Minutes of 11th April 2008 MOTU Meeting

[Emmet Hikory]

Daniel Holbach wrote:
>  I didn't see any a meeting reminder until now, so I'm sending it. The
>  next meeting will be on
>
>         Friday, April 11th, 12:00 UTC.
>
>  The agenda is at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MOTU/Meetings so if you have
>  anything to discuss, please add it there.

    Please find below the minutes from this meeting.  These should
appear on the wiki (1) as soon as the current technical difficulties
are resolved.  A MootBot summary is also available (2).

Ubuntu MOTU Meeting Minutes for Friday, 11th April 2008, 12:00 UTC

== Use, nomenclature, and requirements for the Universe Hackers
(Ubuntu Contributing Developers) team ==

This was broken down into three separate subtopics.  During
discussion, Reinhard Tartler suggested that the team might be useful
for a) bugs, b) bzr branches, and c) PPAs.  A quick review of use for
bugs determined that the team should not be assigned or subscribed to
bugs, but that it may be worth discussing the team with bugcontrol to
determine if other activities would be useful.  More extensive
discussion regarding the use of the team for VCS authorisation came to
the conclusion that any such usage should be determined by the
individual administrators of VCS repositories.  It was suggested that
a team PPA might be useful for managing transitions late in the
release cycle and agreed that such use should be deferred to a
separate discussion to be initiated on the mailing list.  The
conclusion of the use discussion was agreed as "The new restricted
team will represent MOTU-originated Ubuntu Membership (this does not
include MOTU membership, which is part of the existing MOTU process),
and may be used for other purposes, to be decided later, and as they
come up."

For nomenclature, there were three names under discussion: the wiki
name as shown on [UbuntuDevelopers] (currently "Ubuntu Contributing
Developers"), the long name on the Launchpad team page (currently
"Ubuntu Universe Hackers", and the short name on the Launchpad team
page (currently "universe-hackers").  The wiki name was considered
mostly acceptable, but there were concerns that it may be confusing
when comparied with with the existing
ubuntu-universe-contributors/"Contributors of packages to Ubuntu
Universe" team.  The launchpad names were considered less ideal, with
primary concerns being 1) confusion by those not familiar with the use
of "hacker" in this sense, 2) overemphasis on programming vs.
maintenance, and 3) general silliness.  Several other names were
suggested, and rejected.  Discussion was set aside until later in the
meeting, at which time further names were suggested and discussed
without reaching consensus.  It was agreed that the launchpad team
names would be left for now, but further discussed, and reviewed at
the next MOTU Meeting.  Given the importance of nomenclature to team
identity, it is unlikely new members will be approved for the team
before there is agreement on the nomenclature.

In a discussion on requirements, it was agreed to adopt a modification
of Scott Kitterman's suggestion for a change in wording from the
initial proposal, such that the requirements become:

* Have been working with Ubuntu development for some time, with a
record of significant and sustained positive contribution
* Have a close working relationship with other members of the Ubuntu community
* Have a clear plan for future activity

The possibility of specifically allowing individual MOTU rejection of
any applicant was raised, and determined to be covered through the
community feedback period as a requirement for meeting the second
condition.

== Agree on MOTU Events team ==

Daniel Holbach proposed a MOTU Events team, with the following
descriptive overview:
 * Team to organise and announce MOTU participation in events like
UbuntuOpenWeek, UbuntuDeveloperWeek, Universe Bug Days, MOTU Meetings,
MOTU Q&A sessions, etc.
 * Liaise with speakers
 * publicise and announce the event
 * document the events
 * help with organisation

In brief discussion, there was general support for a team to support
coordination of events and handle administrative matters, and
self-nominations for team members.  Emmet Hikory raised the point that
it may be worth separating the educational aspects of such a role from
the administrative aspects, and James Westby concurred.  Daniel will
summarise a reduced proposal for an administrative team, and propose
it on the mailing list.

== Other Business ==

    Cody Somerville proposed that there be a session at UDS to discuss
MOTU team organisation, and will start a wiki page with discussion
topics.  Sarah Hobbs noted that many developers do not attend UDS, and
that any conclusions drawn from the UDS session should be further
discussed in other fora to be sure of consensus.

== Next Meeting Time ==

The next MOTU meeting will be 20:00 UTC 25th April 2008

1: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MOTU/Meetings/2008-04-11
2: http://blackbird.kaarsemaker.net/mootbot/meeting/ubuntu-meeting.20080411_1404.html

P.S.  Apologies to those who thought "~24 hours" was accurate, and not
in fact a typo for "~54 hours" :)