Release-critical bug process?

[Jesse Keating]

On Wed, 2009-02-11 at 10:30 -0800, Adam Williamson wrote:
>  It seems to me that what really needs to happen is we - the people who
> actually have the power to decide when a release goes out, and the
> people who would like input into that process (man, I shouldn't have
> thrown away that fridge magnet or I'd know the terminology ;>) - need to
> decide on a process that will actually be honored by both sides.

You're thinking of RACI, Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, and
Informed.

> 
> This could be as simple as just saying, well, we don't really want to
> bother with formal blocker lists for pre-releases (as is, practically
> speaking, the case at present). Pre-releases aren't stable. They're
> allowed to be broken. An informal "are there any real howlers? No? Let's
> go, then!" between a couple of people is enough. If everyone's happy
> with that, then that's fine, and the BugZappers can stop wasting time
> constructing blocker lists for pre-releases.
> 
> Alternatively, we decide that we *do* want blocker lists for
> pre-releases, in which case those making the pre-releases have to honor
> them, which means either waiting until all the bugs on them are resolved
> or giving a proper explanation of why they're releasing without this
> happening. And we also specify who gets input into the blocker list. I
> would say that should be managed by the BugZappers, as they should be
> the group with the greatest ability to judge what issues are truly
> critical.

What's happened in the past is more like this:

Zappers add /potential/ blockers to a blocker list, and
releng/qa/sigs/etc.. review the issues on the blocker list and determine
if we really would delay the release for the issue, and move it
accordingly.  That process is somewhat opaque and often happens either
over a phone call (Fedora Talk) or IRC meetings, were we hijack people's
time to actually look at the bugs and make the call.  Each special
interest area (SIG) makes the call for the bugs that effect their area.
We don't have the best participation here, but we're trying to grow it.

-- 
Jesse Keating
Fedora -- Freedom² is a feature!
identi.ca: http://identi.ca/jkeating
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 197 bytes
Desc: This is a digitally signed message part
URL: <http://listman.redhat.com/archives/fedora-test-list/attachments/20090211/15309e90/attachment.sig>