 |
CanoeBerry |
show me the bylaw |
| 17:22 |
cjb |
on the other end of a very tiny internet pipe. have you tried looking it up from there? |
| 17:23 |
bernie |
walterbender: +1 on letting the Membership Committee (lfaraone) decide autonomously |
| 17:23 |
|
walterbender: whoever disagrees can volunteer for the membership committee next year :-) |
| 17:23 |
CanoeBerry |
delaying communications is dangerous |
| 17:23 |
|
yama <yama!~yama124-149-59-60.dyn.iinet.net.au> has joined #sugar-meeting |
| 17:23 |
CanoeBerry |
but lfaraone is fast, it is true |
| 17:23 |
|
yama has quit IRC |
| 17:23 |
|
yama <yama!~yamaubuntu/member/yama> has joined #sugar-meeting |
| 17:24 |
CanoeBerry |
what bylaw is cjb talking about? |
| 17:24 |
silbe |
Where _is_ the bylaws? I looked for it some time ago, but didn't find it. |
| 17:24 |
cjb |
http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Sugar_Labs/Members seems to describe the situation as I understood it |
| 17:24 |
|
but it's not phrased as a bylaw |
| 17:25 |
|
akeybl has quit IRC |
| 17:25 |
cjb |
anyway, that page makes clear that in the eyes of the Membership Committee, there's a deadline for registering to vote, and it was Oct 1 |
| 17:25 |
walterbender |
sunjammer seems wedged again :( |
| 17:25 |
silbe |
(the formal one that probably needed to be sent to the government - assuming tax exemption works similar to how it works in Germany) |
| 17:25 |
CanoeBerry |
let's change this wiki page please, to Nov 1, 11:59pm EDT |
| 17:25 |
cjb |
we could vote to allow them to change that, but that's begging the question -- shouldn't they ask *us* if htey want to change it, if twe're voting to delegate to them? |
| 17:26 |
|
CanoeBerry: so are we overruling the membership committee, or not? |
| 17:26 |
bernie |
walterbender: damn! |
| 17:27 |
CanoeBerry |
motion: SLOBS shouls suggest to the membership committee, to change voter reg deadline on http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Sugar_Labs/Members, to Nov 1, 11:59pm EDT |
| 17:27 |
|
motion: SLOBS should suggest to the membership committee, to change voter registration deadline on http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Sugar_Labs/Members, to Nov 1, 11:59pm EDT |
| 17:27 |
cjb |
we don't need a motion to offer them a suggestion. |
| 17:27 |
CanoeBerry |
huh |
| 17:27 |
bernie |
ok |
| 17:28 |
cjb |
we just say it. I can't find any bylaws, which I guess means they can do whatever they like with regard to the election. |
| 17:28 |
|
walterbender: do we not have bylaws? :) |
| 17:28 |
walterbender |
#action: walter to speak to lfarone about extending the reg. date. |
| 17:28 |
CanoeBerry |
let's pick a coherent deadline together here, vote or no vote i don't care |
| 17:28 |
|
we cannot do promotion if we procrastinate |
| 17:29 |
cjb |
Nov 1 is the coherent deadline |
| 17:29 |
walterbender |
cjb: with the wiki down, I cannot point you to them... |
| 17:29 |
cjb |
walterbender: I tried searching google for site:wiki.sugarlabs.org bylaws, no hits |
| 17:29 |
walterbender |
cjb: I don't think we called them bylaws... |
| 17:30 |
|
cjb: but we have a pretty concrete set of governance rules |
| 17:30 |
cjb |
okay. well, let's take that part to e-mail, I guess. |
| 17:30 |
walterbender |
some baked into our agreement with the SFC as well. |
| 17:30 |
cjb |
we can ask the membership committee what it wants to do |
| 17:30 |
|
and then work out whether it's allowed or not :) |
| 17:31 |
walterbender |
OK. well, we have some work to do and it is late in Taipei. |
| 17:31 |
|
I suggest we adjourn |
| 17:31 |
cjb |
thanks, sounds good |
| 17:31 |
CanoeBerry |
Motion: encourage Election Committee (lfaraone) to delay the start of the election by a few days if that makes his life more sane -- preparing ballots |
| 17:31 |
|
Nov 1 12:01am start of election is a nice idea, but impossible |
| 17:31 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: I don't think we need a motion for that. |
| 17:32 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: I just said, it's meaningless to have a motion on "talk to Luke". anyone can do that at any time, he's a friendly guy. |
| 17:32 |
walterbender |
I'll talk to him. |
| 17:32 |
CanoeBerry |
this info must be promoted now, not delayed |
| 17:32 |
walterbender |
CanoeBerry: meanwhile, please write up the rationale for the delay |
| 17:32 |
cjb |
CanoeBerry: then go ahead immediately |
| 17:32 |
bernie |
walterbender: I've restarted apache on sunjammer and increased the connections limit to 512. let's see if it helps |
| 17:32 |
walterbender |
bernie: thanks |
| 17:33 |
CanoeBerry |
alright, thanks all for getting this election back on track |
| 17:33 |
|
other business? |
| 17:34 |
|
Close meeting? |
| 17:35 |
cjb |
yep, close, thanks |
| 17:36 |
CanoeBerry |
aside: what i find really dumb is that the election committee can strangle Sugar Labs |
| 17:37 |
|
Luke would never do such a thing. |
| 17:37 |
|
But the power to delay/revise election dates at will is too much power. |
| 17:37 |
|
Oversight we need to provide. |
| 17:37 |
walterbender |
#end-meeting |
| 17:37 |
meeting |
Meeting ended Tue Oct 26 17:37:37 2010 UTC. Information about MeetBot at http://wiki.debian.org/MeetBot. (v 0.1.4) |
| 17:37 |
|
Minutes: http://meeting.sugarlabs.org/s[…]-26T15:24:49.html |
| 17:37 |
|
Log: http://meeting.sugarlabs.org/s[…]10-10-26T15:24:49 |
