Understanding the definitions and expectations of our membership processes

Iain Lane laney at ubuntu.com
Thu Jul 21 22:52:26 UTC 2011


Hello,

On Wed, Jul 20, 2011 at 04:11:16PM -0400, Jorge O. Castro wrote:
> Hi everyone,
> 
> I am confused as to the definition of the different levels of Ubuntu
> Developers and how that relates to membership in each of the various
> teams (though probably involves overall project membership as well). I
> thought I would bring this up for discussion as it seems to be getting
> more confusing and I'm having a hard time understanding what the level
> of expectations for someone applying for Ubuntu membership for a given
> role is, as well as to what the expected behavior is for endorsements
> from existing members.
> 
> According to https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuDevelopers an "Ubuntu
> Prospective Developer" is someone "who probably just started
> contributing to Ubuntu". The description on the wiki page doesn't list
> anything critical there; the person still needs a sponsor to upload,
> etc. From what I can read it's basically the same as Ubuntu Membership
> but you're interested in eventually going down the development path
> and you have a mentor/sponsor. Ok, that sounds good to me. This feels
> like a position that should be relatively low barrier.

I didn't write that page, and I don't know who did. If it's confusing
then please go ahead and fix it.

Prospective developer isn't a position. It's just what you are when you
start being interested in Ubuntu Development. I found this definition on
Google

  Likely to happen at a future date; concerned with or applying to the
  future

By the way, I am disturbed at the amount of implied criticism the DMB is
receiving in the past couple of weeks. Is it a coincidence that it comes
shortly after we defer some applications (for the first time in a long
while)? I am not just referring to this and the TB email thread, but
also comments that appear on IRC when individuals don't feel an
application is going the way they like.

I just found two quotes on [0] that both applicants and endorsers should
be aware of.

  While contributions to those projects are appreciated and worth being
  recognised, involvement in Ubuntu is required. After all it's all
  about Ubuntu membership.

and

  We look for sustained and significant contributions. While there is no
  precise period that we look for, it is rare for applications to be
  accepted from people contributing for less than 6 months.

The DMB also applies these tests when granting membership. Please be
mindful of these when you (even implicitly and without naming specific
occasions, which invariably is what happens) criticise our actions.

[0] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Membership

Regards,

-- 
Iain Lane                                  [ iain at orangesquash.org.uk ]
Debian Developer                                   [ laney at debian.org ]
Ubuntu Developer                                   [ laney at ubuntu.com ]
PhD student                                       [ ial at cs.nott.ac.uk ]
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