[fdo-internals] FDO Incubation update

[Greg Boone]

[GregBoone] See inline...

-----Original Message-----
From: fdo-internals-bounces at lists.osgeo.org [mailto:fdo-internals-bounces at lists.osgeo.org] On Behalf Of Daniel Morissette
Sent: Wednesday, January 09, 2008 7:07 PM
To: FDO Internals Mail List
Subject: [fdo-internals] FDO Incubation update

Hi Everyone,

With a bit of pressure from Greg, I finally took some time to review the
FDO incubation documents. Here are a few notes to discuss here before I
send an update to the Incubation Committee and we can finally talk about
getting FDO out of incubation.

1- The FDO Incubation Status page is at the following URL and seems to
be up to date:
   http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/FDO_Incubation_Status

2- FDO as established a PSC which has been operating smoothly since the
fall using the following PSC guidelines:
    http://fdo.osgeo.org/psc.html

3- More developer/contributor info is available here:
    http://fdo.osgeo.org/developer.html

4- FDO has a contributor agreement but it has not been signed by all
contributors yet (not sure if that is a blocker for graduation or not)

[GregBoone] I have sent notification to all developers asking that the new contributor agreement needs to be filled out and signed.

5- The Source code provenance review is at:
    http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/FDO_Provenance_Review

    I did several spot checks and everything seems fine.
    I only have a few questions about test datasets:

    5a- Providers/GDAL/TestData/pci_eg ... should there be a README.TXT
        explaining provenance and license/redistribution terms?

    5b- Other data dirs have a README e.g. Providers/SHP/TestData/Florida
        but it only specifies the source and doesn't mention what the
        license/redistribution terms are.

[GregBoone] Let me get back to you on this one.

6- I reviewed the (unofficial) Incubation Graduation Checklist at:
    http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/Project_Graduation_Checklist

    What we may be missing from this list:
    - All contributors need to agree to project's license policy
      (sign contributor agreements)

[GregBoone] This some overlap here. Some developers have signed the old one and one or two none at all. I will be sending out a second message stating that the new agreement needs to be signed or the submission rights of the individual will be revoked.

    - Is there an automated build or smoke test system? That should not
      be a blocker in my opinion, but http://buildbot.osgeo.org/ lists
      FDO as offline, what does that mean?

[GregBoone] Yes, there is an automated build/smoke test system in place, but it is an internal process maintained by several developers in Ottawa/Toronto. No buildbot mechanism exists at this time. OpenSource builds are generally run weekly. We could put this on our plate as a deliverable once the 3.3.0 build is released.

    - Is there a defined release process? Something along the lines
      of MapServer's RFC-34:
       http://mapserver.gis.umn.edu/development/rfc/ms-rfc-34/

[GregBoone] We have an informal process that fundamentally covers the specifications covered in the mapserver RFC, but I have no reason to object to formalizing it through an RFC.

Overall I think we're in good shape to graduate if we can address or
find answers for the questions listed above... once we have those
answers I'll prepare an updated status report for the Incubation
Committee to get their feedback.

The big blocker last fall was that a few members of the incubation
committee didn't feel that the PSC had operated openly and smoothly for
long enough. The main issues were very little interaction on the lists,
which has improved, and no regular PSC/dev meetings, which may still be
the case, but I'm not sure if I'd consider that a blocker myself since
not all projects do that. I'll wait to have an update for the committee
before raising that question again with them.

Daniel
--
Daniel Morissette
http://www.mapgears.com/
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