[EPEL] EPEL -- the way forward

[Jeff Spaleta]

On 2/23/07, Karsten Wade <kwade at redhat.com> wrote:
> The purpose of the job description is to make it easier for people who
> maintain packages to get at least some of the work "guaranteed" by their
> employer.  Obviously it is not a guarantee or a contract to support the
> package.  This is where the wording matters.  It is just about extending
> the personal responsibility to the organization.  For example, an
> individual can orphan a package for any reason, and their responsibility
> is just to announce the orphaning.  The same should hold true for an
> organization.


Do you have buy-in or feedback from organizations at the
organizational level on this approach? From manager-like entities who
would be making this commitment on behalf of their organization or
company?

Not to name names or anything..but after FudCon I was on the same
flight back with dgilmore, and we had a little chat about EPEL and the
contributor landscape for it.  It was obvious to both of us that IT
people in smaller organizations would very much be interested
consumers of this material, but it wasn't clear that they would have
organizational support to maintain this material as part of their job.
I think some rather valid observations were made concerning the
possible reluctance of IT people in a corporate setting to be involved
in a maintainership role, exactly because it would appear to be an
additional worktime commitment, not supported by their organizations.

-jef