Re: 11 Questions to answer

[<Jim Gettys hp com>]

> 
> 1) Why are you running for Board of Directors?

I care deeply about the X Window System, and use of it.

Despite the great progress of the last several years, I believe that for 
it and open source software to succeed, Gnome must reach out and work 
with other projects to solve a number of major remaining problems.
Just working within the Gnome community will be insufficient.

> 
> 2) Do you have leadership and committee experience? If so, please explain.

Co-led the early X Window System development with Bob Scheifler.

Editor of the HTTP/1.1 specification for the IETF.

Gnome Board member the last two years.

> 
> 3) How familiar are you with the day-to-day happenings of GNOME?  How much
> do you follow and participate in the main GNOME mailing lists?

Pretty familiar: I certainly track the major lists, and run resonably
up to date versions of Gnome.

As most of my development is in the base window system and handhelds area,
I don't participate all that much in the Gnome development mailing lists.

> 
> 4) One of the primary tasks of the Board of Directors is to act as a
> liaison between the GNOME Foundation and other organizations and companies
> to find out how the two groups can work together to their mutual benefit.
> Do you feel you would be good at understanding other people and companies
> and finding ways that GNOME can collaborate with other companies and
> organizations to benefit both groups and their users?
> 

Yes: I believe this is one of my strengths.

> 5) One of the responsibilities and powers of the Board of Directors is to
> identify organizational weaknesses and needs of GNOME and to create
> committees, appoint coordinators of these committees, and act as liaisons
> with them.  What do you believe are the current weak points of GNOME as an
> organization, and if you were able to, how would you change the GNOME
> organization?

I think that we must work much harder on outreach, documentation and 
localization. We need better focus on these areas, so vital to Gnome's 
success, but often under sung.

> 
> 6) The board meets for one hour every two weeks to discuss a handful of
> issues.  Thus, it is very important that the board can very quickly and
> concisely discuss each topic and come to consensus on each item for
> discussion. Are you good at working with others, who sometimes have very
> differing opinions than you do, to reach consensus and agree on actions?

I think so.

> 
> 7) Often Directors have to draft policies, form committees, find
> weaknesses or approaching problems of GNOME and work on solutions, and act
> as liaison with various groups (both within and outside GNOME) and
> companies.  Please name three or more areas which you feel are important
> for the Board to address over the next year and which you would enjoy
> contributing some of your time to help get things started and possibly act
> as a liaison between the Board and any other committees, groups, or
> companies if relevant.
> 

As Gnome goes mainstream, we need to organize outreach to the general 
ISV developer community: we need to work hard at identifying good lecturers 
and getting an initial set of tutorials prepared.

I'm still working the fonts area; keep fingers crossed...

The system configuration morass is essential to drain: for example,
mime-type configuration right now is a disaster, and much more than
of Gnome's making.  A real solution must address the wider community here;
a Gnome only solution will be insufficient.  There are other simialar,
if not so smelly swamps.

> 8) Do you consider yourself diplomatic?  Would you make a good
> representative for the GNOME Foundation to the Membership, media, public,
> and organizations and corporations the GNOME Foundation works with?

I'm usually reasonably diplomatic, and have had formal press training
several times.

> 
> 9) Will you represent the interests of GNOME and the GNOME Foundation over
> all other personal or corporate interests you may represent?

Certainly over all corporate interests: my family, of course, comes first.
All other personal interests clearly overreaches: and my first allegience
is to the success of the open source desktop overall; gnome is second
to this overall concern, which I believe is larger.

> 
> 10) Will you be willing and have the available time to take on and
> complete various tasks that the Board needs accomplished?

Yes; more so than last year, which was spent in large part recovering
from major surgery (had I realized how major, I would not have run
for election last year at all).

> 
> 11) One of the ingredient for success in an Open Source project such as GNOME
> is committed and dedicated memberships. How would you propose to promote new
> membership, and encourage commitment of existing membership to make the GNOME
> desktop the desktop of choice? [ Hints: the number of Foundation members have
> reduced from 460 in 2001 to approximately 300 in 2002 ]
> 

I think the membership issue was very painful for all concerned.  Gnome,
to succeed, must be an open organization, to all comers.  It is dangerous
for any organization to become a "club", to which membership is restricted.
I hope the recent restatement of membership, along lines I have always
advocated puts this to rest, though I regret having not forseen this issue
coming and to be able to forstall it.  How much of this reduction
is due to this controversy is not clear to me: the economy has reduced
the available time of many.

I also think that an identified "membership" is really the wrong way for
open organizations to function: anyone should be welcome to participate
at any time: we must be inclusive, and not exclusive.  The healthiest
organization situation is typified by the IETF, which has no counted
membership at all (anyone who participates in an IETF mailing list
can be said to be a "member").

What matters is that more and more people get involved in Gnome related
software projects: some of these will become independent projects on
their own and people's allegiances may shift to those projects more than
the Gnome "uberproject": this is ok, in my view.

			- Jim Gettys


--
Jim Gettys
Cambridge Research Laboratory
HP Labs, Hewlett-Packard Company
Jim Gettys hp com