On Thu, May 6, 2021 at 12:26 PM Glen Fernandes via Boost < boost@lists.boost.org> wrote:

Rene wrote:

...

It's now been at least a year since Boost switched from the Software Freedom Conservancy to the Boost Foundation for its governance organization.

13:14 <glenfe> @grafikrobot The Software Freedom Conservancy never governed the Boost C++ Libraries, nor did the Boost Steering committee, nor does the Boost Foundation. Only the Boost community does that. 13:15 <grafikrobot> Hopefully you'll clarify that on the dev list.

i.e. The "Boost Steering Committee"[1] became "Boost Foundation"[2].

[1] https://sites.google.com/a/boost.org/steering/home [2] https://sites.google.com/a/boost.org/steering/boost-foundation

It still deals with the C++Now conference, providing the mailing lists, hosting, etc. But any decision making and governance of the Boost libraries is still the domain of the Boost community (i.e. you, me, and the other Boost library authors and maintainers).

How does that reconcile with the statement of purpose on the web site: * The role of the Board is to be able to commit the organization to specific action either where funds are required or where consensus cannot be reached, but a decision must be made. * That, at minimum, implies some form of control and hence governance. -- -- René Ferdinand Rivera Morell -- Don't Assume Anything -- No Supone Nada -- Robot Dreams - http://robot-dreams.net

On Thu, 6 May 2021 at 19:26, Glen Fernandes via Boost wrote:

The Software Freedom Conservancy never governed the Boost C++ Libraries, nor did the Boost Steering committee, nor does the Boost Foundation. Only the Boost community does that.

[...] any decision making and governance of the Boost libraries is still the domain of the Boost community (i.e. you, me, and the other Boost library authors and maintainers).

I learned about this from the political discourse here around the advent of the CMake for Boost and I've never since clarified it (to myself) how it's supposed to work. If I want to contribute to a FOSS project, then I head to its repository and learn the way from the README.md, CONTRIBUTING.md and documentation (in that order usually). If I want to submit a Boost-wide proposal, e.g.. pay for CI, I have no idea what is the path I am supposed to walk. Let's suppose, hypothetically, there was a mechanism that: 1. captures the current state of the project and the community affairs without excessive intrusion or any stir-up, hopefully. 2. is simple to implement and document 3. is effective for collective decision making Let's suppose, hypothetically, the capturing part means labelling to distinguish already existing roles: - Boost Community Participant - an every named or anonymous individual who participates in activities of the Boost project. - Boost Community Member - every fully named non-anonymous individual who participates in activities of the Boost project. - Boost Charter Member - every fully named individual who is either an original author or currently active maintainer of a Boost library. Such person is automatically considered a core contributor to the Boost project and is entitled to vote for motions put forward to the Boost project. Then, the implementation could be described quite clearly: - We do not have a hierarchical structure. - Every strategic decisions regarding the Boost project, decisions that cannot be decided by consensus, decisions that might be controversial are brought to a vote. - Only named Members or Charter Members can put motions forward to the Boost organization for voting. - Only Charter Members can vote for proposals acting as individuals according to their individual point-of-view, wearing their personal hat for the best interest of the Boost. - The Voting Wizard is an admin role to coordinate the voting, namely, 1) validates the proposal; 2) puts it for two weeks review period; 3) announces start/end of voting; 4) counts total of votes and validates votes against the latest list of names in `authors` and `maintainers` fields of `meta/libraries.json`. Statistically, 100% participation rate means total of votes == total of names in meta/libraries.json. Then, I think, the collective decision making in Boost might become clear for everyone, regardless of their seniority and experience within the community, almost a no-brainer ;) Best regards, -- Mateusz Loskot, http://mateusz.loskot.net