I don't want to start a flame but so will end. Anyway...

>From some weeks to date I have been wondering what is the point of so
many little and not so little random fixes going to trunk (not
minimizing the effort or quality of them, that they indeed have).
I have entered the Squeak page and nowhere could I find a single
sentence about the goals that motivated so may changes.

Are they trying to fix Monticello (fix what)?
Are they trying to fix input (unicode, japanese, russian, what?)?
Are they trying to fix collections (were they broken?)?
Are they trying to get some social results by experimenting with the
number of automated mails about said fixes and reactions of people?

This are some of the headers of the 524 (in my inbox) mails sent
automatically for each single commit to the squeak trunk.

[squeak-dev] The Trunk: Tools-bf.106.mcz [aug 20, 2009]
[squeak-dev] The Trunk: MonticelloConfigurations-edc.60.mcz [aug 21,
2009]
[squeak-dev] The Trunk: MonticelloConfigurations-ar.61.mcz [aug 21,
2009]
...
[squeak-dev] The Trunk: Monticello-ul.331.mcz [oct 05, 2009]

Some could say that they show that are a lot of work (because are a lot
of commits) but you could also say that they are part of just two or
three single goals (e.g Fixing monticello and fixing collections)
although with each single goal implemented as 200 commits, all part of
the same overall change. That way it doesn't look as much work being
done.

I tried to look in the squeak page for a list of goals or milestones
that the individual commits are trying to fix and couldn't find any. So
I can't get the overall picture. The squeak list is full of commits
mails that for a new user say nothing. On the other side, the page is
the same old outdated page with no hints about where the squeak is going
on.

What is a new user to learn about this? Or to expect about squeak in a
give timeframe?

Then is the issue of the blog vs. list discussions. Igor, has posted a
terms of reference request for discussion in the blog, not in the list.
This touch a point that Keith put in the table four or five months ago
and nobody wanted to discuss in the moment? Has something changed now
that the topic is worth discussing? The meat of the discussion is the
role of the board. And that is something that I can't understand because
four months ago the de facto solution was to give the board time to
organize and later, they promised, they will show the road to follow.
But I don't see that today. Today we are in the same point that before,
without established responsibilities/limits and without a published road
for squeak. Too bad.

The squeak oversigth blog list the agendas for each meeting:

11/18/2009
Free server hosting options
Terms of Reference
Packaging/Distribution of Contributed Packages with Release
SFC/Relicensing
Promotion and Visibility of Squeak
Development Progress
Squeak Swiki Improvement
Comment with any suggestions.

11/4/2009
Terms of Reference
Free Server Hosting Options
SFC/Relicensing
Promotion and Visibility of Squeak
Development Progress
Squeak Swiki Improvement

10/21/2009
Should we be paying attention to something?  Let us know…
Community Server/Services Hosting
SFC/Relicensing
Promotion and Visibility of Squeak
Development Progress
The technical responsibilities of the Board
Squeak Swiki Improvement

10/7/2009
SFC/Relicensing
Promotion and Visibility of Squeak – OOPSLA, ECOOP?
Internal Processes
Development Progress
The technical responsibilities of the Board
Squeak Swiki Improvement

9/16/2009
SFC/Relicensing
Promotion and Visibility of Squeak
Internal Processes
Development Progress
The technical responsibilities of the Board
Squeak Swiki Improvement

9/2/2009
Internal Processes
Development Progress
Relicensing Progress
The technical responsibilities of the Board
Squeak Swiki Improvement

8/19/2009
Suggestions are appreciated.
Development Progress
Relicensing Progress
The technical responsibilities of the Board

8/5/2009
Development Progress
Relicensing Progress
The technical responsibilities of the Board
Squeak Swiki upgrade/replacement

7/15/2009
Development Model Progress
Relicensing Release Progress

7/1/2009
3.11 Status
4.0/Relicensing Status
Squeak Swiki update or replacement
Teams

5/7/2009
Project Updates
Licensing Status
Mission Statement
Teams Updates
Process improvements

4/17/2009
Project Updates
Seconds (aka backups)
Licensing Release
Mission Statement
Teams
Positioning towards other communities
Process improvements (BPPs, decision making etc)

And so and so...

Do you see the trend?
Discussions and discussions from at least april 2009 and nothing that a
external unknowing user could say about the future of squeak.

Summary, squeak has no direction and we are not better now than 6 months
ago.

So finally, the question?

Where is Squeak going?

As said, I don't want a flame but it is really disappointing to see this
community getting lost in the color of the bikeshed.

http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/misc.html#BIKESHED-PAINTING

Board, do one thing: Make decisions not discussions.

Put a list of goals move the boat that way. 

Cheers

-- 
Miguel Cobá
http://miguel.leugim.com.mx