Moin,

On Wednesday 05 August 2009 15:12:43 Martin Schlander wrote:

> Onsdag den 5. august 2009 14:26:14 skrev Christian Jäger:

> > The problem here is a misapprehension of what a majority vote can and

> > can not do.

> You're completely off-beat with all of this. A majority decision has never

> been in the cards.

> The decision will be made by openSUSE management and the openSUSE board

> (assuming noone higher up in the Novell hierarchy interfers).

a) the openSUSE Board as of the Guiding Principles [1] is not supposed to make decisions but recommendations:

Act as a central point of contact
Help resolve conflicts
Communicate community interests to Novell
Facilitate communication with all areas of the community
Facilitate decision making processes where needed

b) I fear the decision has to be made by myself as the Product Manager of openSUSE. It's most likely a decision which just can be wrong. But it will be taken soon.

Best

[1] http://en.opensuse.org/Guiding_Principles

> > a) discontinue the DVD-releases and only put out Live-CDs, thus avoiding

> > the issue (a mild kind of split, as I don't think anybody would really

> > want 'KopenSUSE' and 'GopenSUSE'...)

> The exact same issues exist for the download page on the website as for the

> dvd installer. Besides solving nothing, discontinuing the dvd is also a bad

> idea because it's the preferred media by most.

> > b) treat both communities equally by NOT defaulting to a specific

> > desktop (the zero-sum game is made a taboo)

> Ahh, but you ignore the fact that the majority of our community don't see

> the current situation as being equal at all.

> > and there is always

> > c) declare it someone else's problem (as in 'let Andreas decide' ;))

> >

> > 'c)' is not really an option because the new decision maker be it a

> > maintainer of whoever - would face the same problems and consequences.

> AJ's draft of a policy for the matter mostly takes care of the problem of

> the issue coming up again at random times:

> http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-project/2009-08/msg00196.html

> > But with a vote on a) or b) I think we would have it down to two

> > meaningful, non-destructive options which don't align with the borders

> > of the two 'camps'.

> They're both quite destructive.

> > b) would mean everyone has to either accept that the openSUSE community

> > as a whole is more important than their feelings

> No, it would mean that the feelings of a small minority would be more

> important than the good of the project as a whole.

> > I am frankly quite amazed by the nonchalance with which a KDE-team

> > member has brought up this explosive issue

> He is not part of the openSUSE KDE team if that's what you mean. I don't

> think any KDE person close to the openSUSE project would have ever bothered

> opening this debate - cuz frankly everyone expected/expects that Novell

> politricks would overrule the interest of the block the correct decision

> from ever being made. Which is in itself one of many reasons why the status

> quo is quite destructive.

> > The gains of this whole discussion are close to zero, the damage has

> > already been done

> Again you ignore the fact that the status quo is doing damage every day,

> and has been doing so for years - for all the reasons already stated in the

> discussion.

> If the correct decision is made, this whole thing is an opportunity for the

> openSUSE community to come out healthier on the other side.

Michael Löffler, Product Management

SUSE LINUX Products GmbH - Nürnberg - AG Nürnberg - HRB 16746 - GF: Markus Rex