Kai-Uwe Mätzel: 2005 Election Statement

The success of Eclipse is of genuine interest to the Eclipse committers. The success requires the committers to work effectively. As committer representative I will:

1. Enable the continuous success of Eclipse.
2. Communicate the varied perspectives and needs of the international Eclipse committer community to all the other parties represented by the Eclipse Foundation.
3. Work closely together with all the other parties represented by the Eclipse Foundation to get their best possible support that continues to allow the committers to work effectively and to produce results that satisfy the needs of all the parties.

In the scope of these general responsibilities, I would like to address the following in the next year:

• We must continue to improve our infrastructure. Last year we made progress. Considerable improvements are to be put in place in the spring of this year. In addition to actively supporting this process, improvements to our bug reporting system are necessary. Components dealing with high bug report traffic pay a non-trivial overhead for managing those bug reports. A considerable portion of the overhead is generated by the need to request the bug reporters to complete bug reports with required information such as build ids; by transferring the bug reports to the correct product and component; by identifying duplicates; and by explaining reporters what severity, priority, and state express and by whom they may be manipulated. Improvements to the bug reporting system can be implemented to minimize the overhead. Changes to be investigated are an improved bug reporting form, tool supported duplication identification and management, and a more fine grained rights management.
• The work on the first Eclipse projects was started about four years ago. They are maturing. This maturing can pose risks to technical innovation, if left unmanaged. In close cooperation with all the parties represented by the Eclipse Foundation we should explore what can be done to keep our development performance as high as it is and to sustain and extend our current technical leadership.
• Eclipse is the home of numerous projects that build onto each other. We, the committers, have to work with all the other parties to ensure a steady flow of contributions and concrete collaborations between the projects in order to let the projects’ scopes and boundaries naturally evolve beyond their initial specification. We should work with the Eclipse Foundation to explore options to encourage and foster these collaborations.
• We, the Eclipse committers, publicly connect our names with the brand ’Eclipse’. We are interested that the ’Eclipse’ brand gains reputation and sustains its level of quality. We should work with the Eclipse Foundation to explore ways in which the committers of new projects can be supported in adopting the essential process attributes of existing, successful Eclipse projects. Such attributes are starting small and concrete, convince by delivering, and grow on previous concrete successes.