GovernanceIssues

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Revision as of 22:19, 16 December 2009 by Gerv (talk | contribs)
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This is a list of open Mozilla community governance issues.

We also have a page listing existing policies.

Open Issues

Commit Access Policies: Dormant Accounts

Issue: We have many SCM accounts which are no longer used. This increases our security attack surface.

So Far: We now have a policy, and we are in the middle of implementing it. Scripts have been written to extract the dormant list, and refined based on a first round of feedback.

Next Steps: Final list generated; IT to disable.

Commit Access Policies: Harmonization

Issue: Our commit access policies are currently very diverse. We should harmonize them and make them consistent, understandable and easy to implement.

So Far: A draft of a unified policy has gone out for feedback, and received it.

Next Steps: Gerv to take feedback into account and make policy simpler.

Committer's Agreement

Issue: Transition to the new agreement by nagging those who have not signed and eventually disabling accounts.

  • There is a private Google Docs spreadsheet tracking the progress.

So Far: Since summer 2008 lots of calls to sign the new one have been issued, and many people have moved over. An ultimatum was issued and the deadline given in that ultimatum has now passed. We are now moving on to disabling the SCM accounts of those who have not signed the new agreement.

Next Steps: blocked on dormant accounts work - getting a final list here will allow us to reduce the list to active untransitioned people. We can then disable those accounts.

Bug Triage

Issue: There are numerous open bugs in the Governance component in Bugzilla, which need to be triaged and, where possible, resolved.

So Far: Open bug count reduced from 24 to 7.

Next Steps: triage ongoing.

Monday Meeting

Issue: the Monday meeting is having an identity crisis. Clarify the purpose and most useful content of the meeting, and determine whether the current timing is optimal.

So Far: Timing has been changed. Lots of discussions.

Next Steps: Asa has a plan for making technical improvements in the next three months; Ten Forward has been rearranged; Gerv and Tim are working on format and guidance tweaks.

Non-Code ("Activities") Modules

Issue: Do we need any more Activities modules? Who might own them? We should work out what makes a good module, and who makes a good module owner. Possible examples: SFX, mozilla.org (content vs. technical split?). Do we need to separate policy creation and implementation?

"We should create modules when there is a specific level of responsibility, authority and decision making that it would be helpful to invest in a person." - Mitchell

"We should make modules to unambiguously place an activity in the arena of stuff which we apply open source and transparent principles to." - Gerv

So Far: A call for ideas was issued; the following proposals were made: Websites (David Boswell), Education (Gervase Markham). Other suggestions that have been made in the past include "Events and Speaking", "AMO", "Mozilla Style Guide", "Transparency".

Next Steps: Mitchell to propose a model for Community Metrics.

Revise MPL

Issue: the MPL has a number of features which are inconvenient from a practical perspective. An update to the MPL could e.g. remove some of the more pointless notification requirements. We should also retire MPL 1.0 with the OSI.

On Hold

Module Owners List

Issue: it's often out of date, because it's maintained through despot, which takes a lot of work. We would like to make it hackable, parseable, easier to maintain and therefore more accurate.

Next Steps: reconsider objections raised. Try and get consensus on switching list format. (dmose very much in favour.)

Stale Reviews

Issue: Review requests remain open and unloved in Bugzilla. This is bad for the (often new) contributors who make patches and see them ignored. Fixing the Module Owners List and mapping it to Bugzilla components allows us to nag module owners about their reviews - cancel, do or delegate.

Next Steps: blocked on above. Then add mapping to list, and write nagging scripts.

Discussion Forums

There are several issues with the current technical implementation - the unresponsiveness of Google re: Google Groups and so on. Need to look at whether to take the web interface part back in house, and/or put in place other anti-spam measures.

Next Steps: it doesn't look like there's a suitable alternative web interface out there. :-( So it's hard to see how to proceed.

Shouldn't-Be-Private Mailing Lists

Issue: Mozilla runs a large number of mailing lists, as well as our public discussion forums. We should audit that list to make sure no project discussion is private when it should be (at least) read-only public.

So Far: Gerv wrote a small script to extract a list of possibly-concerning mailing lists from mailman. He has had several iterations of the list from mzeier, refining the script each time.

Next Steps: contact the owners of possibly-concerning lists, and ask them politely about the purpose of their list and whether public would be a better option.

Proposed

Bugzilla Workflow

Issue: the current Bugzilla workflow may not be optimal for the Mozilla project. Now that it's configurable in Bugzilla, we could have a discussion about what is best, implement it in the software, and educate the community to use the new workflow.

Resolved

Super-Review Policy

Issue: super-review policy is out of date. mconnor is updating it.

Resolution: mconnor updated the super-review policy.

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