Re: [nbdt] Re: [nbboard] Re: NetBeans Governance [was: [n b d t] Conversations during JFokus]

On Wed, 2011-02-23 at 09:01 -0600, Tom Wheeler wrote:
> There is a widely-held perception that NetBeans is "Oracle's project"
> whereas I view it as a community project in which Oracle is the
> biggest participant.

I think this is demonstrated by the greatly increased community
participation we've seen recently: the two biggest ones that come to
mind are the evaluation of test suites by the NetCAT tribes and the
adoption of NetBeans' Ruby support as a community project.

> Although low-level technical discussions have generally continued to
> take place in the open, the longer-term "vision" decisions about
> NetBeans direction and marketing haven't involved the community at
> all.

It's true that many new features in NetBeans come as a surprise (as Lady
Bracknell famously said, "pleasant or unpleasant, as the case may be").
Of course, this was true under Sun's leadership as well. It seems
sensible that those contributing to NetBeans in one way or another
should have some input into its direction. I think Oracle would find
that in such a case, community contributions to NetBeans would increase.

-- 
____________________________________________________________
Glenn Holmer                          [email protected]
Software Engineer                        phone: 414-908-1809
Weyco Group, Inc.                          fax: 414-908-1601