A few initial notions (following several of the points Tim made earlier) which I hope others will add to, refine, step on, etc :
The SqueakFoundation should be a single, easily found, responsive, reliable, up-to-date point of contact and information for most things Squeak; should act as an organizing entity to sift out the best of the Squeak world and present it in a well-structured, easily accessed and understood form; and should create content as necessary to achieve this.
This means creating/compiling/maintaining: - a reliable, regularly updated, organized web presence; - clear detailed info for getting started with Squeak; - an organized repository of sources and premade Squeak distributions for most platforms; - a good updated FAQ database (searchable would be nice) with info for newbies and not so newbies; - task oriented how-to-do info; - a *complete* searchable archive of the Squeak mailing list from its beginning; - host the Squeak mailing list and actually maintain it (no more running on inertia like it's done for so long - not meaning to be ungrateful, but the list needs and deserves better);
I realize there can be much more to SqF, and there is much more to add, but there also needs to be a place to begin.
-- Dwight
Nice formulation, Dwight. I put it on the Swiki; I also outlined the steps of the "Chaordic Design Process" (Create Your Own Chaordic Organization In Six Hard Steps ;-)) on the Swiki's front page.
I do think this part of the CDP has its merits: concentrate on your goals first, and only when everyone agrees check what the possible means are. From Dwight's formulation (which I think is a great first definition) it is already clear that the SqF will be broader than pampering Stable Squeak...
I'll have to look a little deeper into the chaordic process -- the precepts look good, I'm just not sure how one goes about properly applying all of them in practice yet.
I definitely think SqF's domain should be much broader than just being the support site for Stable Squeak. The primary contribution of SqF to the world of Squeak should be "professionalism" - applying, creating, contributing, and striving for the best professional standards in all aspects. Stable Squeak will certainly be a major part of this (and will be SqF's "baby" most likely), but so should support of the "dream" - the SqC bleeding edge Squeak. Of course, it will be very important to feed the improvements in Stable Squeak back into SqC Squeak and vice versa, and to do what we can to make this possible. A hard fork is in nobody's best interest, and Stable Squeak must not be allowed turn into Stagnant Squeak.
I don't see SqF competing with http://www.squeakland.org/ at all -- I see this as an entirely different domain from where SqF should be (not what they are trying to do so much as the audience being addressed).
-- Dwight
At 03:42 AM 04/25/2001, Cees de Groot wrote:
Nice formulation, Dwight. I put it on the Swiki; I also outlined the steps of the "Chaordic Design Process" (Create Your Own Chaordic Organization In Six Hard Steps ;-)) on the Swiki's front page.
I do think this part of the CDP has its merits: concentrate on your goals first, and only when everyone agrees check what the possible means are. From Dwight's formulation (which I think is a great first definition) it is already clear that the SqF will be broader than pampering Stable Squeak...
Hi Guys,
While talking about chaordic process, you might also want to look at Charles Savage's "Fifth Generation Management, Co-creating through Virtual Enterprising, Dynamic Teaming and Knowledge Networking" and Peter Senge's (old) "The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of The Learning Organization "
We can use Squeak News site as well, at least as a mirror.
We can also have a column there that discusses issues related to theSqF.
Is there anything else done towards SqF so far? Or is this the only activity about it?
Cheers
Tansel
Dwight Hughes wrote:
I'll have to look a little deeper into the chaordic process -- the precepts look good, I'm just not sure how one goes about properly applying all of them in practice yet.
I definitely think SqF's domain should be much broader than just being the support site for Stable Squeak. The primary contribution of SqF to the world of Squeak should be "professionalism" - applying, creating, contributing, and striving for the best professional standards in all aspects. Stable Squeak will certainly be a major part of this (and will be SqF's "baby" most likely), but so should support of the "dream" - the SqC bleeding edge Squeak. Of course, it will be very important to feed the improvements in Stable Squeak back into SqC Squeak and vice versa, and to do what we can to make this possible. A hard fork is in nobody's best interest, and Stable Squeak must not be allowed turn into Stagnant Squeak.
I don't see SqF competing with http://www.squeakland.org/ at all -- I see this as an entirely different domain from where SqF should be (not what they are trying to do so much as the audience being addressed).
-- Dwight
At 03:42 AM 04/25/2001, Cees de Groot wrote:
Nice formulation, Dwight. I put it on the Swiki; I also outlined the steps of the "Chaordic Design Process" (Create Your Own Chaordic Organization In Six Hard Steps ;-)) on the Swiki's front page.
I do think this part of the CDP has its merits: concentrate on your goals first, and only when everyone agrees check what the possible means are. From Dwight's formulation (which I think is a great first definition) it is already clear that the SqF will be broader than pampering Stable Squeak...
Squeakfoundation mailing list Squeakfoundation@lists.cdegroot.com http://lists.cdegroot.com/listinfo/squeakfoundation
Cees de Groot wrote:
Nice formulation, Dwight. I put it on the Swiki; I also outlined the steps of the "Chaordic Design Process" (Create Your Own Chaordic Organization In Six Hard Steps ;-)) on the Swiki's front page.
(Cees, would it be possible to add a link to the Swiki from your SqueakFoundation list info page? I've already lost track of which Wiki it's on, and I'm too lazy to search for it at the moment. :) )
I also like Dwight's initial list of items. One other possible function for the foundation was mentioned on the Squeak list... it could coordinate screening and testing bugfix and enhancement submissions on the Squeak list, and forward the recommended changes to Squeak Central for possible inclusion in the base image. (And maybe do the same for Stable Squeak. Further down the road, it could possibly try to get a more formal fix/enhancement submission process in place, too.)
This function has been performed by various volunteers (Stefan Matthias Aust and others), but it has been difficult to find someone to do it on a consistent basis, since it is a fair amount of work. It might not be as important to implement right away as some of the other items on Dwight's list, though.
Just some extra thoughts,
- Doug Way dway@riskmetrics.com
"Dwight" == Dwight Hughes dwighth@ipa.net writes:
Dwight> The SqueakFoundation should be a single, easily found, responsive, Dwight> reliable, up-to-date point of contact and information for most things Dwight> Squeak; should act as an organizing entity to sift out the best of the Dwight> Squeak world and present it in a well-structured, easily accessed and Dwight> understood form; and should create content as necessary to achieve Dwight> this.
I didn't get any feedback from the Sq list about having SqF be funded as a committee under Yet Another Society (YetAnother.org), already established as a 501-3-c with a compatible charter, and with a board that has already expressed enthusiasm about having SqF participate.
So, can I get some feedback here?
Well, it's just my personal not-particularly-well-informed opinion, but that sounds like a really good idea for a way to kick-start the process.
"Randal L. Schwartz" wrote:
"Dwight" == Dwight Hughes dwighth@ipa.net writes:
Dwight> The SqueakFoundation should be a single, easily found, responsive, Dwight> reliable, up-to-date point of contact and information for most things Dwight> Squeak; should act as an organizing entity to sift out the best of the Dwight> Squeak world and present it in a well-structured, easily accessed and Dwight> understood form; and should create content as necessary to achieve Dwight> this.
I didn't get any feedback from the Sq list about having SqF be funded as a committee under Yet Another Society (YetAnother.org), already established as a 501-3-c with a compatible charter, and with a board that has already expressed enthusiasm about having SqF participate.
So, can I get some feedback here?
-- Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095 merlyn@stonehenge.com URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/ Perl/Unix/security consulting, Technical writing, Comedy, etc. etc. See PerlTraining.Stonehenge.com for onsite and open-enrollment Perl training!
Squeakfoundation mailing list Squeakfoundation@lists.cdegroot.com http://lists.cdegroot.com/listinfo/squeakfoundation
I have basically zero experience in the actual legal and financial creation of a foundation, so I'll differ to others on the business side of things.
However, some general concerns: I strongly agree with Dave about the prime importance of SqF as a community first and as an institution second. There is a need to figure out what SqF's goals and purpose are first, and then consider what needs to be done to accomplish all this, and when.
SqF also needs visibility and its own distinctive identity to draw interest and attention -- will that be well served with SqF as a committee under YAS? (I mean that as a question, not a challenge.)
-- Dwight
At 06:27 AM 04/25/2001 -0700, Randal L. Schwartz wrote:
I didn't get any feedback from the Sq list about having SqF be funded as a committee under Yet Another Society (YetAnother.org), already established as a 501-3-c with a compatible charter, and with a board that has already expressed enthusiasm about having SqF participate.
So, can I get some feedback here?
"Dwight" == Dwight Hughes dwighth@ipa.net writes:
Dwight> SqF also needs visibility and its own distinctive identity to draw Dwight> interest and attention -- will that be well served with SqF as a Dwight> committee under YAS? (I mean that as a question, not a challenge.)
I believe so. SqF would function as its own commitee, with whatever web presence was wanted. On the page with "donations", it'd say "SqF is a standing committee of Yet Another Society... you can make targeted tax-deductible donations to YAS to benefit SqF".
Other than that, I can assure you that YAS would stay hands-off, except for ensuring compliance with YAS's charter for tax purposes.
merlyn@stonehenge.com said:
I didn't get any feedback from the Sq list about having SqF be funded as a committee under Yet Another Society (YetAnother.org), already established as a 501-3-c with a compatible charter, and with a board that has already expressed enthusiasm about having SqF participate.
That's because I'm a chaordic convert - I'd like to focus on goals first. It's a suggestion, and I think a useful suggestion, but I've probably lived too long in Germany: I like to take things in order :-).
Cees makes a great point and he obviously speaks from experience. (And thanks for setting up this list).
Defining a purpose, and then outlining some agreed on principles (along the lines of the Chaordic http://www.chaordic.org process) makes a lot of sense to me rather than trying to raise funds (for what?) or struggling to find or build a legal place to put them.
I haven't been involved in forming a Chaordic organization but I have read Dee Hock's book and think the ideas make a lot of sense. In particular, I think these are good principles for almost any organization: http://www.chaordic.org/what_princ.html
If we get to that point where we need funds handled or raised, there are several non-profits that could host such efforts (Yet Another Society is one and looks like a good choice from the web site), and there are also other non-profit incubators that can take charitable projects under their wings (Tides http://www.tides.org/ is one I have thought of using for other reasons and contacted in the past). A stumbling block with Tides was they wanted to own the copyright of everything (they pretty much have to for reasons of maintaining non-profit status), or pass it onto another non-profit forming from the effort. That's OK with me -- but it assumes they can be trusted to understand copyright issues (say with writing licenses, where they either might not accept giving away code or alternatively putting Squeak-like restrictions).
And, as Michael Phillips says in the book "The Seven Laws of Money", what any effort needs is "supporters". With enough supporters, money for what needs to be done is never a significant stumbling block.
A word on money -- when I proposed my doing a Business Squeak/Pro over a year ago on the list if I could raise the money to support me, I got within a couple of days several pledges totaling about $2000. I decided not to proceed with taking people up on their offers, in part because I was concerned about the impact on the community if I was paid to do Squeak stuff and others were not. That could be demotivating to some people out there otherwise happily Squeaking away and contributing in their spare time because it might be felt unfair. Obviously, there are people who are paid to do Squeak as part of their job at a non-Squeak company, but I'm talking about specific community funded work.
That said, if we do raise money in the future, we may want it for non-programming things like conferences, events, licensing something cool to add to the system, or paying someone to do the less interesting (to programmers) legal/secraterial work of making sure every Squeak related contribution in any main distribution is nice-and-tidy legal with a "wet" signature like FSF does. That is something that would make Squeak more acceptable for business use because it would prove "due diligence". But I see those activities as in the future, after there are supporters of a Squeak Foundation purpose.
I will start another thread called "Chaordic Purpose" in which I will post a few purposes of other chaordic organizations as examples. Maybe we can focus that thread on purpose and if people want to talk about funding (or specific projects) it can continue in this thread or another.
-Paul Fernhout Kurtz-Fernhout Software ========================================================= Developers of custom software and educational simulations Creators of the Garden with Insight(TM) garden simulator http://www.kurtz-fernhout.com
Cees de Groot wrote:
merlyn@stonehenge.com said:
I didn't get any feedback from the Sq list about having SqF be funded as a committee under Yet Another Society (YetAnother.org), already established as a 501-3-c with a compatible charter, and with a board that has already expressed enthusiasm about having SqF participate.
That's because I'm a chaordic convert - I'd like to focus on goals first. It's a suggestion, and I think a useful suggestion, but I've probably lived too long in Germany: I like to take things in order :-).
-- Cees de Groot http://www.cdegroot.com cg@cdegroot.com GnuPG 1024D/E0989E8B 0016 F679 F38D 5946 4ECD 1986 F303 937F E098 9E8B
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