Meeting minutes: DMB 1st September 2025

[Christian Ehrhardt]

We had a DMB meeting without a new application but plenty of things
from the mailing list and topics to discuss to improve our process.

# Review of previous action items

No open items from last meeting


# Application review

No application queued this week


# Outstanding mailing list [0] requests to assign

## Desktop package set

There is an ongoing discussion [1] about adding packages to the Ubuntu
desktop package set that had fallen too silent
Some packages requested have wider impact, like plymouth (boot) and
general updates (update-manager) and so on, but the majority of
packages requested seems fine, yet not trivial to add.

Robie Basak explained that the package set is defined by things seeded
by the desktop
If a package is not seeded, it is out of scope
But there is the desktop-extra package set [2] to cover for that
Yet we need a definition that makes it clear what is part of it and what not.
Currently it is “Every package that is NOT in ubuntu-desktop,
desktop-core or core, but needed for a vanilla GNOME.” which can mean
all or nothing, what is “vanilla gnome” really.

Robie Basak will continue that discussion to clarify and unblock this
=> action defined



## Wiki struggles

People see issues with the wiki and we would like to give people a way
to avoid them.
Generally application pages are on the wiki, but that can be pain sometimes [3].

We discussed and agreed that we want to allow application pages in
discourse as well.
The idea is to align with how the community manages it in [7]

Assuming that one day also discussions will move there, and to not
pollute others, we will need an own category there [4].

We furthermore would want to have a template application, that can
start crude but evolve, so people can more easily copy and create
theirs.

Christian will look to set this up, but can’t commit to it short term
=> action defined


# AOB

## Clarify expectations

We discussed the ongoing efforts to clarify our expectations
A lot was considered an improvement, but some aspects we discussed in detail.
A particular topic was Expectations for MOTUs vs. Core-Devs - after
discussion those are actually mostly the same.
This was a long discussion, but the condensed summary has been taken
as a note in the PR [6]

Christian will use that and the general smaller feedback to update the
PR and then it seems to be ready to land => action defined


[0]: https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/devel-permissions/2025-August/thread.html
[1]: https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/devel-permissions/2025-August/002872.html
[2]:  https://ubuntu-archive-team.ubuntu.com/packagesets/questing/desktop-extra
[3]: https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/devel-permissions/2025-August/002875.html
[4]: https://discourse.ubuntu.com/c/project/307
[5]: https://github.com/ubuntu/ubuntu-project-docs/pull/159
[6]: https://github.com/ubuntu/ubuntu-project-docs/pull/159#issuecomment-3242863955
[7]: https://discourse.ubuntu.com/c/community/membership/93


# Next Chair

Julian volunteered to drive the next session - thanks!


-- 
Christian Ehrhardt
Director of Engineering, Ubuntu Server
Canonical Ltd