consequences when a feature gets dropped (Re: FESCo Meeting Summary for 2008-09-17)

[John Poelstra]

Thorsten Leemhuis said the following on 09/18/2008 10:51 AM Pacific Time:
> Well, that logic does work much for me. If I'd be a *lazy* fedora 
> contributor (and I'm sure we have some of those then work on 
> middle-sized or big features) then I'd just do my work and simply ignore 
> the whole feature process right from the start (or at this point) to 
> avoid the bureaucracy that it brings. Sure, my Feature then might not 
> get mentioned in the FeatureList -- but a lazy packager might not think 
> about that at all or just say "that's mainly Fedora's problem, not mine".

Having the right level of accountability and motivation around the 
feature process has been the unsolved riddle for me since we started it. 
  If you can suggest and help me implement the alternative we will have 
taken Fedora to the next level!  I ask myself this every time we try to 
fine tune the feature process to make it better.

Way back when there was no formal process around features or what was 
new in a release.  There also seemed to be limited visibility into areas 
Fedora was innovating in.  I guess we are working under the assumption 
that all of us want Fedora to be good and to be recognized for what we 
do even if that means "bureaucracy" (which I believe is overstating how 
hard it is).

I can't think of any thriving communities or projects that have 
succeeded because most of the members thought it was "someone else's 
problem".  Without waxing too philosophical, it is really OUR problem if 
WE want to make Fedora a good and better distro.

> But if that scheme works for you guys then I won't ask more stupid 
> questions, especially as I normally don't have to deal with the Feature 
> process much :-) .
> 
> But I have one final question (hopefully not that stupid): Is anybody 
> doing checks for "new features" (as i features, not as in feature 
> process) that (for example) should get mentioned in the release notes 
> and checked during QA, but don't have a Feature page (yet)? Take for 
> example KDE 4.1, which afaics has no Feature page (correct me if I'm 
> wrong, I could not find one), but at least should get mentioned in the 
> realease notes properly.

As I said above, I think it is up to all of us and the different 
oversight committees to make sure everything is covered.

How can we know about the things that we don't know about if nobody 
tells us? ;-)  Or as the great philosopher Donald Rumsfeld is quoted as 
saying here 
http://politicalhumor.about.com/cs/quotethis/a/rumsfeldquotes.htm

"...We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there 
are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns -- 
the ones we don't know we don't know."

John