[ubuntu-studio-devel] I will be stepping down as project lead at around the release of 16.04

[Kaj Ailomaa]

On Tue, Aug 18, 2015, at 06:17 PM, Set Hallström wrote:
> I would like to take the opportunity to apologize for disappearing. I
> have
> been stuck in a hamster-wheel i'd rather not discuss here. I basicaly
> kept
> on pushing the moment to say something about it, thinking i would soon
> get
> available again whilst fearing it would be vain promises.
> 
> I hope i haven't wasted my chance and to be able to get busy with you
> guys
> as soon as possible.
> 

It's only natural for everyone here to have very little time, since none
of us have this as a job. You haven't had any specific responsibilities,
so nothing has been suffering because of absence. I would be a lot more
absent too if I was in a different position.

I'm counting on that some people may step up in their commitment if they
need to fill a role such as project lead. However, it is good to
understand the weight of the commitment. I'm thinking two years minimum,
until the next LTS.

And there's a difference between what you must do as a project lead, and
what you can do.
What you must do is make sure:
 * Releases are tested
 * Critical bugs are fixed (before release, usually)
 * Announcements for releases and other important things are done
 * Web page, wikis and social channels are maintained
 * Be available on at least email, but preferably also on IRC

In order to fix bugs you need to have some understanding of the whole
development procedure (launchpad, bug reports, how to analyze a problem,
who to talk to for information, etc, etc), as well as knowledge of
packaging. Otherwise, you will be relying on someone else to fix the
problem for you.
So, I'd rather see a project lead who is an able Debian packager, with
upload rights to our own packages. This is where I am now, after many
years of involvement, but I was never a software developer to begin
with. This is just a side interest of mine. Len could do this, he'd just
need to get upload rights.

On top of that, there's a lot anyone can do, be he/she a project lead,
or not. And, things not being obligatory, they often do not get done,
unfortunately.

Beyond that, I think it's also important to respect Debian Policy (in
the case with packaging), Ubuntu policies, and whatever non-formalized
policy that we have - which is something worth thinking about and
writing down. There are a bunch of stuff that we follow, like how we
select packages for our metas.