Debconf

[James Westby]

On Wed, 2009-03-25 at 14:00 +0000, James Westby wrote:
> So, a first proposal to get us going: a half-day BoF on vcs-pkg, 
> attempting first to define the problems the project should solve, and
> then sketching out a roadmap to tackle them.

OK, it's a bit last minute, sorry, but here is a proposal that I
will submit to debconf in 24 hours time, any feedback is welcome.

--------------------
Event Title: vcs-pkg.org workgroup
Subtitle: Drafting a roadmap for vcs-pkg.org
Track: DebConf
Event type: Workshop (or should it be BoF? There is no explanation)

Abstract: The vcs-pkg.org project aims to improve package maintenance
in distributed version control by providing both best practices and
tools to support those practices. While there has been valuable 
discussion on the merits of various approaches to parts of the problem,
the project lacks a clear plan of how it aims to achieve these goals.
This workgroup will discuss the current state of the project, and come
up with a proposal for a roadmap for the project which the project as
a whole can then approve.

Description: Aiming to provide a set of tools and workflows that work
for most people, while remaining distribution and VCS agnostic is
laudable, but requires solving many problems to achieve. Our knowledge
of the available techniques and the problems to solve is still limited,
and so the path from the current point to the final goal is unclear.

Breaking the problem up and deciding which parts to tackle first will
allow the project to move towards the target, and if done correctly
will mean that there is useful output before the final goal is reached.

The workgroup will asses the problem as we understand it today, and
decide which problems to solve first, without attempting to solve
the problems, though debate will certainly arise.

As vcs-pkg.org is a cross-distribution project, and the choice of 
DebConf means that the workgroup will be almost entirely formed of
people from Debian and Debian-based distributions, the output will
be a proposal to take back to the rest of the project.

Submission notes: We would appreciate having more than one hour for
this topic, up to half a day if possible.
---------------

If any DebConf attendees have a radically different proposal then I
suggest you go ahead and submit it, as the deadline is on the 15th
of this month, and we can then decide which of the proposals to
withdraw afterwards (if any).

Thanks,

James