Re: [tools-pmc] Eclipse PDT in Helios release

[David M Williams <david_williams@xxxxxxxxxx>]

0, abstain

My official vote will be to abstain,
and I'll leave up to the rest of the Tools PMC to decide. This is partially
because I lead the Planning Council, and if/when exceptions are brought
forward there, I intentionally abstain to make sure not to have too much
influence. And partially because I really could go either way. I will make
some comments though, and will look forward to others views -- I do think
this case is important enough each PMC member should voice their vote and
point of view. 

First, in addition to explaining what
happened and why it won't happen again, exceptions to Planning Council
should present a "business case" why it is important to make
this particular exception. These usually take the form of being required
by other Helios projects, being required by an Eclipse Strategic Member,
is essential to Board directed strategic direction of Eclipse, etc. While
I know there's many users of PHP (me included) the business justification
should be a little more concrete. Perhaps the exception should mention
that it currently ranks 4th on EPP package downloads (hence, popular in
the Eclipse community) as part of the justification. 

Second, if it was really just this milestone,
that'd be one thing. But there seems to be a pattern here. I know it took
multiple reminders from me just for the PDT project to mark the "intent
to be in Helios" and, that was about a milestone late. Also, so far,
there is zero "compliance tracking information" filled out by
PDT on the Portal's Simultaneous Release Tracker. And PDT's plan, at http://www.eclipse.org/projects/project-plan.php?projectid=tools.pdt,
appears to be an empty template, with some things still pointing to Galileo
links. Seems to me if nothing is planned, it should say "no new features
are planned, but will fix bugs and be current with Helios pre-reqs",
or similar. Worst of all, IMHO, there was zero communication about the
state of PDT's M7 on cross project, even after queries, nor in the bug
I opened that I had to remove them from the build (bug 305728).
It is one thing to be late after announcing "difficulties" and
keeping everyone informed, but just to be completely silent demonstrates
a lack of understanding of the Simultaneous Release process (or, lack of
interest to actually participate in the whole incremental, participatory
process and the "Eclipse Way"). Communication is key. 

And to remind everyone of an alternative,
we intentionally set things up this year so it is actually possible to
"release" with Helios, with minimal participation, but then in
that case, the project can not be part of the common repository (which
implies no longer being an EPP Package). See http://www.eclipse.org/helios/planning/EclipseSimultaneousRelease.php.
While this isn't ideal, from the Eclipse community point of view, perhaps
this better fits the PDT's pattern of development, and then they can just
make their code available on their own project's site? 

I hope I don't sound (too) negative,
and really will support what ever the Tools PMC (and Planning Council)
decides, but just please be aware of the precedent or "example"
we will be setting by requesting the exception. Perhaps, while we are deciding
this case, think about when would we make the hard choice to say "no"?
Similarly, we should think about if there is more we as the PMC should
do to "mentor" or monitor projects to make sure they stay on
track? 

Thanks,

From:	Doug Schaefer <cdtdoug@xxxxxxxxx>
To:	Tools PMC mailing list <tools-pmc@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Date:	03/25/2010 12:50 AM
Subject:	Re: [tools-pmc] Eclipse PDT in Helios release
Sent by:	tools-pmc-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx

---

+1 from me. But Roy, please make sure you have someone
to cover for you in the future in these situations.

Doug.

On Wed, Mar 24, 2010 at 11:50 PM, Roy Ganor <roy@xxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Hi,

The PDT Helios update site was broken on the M6 release date. As a result Eclipse PDT build caused Helios build to fail and PDT was removed from the build system (See bug 305728). This problem was resolved today and PHP Helios update site is now updated. The problem originated from the following issues:

1.       302170 – fixed a month ago but required a small change in our publishing system

2.       Bad permissions in the downloads server - handled by Matt this week

From personal reasons I couldn’t handle these issues during the last two weeks.

 

I would like to ask the planning council (through you) to use the exceptional procedure to get PDT back to the Helios train.

Thanks for your time,

Roy

 

 

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