[gdal-dev] Driver maintenance - long-term solution ?

[Sean Gillies]

Hi Howard and all,

On Wed, Jan 13, 2021 at 3:58 PM Howard Butler <howard at hobu.co> wrote:

>
>
> On Jan 13, 2021, at 4:28 PM, Nyall Dawson <nyall.dawson at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Thu, 14 Jan 2021 at 06:24, David Strip <gdal at stripfamily.net> wrote:
>
> What is the path forward?  One path Howard suggests is establishing a
> foundation similar to that behind Qgis. Another alternative, probably far
> more controversial, is a license change.
>
>
> I'm pretty clueless regarding licenses -- but this is an interesting
> thought. I wonder if any new drivers added to GDAL could be done with
> a dual-licensing under both GPL + some other license which requires
> ongoing sponsorship of the GDAL project?
>
>
> License monkey business isn't viable in any way with GDAL. It would just
> create confusion and erode trust, which we can't get back if broken.
>

> The big organizations running 100,000,000s of CPU hours extracting
> information from imagery they're reading in COGs with GDAL need to be
> donating substantial resources into an organization that provides
> coordination. The last time I did a fund raise with gdalbarn.com I was
> called out for naming some of these organizations and expressing my
> disappointment they couldn't find a way to participate or simply ignored
> the request.  Maybe they will step forward this time around.
>

Maybe? Getting shamed feels bad and makes people bitter. The good news is
that the attrition rate in big organizations is pretty high and those
people may have left and been replaced by new people who we can approach
again. This turnover is also the bad news: people who have been
stakeholders in the past may have moved on as well.


> Whether it is in a new foundation or an existing one like NumFocus,
> substantial resources need to be dumped in a pot that are earmarked for
> supporting work that generates value for the project. Chasing new feature
> work to subsidize project maintenance activities is not sustainable in two
> directions – burn out for the maintainer and creeping feature-itis for the
> project.
>

Agreed. I'd like to try to improve this situation in 2021.


>
> It's clear what's happened in the past is a combination of luck and
> graciousness by both Frank and Even.
>
> Howard
>

Howard, you're so right. Not every industry enjoys a resource like GDAL.
It's a special project run by uniquely dedicated people.

-- 
Sean Gillies
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