On 11/15/18 12:08 PM, Theodore Y. Ts'o wrote: > On Thu, Nov 15, 2018 at 04:29:43PM +0000, Joseph Myers wrote: >> On Thu, 15 Nov 2018, Theodore Y. Ts'o wrote: >> >>> That's great. But is it or is it not true (either de jure or de >>> facto) that "a single active glibc developer" can block a system call >>> from being supported by glibc by objecting? And if not, under what is >>> the process by resolving a conflict? >> >> We use a consensus-building process as described at >> <https://sourceware.org/glibc/wiki/Consensus>. > > So can a single glibc developer can block Consensus? Yes. I think the comparison to the "liberum veto" is not a fair comparison to the way the glibc community works :-) (1) Community consensus. Consensus need not imply unanimity. Consensus is only from the set of important and concerned interests. The community gets to decide that you're a troll that does no real work, and can therefore ignore you. Consensus is blocked only by sustained objection (not just normal objections, which are recorded as part of the development process e.g. "I don't like it, but I leave it up to you to decide"). Therefore an involved glibc developer can lodge a sustained objection, and block consensus. (2) The GNU package maintainers for glibc. There are 8 GNU package maintainers for glibc. The package maintainers created the consensus process to empower the community, but they can act as a final review committee to move issues where there are two reasonable but competing view points. As Joseph points out we haven't ever used the GNU pakcage maintainers to vote on a stuck issue, but I will arrange it when the need arises. If you think we're at that point with wrapper functions, just say so, but it doesn't seem like it to me. -- Cheers, Carlos.
