[gentoo-nfp] Re: Next meeting; a motion to have 1 type of Gentoo member.

[Michael Palimaka <kensington@gentoo.org>]

On 07/11/16 13:32, Alec Warner wrote:
> The foundation currently has 1 member type (in the bylaws) but Gentoo
> itself still seems to have 2 (Gentoo staff and Ebuild developer)

That is no longer correct - "staffer" is a thing of the past. These
days, everyone is a developer whether they work on ebuilds or not.

> 
> This motion represents an idea that the community itself would only have
> 1 contributor type.
> 
> 1) Contributors must take the staff quiz (which we should rename to the
> contributor quiz.)


If by contributor you mean a developer who does not work on ebuilds,
this is already the case. Such developers already require a mentor,
complete the historically-named 'staff' quiz, and follow the normal
recruiting process.

> 
> 2) Contributors are encouraged to be foundation members, but membership
> is not required. We may amend the contributor onboarding process to
> offer foundation membership at the time they join Gentoo as a contributor.

We already do this. Part of the text a recruiter posts to a
newly-recruited developer's bug is "contact trustees@gentoo.org for
Foundation membership (optional)".

> 
> 3) Contributors that want access to the gentoo ebuild repository still
> need to follow the normal recruiting process (ebuild quiz, mentor, 30
> day period.)
> 
> 4) Contributors that do not want access to the gentoo ebuild repository
> (because they contribute in other ways) do not need to take the ebuild
> quiz. Its unclear if a 30 day grace period is required for non-ebuild
> groups.

This is no change to current practice. Every new developer already is
required to have a mentor, complete a quiz appropriate to what they'll
be working on, and have a 30 day probation period.

> 
> 5) Existing developers and staff are rebranded as contributors.

As there is currently no distinction between different types of
developers, what will be gained by rebranding everyone?

> 
> If approved, I expect a few months of working with comrel to adjust
> existing policy documents and recruiting guidelines to implement.

While I applaud your efforts, the proposal seems to be based on an
outdated picture of the community. Additionally, given our current
metastructure, it's not clear to me how this is even a Foundation issue.

The only thing that needs updating is documentation to reflect the
reality that everyone is a developer, and everyone completes a quiz
appropriate to what they will be working on.

Coincidentally I've already looked into fixing the quizzes. The 'staff'
quiz and the non-technical section of the 'ebuild' quiz are very
similar, so my proposal to recruiters was to:

1) Rename 'staff' quiz to 'developer' quiz
2) Remove non-technical section from the 'ebuild' quiz
3) All developers take the 'developer' quiz, and developers wishing to
work on ebuilds take the 'ebuild' quizzes.

This should be uncontroversial because it's just fixing the semantics to
match reality. There's no change to the actual questions asked by any
given new developer.