Hi Anastasia,
On 16.05.22 07:15, Anastasia Klimchuk wrote:
I am also not a native English speaker, and need to always concentrate on the language. Sometimes I can't understand the person who has just spoken, in this case I am trying to clarify for example by asking "do I understand you correctly, do you mean ABCXYZ?". Also I remember a few times when I noticed you were frowning and not saying anything, I asked you "Nico what do you think? Do you agree?" etc.
that is right, I often keep some thoughts for myself. Simple reason: I fear the meetings would become much less efficient otherwise.
give them an inch and they'll take an ell
I don't understand this (maybe because I am non-native English). I see this is a metaphor, but I don't understand how to map it into the reality of flashrom project. Who "gives"? Who are "them"? What do you mean by "inch" and what do you mean by "ell"?
Hmmm, I got this out of an German-English dictionary. But I have to admit, I can't recall ever having heard this. There's a similar phrase in German, different nouns, though (pinky and hand). The idea of it is that when you support somebody and they don't realize it (or are just selfish), they might ask for more support without showing gratitude (or exploit you deliberately).
The inch could be having the video meetings. They, the Googlers, because the meetings are a great way to include you folks. The ell would be using these meetings to decide on matters like revoking +2 rights of people. IMHO, too much. Because as much as we can include people who like such meetings, I'm afraid we might leave people behind who don't.
Also, in your statement "Here's how things look like when we don't compromise"
There are two things that I don't understand.
First of all, who are "we"?
All of us. Which includes myself.
Secondly, compromise with what? You provided a list of things you won't do, you said "I'll not" 4 times. But what do you do?
I meant to imply that. If I say without compromise "I'll not", then I mean "I'd do" the same if I keep compromising.
What is your suggestion for the decision making process, can you describe the complete process?
When I find the time, sure.
Just to be clear, my suggestion for decision making process:
#1 Discuss things on the mailing list first (it could be ongoing for months, not a problem - so that everyone interested has time to read and respond) #2 When/if the discussion seems to be settled and people are in agreement, the item can be added to the agenda of the meeting. #3 At the meeting the item can be discussed again, and a decision can be made (or not made, if people disagree). #4 After the meeting we send an email with meeting notes and “Decisions summary” on the top of the email. #5 Since stuff never gets done immediately, there always be some time to react on #4
And I am really interested in what other people think about the suggestion!
Great, then put it into another thread, please, with a matching subject. It's really too hidden here. Especially when people start to squabble, other people won't continue reading a thread.
Also I am thinking: decisions from all previous meetings were fine, you never protested before.
Yes, I didn't. I guess because we only made decisions about the meeting itself, the people who attended, or about some long-term strategy like the Meson transition. AFAIR, nothing that immediately affected non- attendees.
We had 5 meetings already, each one made at least one decision. The number of decisions per meeting: 1, 4, 3, 1, 4. And now you are protesting, when we decided to go ahead with your idea? Your own good idea, which solves real issues on the project, the issues that you regularly complain about? I don't understand your behavior. Can you please explain why you behave like this?
As I already tried to explain there were misunderstandings. And I don't even know what you mean with "behave like this". I merely asked to write a proper email that the affected folks can notice easily. No idea why anybody would want to fight this.
If you have concerns and the software we are currently using, you are welcome to organise a video call with any other software that you prefer. Create a meeting room, write instructions for people how to join, and we will start using it. I am happy to help spread the word and tell everyone when you set up new software, and when everything is ready to switch from current one into a new thing.
I won't. It's not me who wants these meetings.
I set up the software that I am familiar with. Me and Felix spent a lot of time making sure all the use cases work, so that no one needs to spend time troubleshooting during the actual meeting. So my reason for this choice was: I know how it works, I know the features, where are the buttons etc.
Mailing list and IRC channel have been here since forever, they are good for discussions but don’t work for making decisions.
Please, elaborate on this.
Please explain how the decision making process would work on the mailing list. And, specifically, please define the criteria to detect when a decision is "done". Please give an example, a link to a flashrom mailing list thread where the decision was made. Good thing we have archives, so even a thread from some time ago can be linked.
I don't see a reason too. I'm not the one who's making claims. You say it's not working. So please show an example. Then we can figure out how to do better.
I don't see a realistic way for flashrom to make decisions on the mailing list, and I have never seen that happen. What I see is that issues keep repeating again and again for years, and questions are not answered.
Example?
For example, a question that was added to the agenda of the first meeting (which was >2months ago): "how do people get commit rights on flashrom?" No one has an answer. Gerrit groups were created in 2017, which is 5 years ago, and yet for all the years flashrom has no rules and no criteria on how people get commit rights! Mailing list was functioning for all the time, so why the question haven't been answered in 5 years?
Maybe nobody has asked. Maybe nobody had to ask? What do you want me to say? Mailing lists are no magical answering machines that predict questions.
Also, I remember having answered that question lately. Not sure if it was during one of the meetings. People who gained trust and kept contri- buting earned such rights.
Finally, I noticed some statements that can be misleading. Surely not intentional, but I want things to be very very clear.
I feared people could use the meeting to force decisions at some point.
I don't know what you meant to say, but this statement may look as if you are suggesting that decisions are forced at the meeting. This is not true. All the items are discussed and decisions made when all people agree.
When the attendees agree and then it would be set in stone, it's kind of forced upon the non-attendees.
It's not a true random selection. It's biased, of course. Based on people's experience with the meeting (i.e. what is usually discussed and if that's worth their time), the date/time of course, how well they speak the language, if they are paid for it etc.
Why "it's biased"? and especially why "of course"?
I think it's quite human. Everybody has their own reasons to attend or not to attend. There's no lottery that decides who attends.
I don't know what you meant to say, but this statement may look as if you are suggesting that the meeting is targeting/preferring some people over the others.
Not deliberately, but is water wet? For instance, we decided to pick times that suit EU/AU folks.
This is not true. Meeting is as open as possible, all information is public, everyone can join and no account is needed. Meeting agenda for future and notes from the past are public. I regularly remind people about the meeting both on the mailing list and IRC channel.
Sure it's open to everyone. But does it attract everyone? Does everybody always have the time? I'm not saying we do anything wrong having mee- tings like this. It's just not a prefect forum either.
Nico