[Folks: My apologies: I have just now realized that my subscription to the SqF mailing list was my old Disney one, and this message, sent yesterday, went into the bit bucket. Now I think I'm properly resubscribed]
Dave Thomas wrote...
While I appreciate Stephane's (and a few others) passion and frustration his recent post may easily be taken out of context. So I would like to provide some clarifying comments.
...and since this forms a nice coherent base, I'll try to respond within that context.
- For some time (XP2000, ECOOP 2000, OOPSLA 2000, Smalltalk Solutions
2001, EOOOP 2001...) and myself and others have advocated for a Squeak Foundation (sometimes called SqF) in the spirit of Apache and other open source efforts. Such foundations are non-profit companies run by a meritocracy. Having a company provides a place where both individuals and corporations can make contributions of money, code, people etc. While Apache is rich relative to some consortium my expectation is that SqF would have $30K -300K per year to support Squeak.
There's no doubt that this would be a good thing. I have tried to be supportive at every turn. I remember sending out a number of messages back in May trying to establish working charters for SqC and SqF to help in planning what projects might best be done by what groups, etc.
- Dan and Alan have been very supportive for this idea from the outset,
indeed the much appreciated efforts of the StableSqueak team were a side effect of these discussions at XP2000 etc. We made some initial progress in the Spring 2001 following Smalltalk Solutions after some interest was stirred by my provocative <grin> "Ask Not What Squeak Can Do For You, But What You Can Do For Squeak" talk. This list was in fact initiated at this time. Many to he consider having an outstanding head of the meritocracy a critical success factor. In such discussions Dan has been promoted as SqF's Linus <grin>. Dan agreed he would consider this role.
And this is still true. I don't think I'm the best person for the long term but, to the extent that I can provide continuity, and maybe some credibility, I'd be happy to do this to get things going.
- Unfortunately soon after that the Squeak team (SqC) left from Disney
looking for a new organizational setting in which they could continue with their important research. During that time Dan initiated in the important work on Modules while concurrently working on the next release of Squeak etc. There are only so many things Dan et al can do, and we all want him doing those not wasting his valuable time on administriva.
In truth the problem wasn't one of inadequate cycles on my part for, if it had been, I would have called for help. The real problem for me was one of organizational uncertainty. Without knowing who would be SqC's next patron, I had no foundation to plan my role and set of commitments for Squeak the Vehicle. At least that is how it affected me. If I had stepped back at that time I probably could have taken this all into account and still supported forward motion in the formation of SqF.
- In August in response to the availability of some very talented
Smalltalk resources due to the economy I approached AITO, which is the non-profit company that runs ECOOP with a request to host an account for SqF contributions. AITO held a special vote and very quickly approved agreed to host the account and to dispense the funds on the basis of recommendations of a committee consisting of a Dan, Stephan (representing ESUG) and some AITO board members (where there are many Squeak supporters including myself). Dan and I talked briefly at OOPSLA 2001 in October and apologized for not getting back to me to confirm his participation.
My position, and that of SqC, about this is one of total support. I never meant to inhibit things through lack of a more active response.
Summary
Neither an SqF mailing list, nor an SqF bank account will make a foundation. SqF needs people who have skills, time, $ to contribute as well as leadership which shares the values of Squeak and has the respect, trust of the Squeak community. One needs to start with great dreams but modest expectations and build on success. It won't become Red Hat, Apache... nor Squeak Park <grin> a research center employing 50+ Squeakers over night and many would argue that either achievement would be a failure in another dimension. If SqF were only able to support students and sabbaticals for professional developers it would still be an important contribution.
Further the essence of a successful non-profit foundation is that people contribute to the cause and have no specific expectations. While the analog to Apache is useful, SqF needs to provide sufficient flexibility to "let the flowers" bloom. For those concerned with building on Squeak as an industrial platform it makes perfect sense to have a project AlwaysBehindReliableStableSqueak <grin> and for those building on Squeak as a laboratory or playground for ideas it makes sense to have a project AlwaysAheadUnstableSqueak <grin> with all shades in between including Squeak x.y for SqF.
I agree with all of this, as does all of SqC.
End of Year Special Offer (Stephane you got to me <grin>)
Many people ask me how is SqF going, assuming that since I talked about it a couple of talks that I'm the driver. I'm NOT; I'm just a cheerleader and an grateful Smalltalker who has offered to help make the admisistriva happen iff Squeakers want SqF. So in order to bring closure on my effort I make the following offer. Good for 30 days, no refunds etc. Iff I receive sufficient personal requests from a representative population of Squeak contributors, and offers of assistance I will consider this a mandate to incorporate non profit SqF, organize an interim board etc. After which I will resign to download the fruits of there labor <grin>.
Best Wishes For the Holiday Season and 2002 Dave
Dave, this is a wonderfully generous offer, and also a perfect complement to the current skill set available in SqC and the nascent SqF.
Here is what I will do in the short term to add momentum:
1. Today after some time with the kids, I'll send out a simple message to the big list to let them know that things are heating up on this front, in case any others want to subscribe to this list.
2. In the next day or two, I'll digest some of the messages from last May about charters for SqC and SqF, and produce a new draft of how energy might flow into various projects, based on these charters.
3. I'll check with Dave off-line about what he needs or wants most to see as this effort gets underway. Presumably in addition to a charter, we need to establish a set of roles and interim assignments to get a heartbeat going.
As I said in one of my messages back in May, I'm sure we can converge on a rigorous definition of SqF over time, but I also think we can come pretty close with an informal shot at it in the short term. Dave has cleverly mandated this by the term of his offer ;-).
- Dan