On Thu, 19 Jan 2006, Rahul Sundaram wrote: > Hi > > > > > Hi Rahul, I just browsed through some fedora-devel-list posts from > > this month, so far all I see is two people in a thread: "RFE: Retire > > Fedora Core 4 only _after_ FC6 has been released." who mention that > > they think "legacy" has negative connotation(s). Are there other > > posts I'm missing, or is that what you were referring to? > > > > -Jeff > > After FC6 part is not important here. Whats important is that several > users in the list have expressed their opinion that the term "legacy" > has negative canotations associated with it. I do not feel so. In fact I > think legacy is a perfectly suitable name for what this project stands > for but we can listen to the users here. If we do get more community > contributions and users by doing something as simple as expanding on a > name and lowering the barrier to entry by providing seamless transition > between Fedora Core and Fedora Legacy, lets shoot for it.We need all the > people we can get. If we have to set aside our own preferences and bend > a little to enable this to happen, so be it. I'm going to step into this discussion with a point that some non-USA folks here may not realize. In my midwestern United States dialect, the word "maintenance" generally has connotations that make it rather less than glamorous. When you hear about "building maintenance," that usually means the custodian or janitorial staff for the building or campus. To me, calling our project a "Community Maintenance Project" sort of has the connotation of "software janitor project," or "package housekeeper project," or "security roto-rooter project." Maintenance is also a synonym for "alimony," according to my handy-dandy gnome-dictionary. Nevertheless, those who participate in this project *are* maintainers. "Developer" seems to be a much sexier word, but alas, our work here really isn't software or package development. It's software/security maintenance, custody, or stewardship. Maintenance just doesn't sound sexy or alluring. Nevertheless, there is an area of software engineering called software maintenance, which is an important part of the software lifecycle. The work we do is very important. Although the word "maintenance" does seem to have some negative conno- tations, it's hard for me to come up with a better word that describes our purpose and activities. What could the spin doctors can do here? Could we substitute the word "stewardship" for "maintenance"? In terms of the word "legacy:" In my opinion, it's a fine word, and I don't understand what objections people have to its use. Regards, David -- fedora-legacy-list@xxxxxxxxxx https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-legacy-list
