[csw-maintainers] Shared library placement proposal

[Jonathan Craig]

On Wed, Feb 16, 2011 at 12:33 PM, Philip Brown <phil at bolthole.com> wrote:
> On Wed, Feb 16, 2011 at 7:40 AM, Peter FELECAN <pfelecan at opencsw.org> wrote:
>> Jonathan Craig <jcraig at opencsw.org> writes:
>>
>>> [...] I personally don't look at policies as being written in stone
>>> and therefore require exhaustive research to fully specify them the
>>> first time.  Policy simply directs our actions in achieving a given
>>> outcome.[...]
>>
>> Agreeing on this would shorten the length of our discussion and keep its
>> focus.
>
>
> Nice theory. Unfortunately, in practice, what this usually results in,
> is a maintainer submitting a package,
> which then bumps up against an ambiguity in the policy, and then they
> start screaming, "There's no policy against that, let my package
> through NOW!!!! Stop wasting my time discussing this!!"
>
> So, if people were more polite and patient, this would be a decent way
> to go. But given how people actually act, better to get the discussion
> fully done now.
>
> I have another email coming up, addressing a question than Jonathan
> had, in a minute.

Nice theory.  Unfortunately, in practice, what this usually results
in, is no policies get written at all. I'm not arguing that policy
doesn't need careful consideration, just that it has to be tinged with
a sense of timeliness.  Nobody can game out all of the possible
scenario's surrounding a policy, so the policy needs flexibility.
This is achieved by leaving policy at the upper layer of
architecture/design and/or by allowing the policy to be shaped through
experience as the policies of governments are shaped by courts.   One
must capture the spirit of the law so that one can can flex the letter
of the law to see that the spirit is upheld.  If policies become to
cumbersome, and then are administered by strict constructionist, then
they are doomed to failure over time.

Maintainers become impatient when policies are poorly crafted and have
an arbitrary feeling.  If they understand the intent then they can
apply their skills and art to achieving the intent and in the process
further our craft.

So it was written in the "Philosophy of Policy" by Jon Craig ;)